The 'Other' Tragedy
The attack on the Pentagon left heroes, victims, survivors, Here's their story
Firefighter Spector and his two-man crew were among the first responders at the Pentagon. Spector saw flames shooting from the top and armies of people running in an orderly way from the building. The heavy wooden doors to corridor 5 were blown off their hinges. "There's a lady screaming in the E ring," an Army officer cried to Spector. The firefighters combed E ring for about 50 feet until a huge debris pile blocked them. They searched D ring until they hit a wall of fire. At times, they stopped, held their breath and listened, hoping to hear any sign of life. They heard only popping noises and falling ceiling tiles. "We never found a single soul," says Spector. "That will stay with me forever."
Officer Hoopii was more fortunate. He helped people straggling out of the building. One woman's skin was peeling so he hoisted her on his broad shoulders. Another woman was missing her shoes, so he carried her. Her mouth and nose were black, and she was in shock. "You are alive," he reassured her. He wanted to go deeper into the blackness. Someone yelled at him to stop. "We gotta get people," he shouted back. He was going on pure adrenaline. The smoke was suffocating, and he heard the building cracking. But he pressed on to the D ring. That's when he heard the desperate voices.
Wayne Sinclair and five coworkers crawled over the rubble and out of their office, 50 to 75 feet from where the plane hit. The hallway was so black, they lost all sense of direction. Only Hoopii's voice guided them. "Head toward my voice. Head toward my voice," he called. Huddled closely together, they followed it. Hoopii's voice led them out of the building, but Sinclair and the others never saw whom it belonged to. Hoopii was already back helping others.
John Yates was one floor up from Sinclair. Dying in a fire had been Yates's biggest fear. But he didn't let it paralyze him--instead, he started crawling. Someone grabbed his right leg. Yates heard voices at the far end of the room. He moved that way and found some coworkers. "We can't get out this way," they told him. "Yes, we can. Follow me. Just follow me," Yates insisted. They crawled over the debris and ended up in corridor 4. A couple of Navy guys grabbed him under the armpits and walked him to the center courtyard. "I could see the flesh hanging off my hands," Yates says.
Brian Birdwell was lying on the ground in the same corridor, his head on the floor. The smoke was several inches above him. But in those few inches, he could see down the corridor, so he knew which way to head. He stumbled toward A ring. Several Army guys, including a close running buddy, carried him to a triage site. He tasted jet fuel in his mouth. He was shaking violently, and medics cut off his dark green uniform pants. "It looked like I had melted," says Birdwell.
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