Fasten Your Seatbelts: A Flight Attendant's Adventures 36,000 Feet and Below (21 page)

While working a flight, a fellow flight attendant shared her encounter with her sixth sense. Liz had a bad feeling about going to work. She wanted to call in sick, but didn’t feel right about it because she wasn’t physically ill. She lived in Naples and had to drive to Miami on a stretch of interstate commonly referred to as Alligator Alley. Liz said she rarely speeds and always drives on the right-hand side of the road. For some reason she found herself migrating into the left lane even with no cars around to pass. A turkey vulture appeared from nowhere and slammed into her windshield on the passenger side, shattering
glass everywhere. Liz was able to stay in control and pulled the car over. She sat there in shock with the dead vulture lying next to her. Had she been in the right hand lane, the bird may have hit her side of the windshield. Liz felt blessed to be alive. Needless to say, because of the incident she didn’t have to work that night, after all.

My husband and I were visiting Cashiers, a small resort town nestled up in the North Carolina Mountains. My husband decided to play eighteen holes of golf giving me the opportunity to head down the mountain and visit the neighboring cities. Driving down the mountain is no picnic with winding, steep curves the whole way. Just before I reached one particular curve, I had a strong feeling to pull over. I had absolutely no reason to, but I listened to the voice. About that time I saw a semi-truck coming way too fast. His front end took up one side of the lane on the curve; his back side took up the other. I would have been forced off the road and possibly killed.

Before I got married, I was sitting in a dentist chair with a clay impression mold in my mouth. The dental hygienist was having a one way conversation with me. She was telling me she would love to fix me up with someone. They were in the Air Force together in Germany, but he was now a commercial pilot living in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. (Keep in mind, this
dentist is located in Atlanta, Georgia.) “He is very handsome and a great guy,” she said. “His name is Aaron Johnson.” My eyes got huge. I had this stupid thing in my mouth as I was trying to tell her I was presently dating the guy she wanted to fix me up with. Coincidence? Maybe, but all of us have our own unexplained stories!

veryone has a story for 9/11. Where we were, what we were doing, and how we found out. I wish I hadn’t been flying that morning, but I was.

We left very early on a Super-80 aircraft out of Fort Lauderdale bound for Chicago. Due to the early outbound schedule, our airplane was one of the lucky ones to arrive at our original destination. The flight had been uneventful and we had no idea of the horror that was happening at that time.

As we were taxiing down the runway after landing, what appeared to be a Middle Eastern man rose from his seat. He continued walking toward the front of the cabin, stopping at the closet behind first class just holding his briefcase. The seatbelt sign was illuminated and even though you don’t speak English, everyone knows you must remain seated. It was as if he needed to get off the airplane quickly. While strapped in his jumpseat, flight attendant number one motioned for the
passenger to sit down. Obediently, he sat in the second row of coach in an empty seat.

When the aircraft finally stopped moving, the captain called the flight attendants. “Hey, you guys aren’t going to believe this one. We are stuck here on the runway indefinitely, and everything is shut down. That’s all we know.” I looked out the window and saw some kind of tower being evacuated; initially thinking something happened in Chicago.

I turned my cell phone on. It rang immediately. My husband had been trying to reach me. “What’s going on?” I asked.

He said, “The authorities initially thought a commuter airplane hit the World Trade Center, but I think it was a commercial jet.”

We stayed on the runway for hours. In the beginning, rumors were spreading around the aircraft. Seven airplanes had crashed in Los Angeles; Chicago’s Sears Tower was supposed to be on the list. It took a while before we knew what really happened.

The first hour everyone was standing in the aisles, sharing stories of what they heard on their cell phones. None of us knew the magnitude of what occurred. We couldn’t imagine who could have done such a thing. A female passenger shared she works in the World Trade Center, but happened to be in Florida.

A little later, a male passenger came to me. “A passenger sitting in 19F is making me nervous. He’s the one who got
up from his seat while we were taxiing. He went from seat to seat to occupy his original seat. I wanted to let you know I am concerned.”

I told him I would contact the captain and let him know. This was before we knew exactly what happened. I made my way up to the cockpit and told the captain his concerns. He kind of chuckled saying, “As long as this guy isn’t clutching his briefcase, I think we’ll be okay.” (You know in the movies, the man with a bomb has his briefcase held tightly, with copious amounts of sweat dripping down his forehead.)

As I was walking through the cabin, I looked at 19F. He did have his briefcase in his lap; everyone else had their luggage stowed under their seat or in the overhead bin. I called the captain. “Hey, guess what, he does have his briefcase in his lap.” For some reason this alarmed him. This time he said seriously, “Keep an eye on him.”

Two hours had passed as we maintained our professionalism and continued doing a water service. Meanwhile, another female passenger came to the galley. “I am sitting in 18D, there is a man behind me sitting in 19F who seems very suspicious to me. He doesn’t ask questions, he keeps to himself, and is making me nervous.” I told her I would notify the captain, then said to her in confidence, “Don’t tell anyone else. We don’t want to start a panic on the airplane.”

At this point, the cockpit, crew and passengers all know exactly why we are grounded. I called the captain to let him know someone else is concerned about the same passenger. This time the dismissive attitude was gone.

“If he uses the restroom, let me know,” he said. “If he gets up for any reason, you let me know.”

I said, “Okay.”

I did another walk through the cabin. On the way, I decided to try and talk to Mr. 19F. I was slowly making my way talking to all the passengers, so it wasn’t obvious that I was zeroing in on him. I arrived at his row. He was cleanly shaven wearing a blue silk shirt.

“So, are you going to be home in Chicago?” I asked. Before he could say anything, a young female passenger who was not traveling with him answered for him.

“No, he lives in Florida.”

“Are you going for business or pleasure?” I continued.

Once again, she piped up and answered for him. I wasn’t getting anywhere here.

During the in-flight beverage service, he asked a Spanish speaking flight attendant something in broken English. She didn’t understand and asked if he spoke Spanish. He said no, so we knew he wasn’t of Spanish descent.

Three hours now passed when the captain called the flight attendants, “A gate has opened for us to taxi in. I am going to call the chief of pilots to notify him of our situation.”

He called a few minutes later. “The chief of pilots said we are a security risk and can’t come to the gate. Someone is going to storm the aircraft from the rear of the airplane, disarm your doors.” I took a big gulp! I was the aft galley flight attendant. It would have to be my doors to disarm.

I disarmed my doors. There was a rapid knock, knock, knock! I opened the aft door with a huge adrenalin rush. Six armed men, dressed in black, burst through the door!

“Where is he, where is he?” one of them asked.

“He is sitting in 19F.”

“No, go point him out to us.”

Oh great!
I marched down the aisle with two of the men behind me. I pointed to 19F. One of the men grabbed 19D and yanked him up.

“Not him,” I said, “The other one!” (Later, 19D came to me and said it scared him so badly, he about wet himself.)

At first I felt awful. What if the passenger was completely innocent? We weren’t profiling; we had no idea who could have done this horrific act of terrorism. If he wasn’t exhibiting suspicious behavior, we certainly would not have known he even
existed. Who gets up from his seat while the aircraft is still moving?

The security men escorted Mr. 19F off the aircraft. Everyone else, passengers and flight attendants alike, took a bus to the terminal.

The three of us flight attendants were the last to enter the airport. I slowly looked around. “Where is everyone?” It was so eerie. “What are we going to do?” I had never seen the Chicago O’Hare International Airport completely evacuated. In the distance, we saw an agent running toward us.

“Are you the crew coming from Fort Lauderdale?”

“Yes,” we excitedly said.

“You need to come with me.”

We were so relieved someone was looking out for us, because we would never have found a hotel on our own.

The agent scurried us onto a bus filled with stranded flight attendants and pilots. We took the very last and only open row. The crew sitting in front of us was Boston based. We poured out our souls to one another. We told them our story about our passenger. They told us how they were just this morning in the Boston crew operations talking and laughing with one of the ill-fated crews. They said they heard a standby flight attendant’s name called out to work the Los Angeles flight. That plane was the first to hit the World Trade Center.

No hotels close to the airport had any vacancies, so it was a very long, solemn ride out of town. When we arrived, the flight attendants gathered in a room with a television watching together in horror. That was part of our family flying those airplanes. Who could have done this?

As the plot unraveled and the identification of the hijackers appeared, I was brought back to my own crisis on the airplane. As we all learned most of the hijackers had come from Florida. If I had not made an issue of our passenger, we may have let someone of interest go free. Even if he was completely innocent, surely he could see we were just doing our job for the safety of our passengers. I am still haunted by the events of that day and often wonder about 19F.

certainly did not want to fly after September 11. Most planes were flying nearly empty, so it appeared the public didn’t either. I did notice one good thing that came from 9/11: The passengers and crewmembers were standing strong together. I had a male passenger come up to me and say, “They are going to have to get through me to get to you.” I melted. Every eyeball was on each other. Everyone was on their best behavior.