We love our proud and passionate land and strive to be heroes for her when called upon! God Bless Beloved America !
Praise for all who helped on September 11, 2001 - that day of darkness in our land!

God Bless America and God Bless you!   

The call was beyond the normal range, but you won through anyway!   

My story follows the message at this post.

 More than 5,000 dead.
"The September 11 attacks killed 2,997 people and injured more than 6,000 others. ...   Another 2500+ have died from related toxins on that day, including a dozen miscarriages of unborn.   Wikipedia     I cannot find an accurate tally of ANIMALS who died at WTC or later from toxic exposure diseases.    But this story about the few surviving  Search and Rescue Dogs there for days is helpful.         

WHY no one needed to die in the terrorism on September 11, 2001

NO ONE NEEDED TO DIE on Nineleven BECAUSE Earlier terrorism - 1996 - was to have initiated top-level preventions against repetition.   NOTHING WAS DONE.

We missed it badly, in terrorist prevention and preparedness in EVERY WAY - 

1. intelligence

2. security

3. air traffic control

4. military armed jet interception

5. equipment and training for first responders

6. quick air response for fire and escape

7. occupant safety and escape technology

 ( see generalized explanations of each of these items below )

We had been attacked similarly a few years before and did NOTHING to prevent a repetition. So we got a HUGE repetition.  And it is our fault:  "Fool me once, shame on you - fool me twice, shame on me".  OUR burden to bear, in addition to our losses!

SOME DETAILS about the topics, above, follow here in the same order:  

1.  intelligence

We were under-informed in every way. Under-vigilant.    AND there have been way too few improvements in the system.    These sensors are  "orga and mecha" = men and technology, put to work in many ways.....IF they are put to work at all.   We are able to do better than "Gee whattaya think is going on?"

2.  security

 We did get the Department of Homeland Security - to filter out possible terrorists. We are doing better - More on that later. But as the story unfolded, we seem to have invited and trained the nineleven killers - yikes, Sandy!  We co-ordinated what we DID know incorrectly and so it did not give the picture it should have.

3.  air traffic control

just once:   listen to the saved air traffic control tapes ...they are right at YouTube in the list of videos that follow President Bush's message link , above on this page.    It is humiliating how slow, how UNinformed, misinformed, totally nothing to anticipate or prevent!

 4.  military armed jet interception

there is a system of top level national defense armed jets whose job it is to intercept any attack in our boundaries, and act if need be - at the first sign of suspicious.  They are the BEST !    But not the way they were positioned or failed be postitioned - NOT strategically.   HOWEVER, even after the early WTC attack NONE of the planes were nearby to intercept.   After the first hit was determined to be a terrorist attack , armed jets, from the nearest hi-level center, mentioned above, WERE deployed but not in time to prevent the subsequent attacks -  not even going at their top speed. The pilot of that top level jet collapsed himself, later, in futility.   AND there have been way too few improvements in the system.

5.  equipment and training for first responders

no need for major research....Just watch the movie , "World Trade Center" - the Nicolas Cage biopic - time after time, he and others mention a long list of PREPAREDNESS errors that cost lives of civilians and responders - old or dysfunctional equipment, poor or outdated training, lack of medics among them, no moonsuits to protect against extreme toxic exposure....it's sickening.....And "whadddabout now?" to quote a Cage co-star in one of his later films....WE HAVE A VALID NEED AND RIGHT TO SEE THE FIXES IN THE HEADLINES...not just DHS...all of it.

6.  no quick air response for fire and escape

Responders have been a miracle in our lives for so long- we love them - they are our heroes -  but THEY wailed at their lack of modern updates and training and up-to-date tech that would have had them in the air and putting out the fire and saving people FAST.    Aerial firefighting equipment , instantly deployed, might have prevented some of the loss....NOTHING was there.  Better communications - both equipment and the channels they  use etc.   Where was  A sky barrage of water hoses or chemical retardants?? - something should have been there.  Look at the videos at YouTube ....all the major news channels constantly photographed NOTHING there squirting water or bailing out people.

7.  occupant safety and escape technology   

MY PART - there was - and still is -  nothing the right side of the middle ages to first aid people,  put out the fires and eject the occupants to safety on the ground and it is  do-able and affordable.   It is my interest becuase it is my childhood memory, the effort and squelching of the effort to set these things in place fifty years ago.  Full story in MY Story below, but , generally speaking,  today any MIT sophomore could design  it all before lunch - and they won't - When My dad and techsperts did them up , they were way ahead of their time, but the RESPONSIBLE PREPAREDNESS, INTERNAL SUPPORTS AND OCCUPANT ESCAPE TECHNOLOGY should have been in place as a showpiece of our bi-centennial.  IT SHOULD HAVE been there in 1976; and there is much more fact for backup - ask me.  I hate those paranoid activists suggesting all the time, an insidious evil...but gee....EVEN THIS WONDERS.   You won't even see a small article in the news and yet, any leader who takes up this project will win his election in a heartbeat.  

ABOUT ME in this:
Why me?  The story of my aero tech Dad is true and Dad died just before NINELEVEN  He was quite the American head heart and soul!  And I am eldest.  That is part of why.     My late husband is with me in spirit I am sure as he led me with courage and goodness and supported my own efforts in church, School , community an red cross and research.  When I remarry, it will be to one of similar integrity and grownupness and fun - or not at all.  I lost him suddenly and way too young from aneurysm and so I feel some understanding of those who suffer such sudden and stunning shock grief and if I can help I do.

I  remain non-violent - not obscene or profane, but not a coward either and call on others to be better - it would take so little to win the remedies - the enumerated real goals.  What a proud project. Let's   

So why I am doing this,  when people PAID to do it are not doing it?

A friend running for Congress says the word "ACCOUNTABILITY" to me a lot.  This is government by the people and the burden is ours. We must go to our leaders and  we must hold our leaders accountable - we must engage and achieve.   AM I MY BROTHER'S KEEPER?   It goes that far back.  At least to get our word in, when they ask for ideas, and send letters and petitions.  Ask your leaders  for FULL DISCLOSURE of "WHAT HAS BEEN DONE?"  "WHAT IS BEING DONE?"   Send in my list above and ask for the reply that is your right as an American.   I am doing it - all my details are out of date, so I am updating them. I will add them here in an UPDATES list. SOME of the magnificent seven here , above, must have been CLEARLY WON. But one never sees it in the headlines and that is wrong.  WE can
Could we do that?  NOW.

elle

Scroll down for the Dan George and Bill original image that has travelled to educate and inspire in California schools.

My personal part of The story:

 I'd gotten busy after sudden and early widowhood and empty-nesting and the recession undid me,  and it helped, till the accident.  Injured, hot-flashing, bereaved of my Father, now, as well, I was thrilled to stay put in my sunny bungalow -  and maybe permanently.

 I was out of pain and safe and quiet - no more danger or response work for a bit:  lifelong art and redcross work,  I could now stick to my art, as soon as I could draw a straight line again, and heal ME and donate some of my art to help the redcrossers behind me.  

I even bought a  Tv/DVD/VHS combo - white and ladylike - a total treat to set its alarm and wake to hot coffee and morning news!  I had not wanted a television since 1987, but immobile, it would be a help.   I happily smelled the coffee, basked in the morning sun and the news - when suddenly the image was of the Twin Towers injured and in smoke!    I began to change the channel.  Whatever it was, it was certainly nothing real.  Then the newscasters made it clear that it WAS real - surreal - and nothing would be the same after that.

l do not remember dressing that morning, but there were calls in to see if I'd heard the news and was okay - our children, I think.  And then I was dressed and in braces and out the door.   Neighbors and  Friends were speechless, somber, and supportive - we prayed and prayed.   The President spoke to calm and comfort and assure us that our defenses were involved and at alert.   Unreal and aiming at routine tasks for some sanity happened next.  On a work break in my little garden patio, the first of the trucks with huge flags waving proudly drove by.  As the early autumn sun began to set, I looked up and there were our military planes, flying low and kindly, strong, protective - low enough so we could SEE they were there - for us.  I loved my America at that moment like a corny forties movie lady... just me - humbled - and grateful to be safe.  Calming down a bit since the shocks of the morning.

But as I returned to my kitchen to find dinner, I was so overwhelmed by a very old memory suddenly invading the present, that my legs went out from under me, and I reached out for the edge of the counter to stay on my feet.   And I knew:  "Dear Lord - NO ONE needed to die today!"   See my list of WHY at the foot of this entry.  The tragedy was enough - to know it was unnecessary was pathetic - profoundly sorrowful.

I remembered a thing I'd been firmly warned to forget,  nearly fifty years earlier.  I skipped thru Mother's kitchen on another sunny day, my Dad and Doc Adenstedt of the Sikorsky team were at the table, talking hi-tech news!  They were celebrating the pilot ejection seats, and on the table were the words and pictures for the upcoming escape pods for planes and tall buildings.   I was interested in their animated conversation and the pictures they referenced - the two men smiled and hugged me and explained it all to me and promised that pods would make planes and skyscrapers "safe as home" soon for me and all the children growing up.  and off I skipped back to my dolls.   Happy if clueless.  A better world.  Soon.

NOT soon enough.

And then I was, once again, back in the present, fifty years later, and horrified with this fact:  NONE of those people needed to die.  No one had made ANY real effort to update the promised OCCUPANT SAFETY AND ESCAPE TECHNOLOGY FOR PLANES AND TALL BUILDINGS in all those years and the triumph in it remains undone and un-won!

I looked into it further and thought about it and then to my library that week, and told them my story:  I told them about the returning memory and why I had forgotten it so thoroughly:  back in my girlhood days, after the wonderful talks with Father and Doc Adenstedt,  I asked about developments in it and  Mother warned: "do NOT bring it up to your Father" when I asked about it, because he was upset.  The escape tech projects, except for pilot ejection seats were now blocked,  dropped, buried, suppressed  - the mainstream was not ready and technology was immature and high-priced!   Like the Edsel at that time, never seen or heard of again!   I took Mother's words seriously and forgot the entire matter.  Till 7 pm on Nineleven.

When the tech was proposed, in the late 50s and early 60s - the idea was a bit advanced.   But twenty years later - NO - in the seventies, it was time and the breakthrough tech for it was supposed to be done.  Amazing Occupant Safety and Escape Tech would be a shiny star to light America's Bi-Centennial - what happened?  The tech was THERE and IS THERE - "do-able" - relatively AFFORDABLE - the entire cost much much less than damages paid for the lives lost and much less than the cost of all this PAIN.

 On September 11th, 2001, where were the ejection pods, like elevator cars, for the skyscrapers?   Where were the passenger areas of planes constructed to break away and safely land on the ground or on the water with GPS to aid rescuers and survival supplies for those in the passenger pods ??  Most of it is simple mechanics! Yikes!  Every one of us is remiss on this point and we won't be forgiven till we fix it

 Doing my part, my friends from the library understood my story and supported me - two were formerly from the library at United Technologies and urged me to act: they sent me to UT in nearby Hartford.  I went and the receptionist said "Go right up" - suddenly I was one small soul in the middle of nowhere and I realized I was a madwoman and, if I persisted that day, it would only hurt my cause.  People were upset and doing crazy things.   And this suddenly seemed to be one of them.  For the moment, I backed down.

I went home and prayed again - one rosary bead for each life lost - I finished at Thanksgiving, saying one or two full rosaries per day.  It taught my mind the meaning of casualty statistics.  

And,  in the days after the attacks, on my daily walk, I sidetracked to the plant whose ancestors made the first American fabrics, using the little waterfall I could hear from my home to power the mill.  I suggested to the mill's office receptionist that we make a flag and share it on the building - just dazed and determined - and they did it....my proudest art yet, I guess!   It hung there until it frayed, lit at night by the Amerbelle Mill, now sold on to developers.  Heart.  Since those days, it is nice to see that the flag spirit has remained. We are one bit better at least.

Next, I went back online about Nineleven, this time with the Safety and Escape Technology things in mind.  I found and called the NINELEVEN SURVIVORS support group when I found their notes there about the same topic - and they said they KNEW - they knew what I was talking about- others had reached them first with my story and they went to Government, but war hype was up and the representatives would NOT even talk to them - one hid behind a door and, still disabled myself, my life was often online, anyway, so I made my story into a web page and, when my strength would allow it, I sent it around and promoted it as best I could.  NO ONE REALLY CARED, except some MIT guys, who hung their heads, in an email, and said, sympathetically " Yeahhhh we make games and stuff....." feeling rotten that they lacked the focus for achieving the Escape tech.

And, using my art again, I did a diorama of the famous Dan, George, and Bill Story - the three who raised the American Flag at Ground Zero immediately after the attacks - and it showed in the schools in California near the buyer, an old friend, and neighbor.

And that's where I had to leave it - my injuries healed and that meant a reworking of my own life basics!   So now it is FIFTEEN YEARS LATER and I have not connected with the world, EFFECTIVELY,  on this point.  But now I can again and I will.   Pass it on - if I make a petition on it, will you sign it?  Will anyone take this up WITH me, to be wiser and more successful?  Pass it on, please, if you can.

God Bless America!
e.

 Please comment - do petitions and talk it up on your block..."God & Country" both need our witness to win!

happy Sunday Nineleven 2016

elle