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How did you hear about the attack? What was your day like? What was your week like? How did the attack affect your life?
Tsu was in Virginia for a seminar and saw some of the air response up close. She called me at about 7 AM pacific time to let me know what had happened. I had the day off and spent most of it glued to the TV. With all flights canceled and no idea when life would return to normal, Tsu hijacked her rental car and spent the next three days driving home [Oregon].
One interesting subnote for me is that I was on one of the first flights out of Portland when air travel resumed. Security wasn't in place yet and no one knew what we were supposed to be doing. After we had boarded the plane, the pilot came on and explained that we are all in the dark and just have to manage. If someone presents a threat, take the initiative and subdue him or her. He even suggested that laptop batteries make a highly effective weapons! There was a sense of being in the wild west. It was the strangest flight I've ever been on. Everything seemed surreal.
I flew to Huntsville on that trip and had quite a time getting on the return flight a week or so later. By then security was coming into place and Huntsville - the US rocket center - had military personell with machine guns EVERYWHERE! It felt like I was in some third-world country. Then I made the mistake of pointing out to the check-in attendant that I had a suitcase full of test equipment and electronics. This seemed to give the impression that I was a threat [confusion and mild panic still dominated the security system]. I was interrogated for a time and then followed throughout the airport. They had someone watching me until I finally boarded the plane! But it was easy to understand the reaction.
From there I was pretty much on the road until just before the invasion of Iraq in March of 2003. At that time I took a long vacation and spent most of my time watching the invasion on TV. I even got up at 4AM each morning to listen to the Pentagon briefing for the day. A few weeks later, just after we took Baghdad, I joined PF.
Tsu was in Virginia for a seminar and saw some of the air response up close. She called me at about 7 AM pacific time to let me know what had happened. I had the day off and spent most of it glued to the TV. With all flights canceled and no idea when life would return to normal, Tsu hijacked her rental car and spent the next three days driving home [Oregon].
One interesting subnote for me is that I was on one of the first flights out of Portland when air travel resumed. Security wasn't in place yet and no one knew what we were supposed to be doing. After we had boarded the plane, the pilot came on and explained that we are all in the dark and just have to manage. If someone presents a threat, take the initiative and subdue him or her. He even suggested that laptop batteries make a highly effective weapons! There was a sense of being in the wild west. It was the strangest flight I've ever been on. Everything seemed surreal.
I flew to Huntsville on that trip and had quite a time getting on the return flight a week or so later. By then security was coming into place and Huntsville - the US rocket center - had military personell with machine guns EVERYWHERE! It felt like I was in some third-world country. Then I made the mistake of pointing out to the check-in attendant that I had a suitcase full of test equipment and electronics. This seemed to give the impression that I was a threat [confusion and mild panic still dominated the security system]. I was interrogated for a time and then followed throughout the airport. They had someone watching me until I finally boarded the plane! But it was easy to understand the reaction.
From there I was pretty much on the road until just before the invasion of Iraq in March of 2003. At that time I took a long vacation and spent most of my time watching the invasion on TV. I even got up at 4AM each morning to listen to the Pentagon briefing for the day. A few weeks later, just after we took Baghdad, I joined PF.
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