9/11: A Flight Attendant's Firsthand Account (Special Podcast Highlight)
The Patrick Madrid Show
Relevant Radio
4.8 • 590 Ratings
🗓️ 11 September 2023
⏱️ 14 minutes
🔗️ Recording | Apple Podcasts | RSS
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Do you remember where you were on Sept. 11th, 2001? Do you remember the pain, confusion, and fear that so many people experienced?
Patrick Madrid talks to caller Katrina, a former flight attendant who experienced the events of 9/11. Katrina recounts her experience as a New York-based flight attendant who had just completed a flight from JFK to San Francisco on September 10, 2001. She was staying at a crew hotel in San Francisco when her boyfriend from the East Coast called her early in the morning to tell her to turn on the TV and learn about the 9/11 attacks.
Katrina describes the shock and emotional impact of watching the events unfold on television with her fellow crew members. She was scheduled to return to New York on September 11 but was grounded in San Francisco due to the ground stop. Katrina's crew eventually became the first to fly after 9/11, but it was a repositioning flight with no passengers.
During the conversation, Katrina and Patrick discuss the profound changes in airline security and passenger anxiety that followed 9/11. They talk about the heightened awareness of passengers and flight crews, the changes in security measures, and the lasting impact on the airline industry. Katrina also shares her deepened faith and how it helped her cope with the traumatic experience and uncertainty during that time.
The conversation highlights the resilience of those affected by 9/11, the importance of faith in difficult times, and the lasting effects of the tragedy on the aviation industry.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Now I want to come back to you, Katrina. Can you kind of like in a 30-second recap, just |
| 0:06.7 | explain where you were on 9-11 and what your job was and what was going on? |
| 0:12.2 | Sure. So I was a New York-based flight attendant. I worked a flight on 9-10 to San Francisco |
| 0:20.6 | from JFK to San Francisco. |
| 0:21.6 | I was a purser of the crew, so I was in charge of the in-flight crew, |
| 0:25.6 | and we were laying over at our crew hotel in San Francisco, |
| 0:29.6 | and I was awakened by my now husband, then boyfriend, |
| 0:33.6 | to tell me to turn on the TV. |
| 0:35.6 | He was in the East Coast. I was in the West still sleeping. Then that's how I found out. That's how I learned. And then... Was that about six in the morning, California time when he called you? Yeah, six in the morning, Cali time, yeah. And then my phone was blowing up. You know, back then, we didn't have the same technology we have now, but I started getting all the calls. people were, you know, worried, knew that I was a flight attendant, all the family members, all loved ones, people I hadn't talked to in years. At some point, every crew member was in my room, and we were watching all of this unfold live in front of our eyes. All of us were just completely and totally shot. Immortified. There were tears, you know, it was all the feelings. And so... |
| 1:11.5 | Did you know any of the crew in flight attendants? I knew some of them vaguely, not very close, |
| 1:17.8 | though. But still, it was very impactful. It was one of those things where we're all |
| 1:21.3 | sisterhood and a brotherhood in the sky. And so it could have been any of us, right? |
| 1:26.2 | Chances are you probably knew some of them, or at least maybe had flown with some of them at one point or another. |
| 1:32.2 | At the time, I was the largest airline, and we were flying with mixed crews all the time. |
| 1:36.6 | So very possible that I passed one of them in-flight or was on a plane with one of them. |
| 1:41.9 | So some of the names were familiar. |
| 1:44.1 | And so I was a commuter. I was actually commuting to New York from Orlando at the time. But a lot of my crew members were New Yorkers. So that was their home. So I had a crash pad in Queens that I stayed at when I was there. So we were in San Francisco and there was a ground stop. We couldn't go anywhere. There are no planes in the sky. And we were supposed to return back to New York on the 11th. But because the ground stopped, of course, we were there until the 13th in San Francisco. And we were the very, very first crew. We were the very first plane. I was on the first plane that took off after 9-11. It was just |
| 2:17.8 | crew. We were repositioned crew members. I bet you were so happy there was not a single |
| 2:22.0 | passenger on that plane, right? It was surreal. It was surreal, Patrick, because we were |
| 2:26.9 | flying out of San Fran. And you know how busy that airport is. And there was not a single |
| 2:31.4 | passenger in the entire airport. Wow. |
| 2:34.4 | It was like a scene out of an Arnold Schwarzenegger movie. |
... |
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