WEBVTT

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uh , that morning came in was just like

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any other day . We had a bombing

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mission going out , we had air to air

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missions going out , just training

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missions , went up to the production

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meeting and typically that's at 7 45

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came out of the production meeting

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about eight o'clock , we walked into

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the next office and there was a tv on

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of course , we didn't know that

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anything had hit the tower at that time .

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Uh they're showing live footage of the

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first tower burning and we're standing

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there watching and thinking , well like

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the rest of these guys , how could that

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happen ? It's a clear blue date . And

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as we're standing there , We watched

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the 2nd 1 hit the tower and that's when

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I pretty much knew my day was going to

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change uh , as a weapons supervisor .

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Uh , one of the things that I knew was

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we were going to start loading live

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weapons on aircraft . So I went down ,

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I've got all the guys together and this

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is basically the whole maintenance

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group . Uh everybody met , we had a

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meeting about what we needed to do . We

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got orders from ops and how to

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configure the aircraft . We went out

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and we started configuring aircraft

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were taking bombs off , uh

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reconfiguring , taking the bomb racks

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off , putting launchers on and then we

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started loading aircraft . Uh and at

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the same time there was a lot of other

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work going on because we had aircraft

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that were broken the hangar , all the

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shops were involved doing what they

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could to get those aircraft aircraft

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back into FMC status so we can get him

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out on the line and get them loaded .

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Uh of course it was from my perspective

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on the flight line , I didn't know what

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was going on necessarily . You know , I

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heard rumors , people would come up ,

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hey , did you hear this ? Did you hear

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that ? But my , my whole focus and most

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of the guys on the line , their focus

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was we need to get these airplanes

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ready to fly . Uh huh . By the end of

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the day we had all the aircraft that we

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could get serviceable were armed and

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loaded . Uhh and one of the interesting

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things was throughout the day , we had

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guys just showing up from college or

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their jobs . They'd seen what was going

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on in the , on tv and they walked out

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on the flight line in uniform and just

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said , what do you need me to do ? And

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which was great to see because we

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throughout the afternoon we started

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making phone calls to guys to come in

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And because we had to start a 24 hour

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operation with technicians , We just

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don't have enough people to do that 24

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hour shift like that . So we started

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bringing traditional guardsmen in .

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They came in and they did their jobs .

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It was , it was great because everybody

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just wanted to do what they could do

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and obviously this was something we had

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never seen before . No , most of the

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1920 21 year olds . This was pretty

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significant event in their lives as it

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was mine at the time . But you know for

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them this is their first taste of

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anything major that had happened and

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and they were they were excited to be

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there . Obviously they weren't excited

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for what happened , but they just

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wanted to do their jobs and they did it

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and that's you know what the guard is

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we when we when we're called we want to

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do what we can do and and It was just a

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it was a good day . It was about a

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13-hour day for me that day . And as I

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was going home , I just remember as I

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hit the gas station just looking at and

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say you know , I think our world just

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changed and and evidently it has

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because it's I used to like flying

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Before 9 11 now , it's just no fun

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anymore . Yeah . Having to get strip

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searched every time you go through an

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airport just doesn't make it a lot of

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fun . But that's how things changed and

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that's why we're you know what we do ,

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we do what we do and uh huh . So that's

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basically my story