Trials of September 9-11-01

The Trials of September

by Alan Perry

September 11, 2013

September 11, 2001:

I was only four years into my career as an EMS provider on September 11, 2001. I received my Paramedic certification the year before and had joined a State EMS task force in preparation for some natural disaster. My EMS affiliation was with a volunteer agency, the Kempsville Rescue Squad in Virginia Beach, so I was working my day job running my auto repair shop. We normally listen to the morning news on the radio so we heard the first reports filtering in on the news wires, we quickly found it on the TV as the major news networks chimed in. I knew what would come next, I told my daughter I would have to leave, went home a started packing for a deployment. I had barely started when I got the call from the task force wanting to know if I was available, I let them know I was already gearing up and would be there well ahead of the planned noon departure. About that time the first tower collapsed. A chill ran through me, what a cold and calculated attack this was, clearly whoever planned it knew exactly how to bring these buildings down, civilians! Husbands, wives, children, all snuffed out to make what point? It was sickening, but nothing I could do except help pick up the pieces. VAOEMS task force 2 was deployed first to the VAOEMS headquarters in Richmond, then ultimately to Fredericksburg to backfill for their crews who were working the Pentagon site in Alexandria. We didn’t really do much, but we had to do something. What I recall most vividly is how quiet it got everywhere, when I stepped out of my shop in a busy industrial park to go pack my gear what I noticed first was the silence. It was as if the whole world was taking a giant gasp of disbelief. The second thing I noticed was how vacant the skies were, every single flight had been grounded, there was nothing flying in the air. It all seemed so surreal, nothing like this had happened for several generations, not since Pearl Harbor, how many had we lost today? This is all history, but let us not forget those we lost, and the spirit that makes this country so great, our ability to come together as a family and stand up for what is right, help each other, and continue to build and rebuild.

God Bless America.