Regional Office

Air Traffic Division, immediately upon receipt of notification that the WTC had been hit,
worked with others in the regional office to establish an emergency command post on the
5th floor. Personnel from all branches were quickly assigned for duty in the command
post; a system of runners was also set up to ensure messages were relayed to and from the
4th floor. Resource Management Branch, AEA-540, started release of nonessential
personnel at 9:05 am, and notified the regional points of contact for the National Air
Traffic Controllers Association (NATCA) and the National Association of Air Traffic
Specialists (NAATS). The Division received timely updates via phone calls or pages
from field facility managers and/or union representatives. Critical information, such as
the report from Washington Tower that a B757 had hit the Pentagon, was immediately
relayed to the command post. Air Traffic personnel and senior management have been
available in the regional office 24 hours per day since the WTC events of last week.

Washington National Tower

When the personnel at DCA heard about the World Trade Center attacks, we cleared
DCA airspace of all VFR traffic. Later, When IAD called about the unknown primary
target, (AAL 77) our Supervisor (OS Vic Padgett) got on the secret service hot line to
pass information and also stopped all of our departures. One of our controllers (Dan
Creedon) tagged the primary target to make it easier to track. When we saw the fireball
from the crash of AAL77 into the pentagon, we (CPC Dave Walsh) activated the airport
crash and rescue phone to alert the airport crash and rescue personnel of the crash. CPC
Steve Collison turned Gofer 06, C130, to follow unknown aircraft to see where it was
going.

New York ARTCC

On September 11, 2001, between 1239 UTC and 1305 UTC the following actions were
taken by New York ARTCC to try and mitigate the many incidents occurring at this time.
New York ARTCC sector 42 (CPC Dave Bodtiglia) initiated a track on primary target
believed to be AAL11 heading southbound. ZNY STMC (Marty Rosenburg) asks ZNY
MLS (Bob Felser) to get military assistance. ZNY ATM (Michael J. McCormick) called
N90 OMIC to warn them to look for primary target in vicinity of Hudson River
southbound toward Manhattan. ZNY ATM asks Area B OSIC (OS Paul Thumser) & CIC
(Evana Dowis) to coordinate for fighter intercept on hijack aircraft. ZNY MLS contacts
Huntress. Several discussions over a period of 12 minutes occurred, including much
information about type aircraft, aircraft call sign, beacon code and location. UAL 175
asked to recycle transponder by ZNY Sector R42. Sector R42 CPC monitoring both
primary targets for AAL11 and UAL 175 informs CIC continuously of aircraft, positions,
and altitudes when available. ZNY ATM observes target on R42 and R55 display
heading toward NYC. ZNY ATM attempts several phone calls to AEA ATD to warn of
another hijack and probable second attack on WTC. N90 OMIC (Bob Birch) informs
ZNY ATM that EWR ATCT reports an aircraft crashed in the World Trade Center. ZNY
ATM warns N90 that more is going on and that there is more than one hijack. Additional
hijack may be headed toward NYC. ZNY OMIC (Bruce Barrett) directs STMCs (Pete
Mulligan and Marty Rosenburg) to stop all traffic into NYARTCC. ZNY MLS notifies
ZNY ATM that military aircraft are scrambled and requests current location and beacon
code of aircraft. ZNY ATM notifies him that the aircraft appears to have crashed in the
same location. ZNY AATM (Dave Lecates) notified ATM that second aircraft crashed
into WTC with live pictures on CNN. ZNY ATM directs OMIC to declare ATC 0. All
international oceanic traffic within ZNY was told to divert to alternate destinations. A
lock down of New York ARTCC was accomplished.

New York TRACON

STMC Ron Regan and OMIC Bob Birch cleared all Air Traffic out of the New York area
as soon as he became aware of a hijacking with serious implications.

Washington ARTCC

Washington ARTCC ATM (Luis Ramirez) ordered a stop of all departures in the
Washington Area approximately nine minutes before any direction. CPC Richard
Wallace overhead the Telcon discussion about AAL 77 while walking buy the watch
desk regarding AAL 77 and indicated he worked the aircraft and went back to find all
data related to AAL 77. The facility went into a total lockdown and FMA, NATCA,
ZNY-1, and ZNY-2 brought all meals for the personnel remaining on duty. Each area
was directed to set up and look for primary targets within there airspace, and NATCA
and FAA worked as a team throughout this event in accomplishing all necessary tasks in
providing the best possible service to the military and civilian aircraft.

Dulles Tower

During this time of crisis, the Dulles ATCT Team had many instances of exemplary
performance. Within the Dulles Team there were also several star performers, whose
dedication, instincts and professionalism gave our Team the winning edge.

Danielle O'Brien - The certified professional controller at Dulles ATCT who noticed the
primary target later identified as hijacked aircraft AAL77. She immediately brought this
unknown target to the attention of the supervisor and the entire work force in the Dulles
TRACON.

John Hendershot - The supervisor at Dulles ATCT who immediately realized the
importance of the unknown target and contacted the White House Joint Operations
Center and Washington National ATCT to inform them of the danger.
Mark Masaitis - The traffic management coordinator at Dulles ATCT, whose
determination and commanding presence spearheaded the Hub wide evacuation of
airspace. Dulles ATCT was able to vacate its assigned airspace, including Reagan
National traffic, within forty-five minutes of the nationwide ground stop.

Operations Supervisor TerryLee Brown, and Controllers Carl Graves, Robert Utley,
Terrence Walsh, Joseph Mantello, Steven Martin and Thomas remained behind to
evacuate Dulles airspace and continued to provide services to the military and defense
forces, even with the threat of another hijacked aircraft inbound to the Washington DC
area.

The Dulles Team evacuated Dulles' airspace including Reagan National traffic, within
forty-five minutes of the nationwide ground stop and has since returned to 90% of the
traffic volume (prior to 9/11/01), while being impacted by two Temporary Flight
Restrictions in the Washington DC area.

Manassas Tower worked law enforcement operations out of their airport and handed
them off to the Dulles Team throughout the crisis, and Charleston Tower controllers such
as, Sherry Marshall, James Cox, Greg Bailey, Paul Johns, Ben Trainer, Grant Rhodes,
Richard Gehringer and Barbara Bailey (secretary) worked lifeguard operations C-130
squadron stationed at the airport. These are some of the same controllers that worked the
evacuation of the airspace.