According to reports broadcast on CNN Headline News and NBC news, the first attack occurred at 8:45 a.m. EST when the hijacked American Airlines Flight 11, a Boeing 767 carrying 92 passengers and crew, struck the north tower of the World Trade Center. Just 18 minutes later at 9:03 a.m. ETS, United Airlines Flight 175, a Boeing 757 carrying 65 passengers and crew, struck the south tower.
Moments later, the Federal Aviation Administration shut down all airports in and around the New York City metropolitan area. At 9:40 a.m. EST, the FAA halted all flight operations at U.S. airports for the first time in air traffic history.
Three minutes later, American Airlines Flight 77, carrying 62 people, crashed into the Pentagon, a portion of which soon collapsed.
At 10:10 a.m. EST, the fourth and final crash of the day occurred just southeast of Pittsburgh, Penn. United Airlines Flight 93, carrying 45 people, crashed short of its estimated target of Camp David, according to broadcast reports.
            This is the first attack that has been called “an act of war” since the Dec. 7, 1941 attack on Pearl Harbor, which claimed 2,403 American lives.
“I found out on the way to class,” student Josh Ammerman said. “At first I didn’t think it was serious, but when I found out it was, I thought of Pearl Harbor — I thought we were going to war.”
Tuesday’s shock forced government buildings and military bases on what is called Force Protection Condition Delta, the highest implement of security for base people and assets.
“An event of this magnitude will generate this reaction, which brings us to lock down,” Columbus Air Force Base director of public relations Pam Warnken said. “The magnitude of this is bigger than we’ve ever seen, however we do not believe the Columbus area is under any threat.”
President Bush was in Florida Tuesday morning to promote education when the day’s priorities took a dramatic turn.
Bush made immediate plans to return to Washington, D.C., but was diverted to the Barksdale Air Force Base near Shreveport, La.
… Speculations and questions as to why these attacks occurred and whether Sept. 11 had any particular historical significance were brought up throughout the day on several media broadcasts.
One thought was whether former President Jimmy Carter’s Nobel Peace Prize agreement in 1978 with Middle-Eastern leaders, the Camp David Accords, had any significance or possible reason for Tuesday’s act of war.
“That would be a difficult and far stretch to try to connect these events,” said Edward S. Godbold, an MSU history professor who is in the process of completing a two-volume bibliography on Carter.
Godbold reviewed dated sources and materials concerning that day and said there is no possible relationship between Sept. 11, 1978, and Tuesday’s attack.
What Bush has come to call a “despicable act of terror” has left a nation in a state of confusion. Broadcast reports on NBC call confusion “terrorists’ deadly weapon.”
The American public has two certainties: many lives were lost in a very short time, and, as Bush warned, “Our military is powerful, and it is prepared.”