The National Park Service: Responding to the September 11th Terrorist Attacks
McDonnell JA. 2004. The National Park Service: Responding to the September 11th Terrorist Attacks
On the morning of September 11, 2001, a group of foreign terrorists launched an unprecedented, well-coordinated attack on the United States using as their weapons four California-bound commercial airliners, each loaded with the maximum amount of jet fuel for its long trip across the country. The first two hijacked planes slammed into the two tallest towers of the World Trade Center in New York City. These stunning 110-story glass-and-steel towers, which soared above the skyline in Lower Manhattan, had served as a major American business and commercial center. The third plane struck the Pentagon, and a fourth crashed in a field eighty miles southeast of Pittsburgh. At 8:45 a.m. (EST) American Airlines Flight 11 carrying ninety-two people from Boston to Los Angeles crashed into the North Tower of the World Trade Center. Twenty minutes later, United Airlines Flight 175 with sixty-five passengers and crew also heading toward California ripped through the South Tower. At 9:40 a.m. (EST) American Airlines Flight 77, a Boeing 757 commercial airliner carrying sixty-four people and 30,000 pounds of fuel for its long flight from Dulles to Los Angeles, smashed into the west façade of the Pentagon with such force that it penetrated four of the building’s five interior rings. The Federal Aviation Administration promptly banned takeoffs nationwide and ordered all flights that were in the air to land at the nearest airport. Then came the alarming news that United Airlines Flight 93 with forty passengers and crew en route to San Francisco had crashed in Shanksville, Pennsylvania. Not long after, reports circulated that this plane had been headed toward Washington, D.C., and heroic passengers had intervened to thwart this plan. Back in New York, shortly before 10:00 a.m. (EST) the South Tower of the World Trade Center crumbled to the ground killing most of those trapped inside and blanketing Lower Manhattan with a thick coat of debris and dust. Approximately a half hour later, the North Tower tumbled down as well. None of the passengers and crews on the planes survived. Thousands of people were injured or killed at the World Trade Center and Pentagon.
- Type
- Published Report
- Authors
- McDonnell, Janet
- Date of Issue
- 2004
- Units
- HIST
- Keywords
- 9/11, 911, ehistory, History, National Park Service, NPS, September 11, Terrorist, United States