Every September 11 my memory is jogged by something that happened to me at Detroit Metro Airport on 09Sep01. Even though 9/11 is six weeks past, I need to get this off my chest. I’ve never seen anything written about an experience like mine.
When I think of all the news coverage after 9-11 about how dots weren’t connected, I say, “Bull!”
Some people in government knew something was going on and there were extraordinary measures in place to stop it.
On Sunday evening, 09Sep01,I was at the International terminal waiting to board for my flight to Gatwick Airport near London, England. I had taken that same flight 15 or 20 times in the previous 5 years, so it was pretty routine for me…. Until I started down the mobile walkway into the aircraft. There were security men posted at 10 or 15-foot intervals along both walls of the walkway. They were all big guys, wearing blue windbreakers with lettering on their backs. They all had guns on their hips. They were stopping the boarding passengers at random, looking at passports, boarding passes, and asking questions. They stopped me. I was in my late 50’s, blond hair, 5’ 8” and overweight. They asked me where I was born. Try saying “Philadelphia” when you’re scared. I was allowed to board, and didn’t see anybody turned away or taken into custody.
Then 9-11 happened. The extra security began to make sense:
Intercontinental flight – direct from Detroit, MI to London, England.
Full load of fuel (and passengers). About an hour’s flying time to NYC.
We could have one of the planes that crashed into the World Trade Center towers. Or the Pentagon. Or the Capitol. Someone in our government had connected the dots. They just picked the wrong departure point for surveillance. As Tom Ridge used to say, “We (U.S. security people) have to be right 100 percent of the time. The terrorists have to be lucky only once.”
Steve S.
