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Special unit vital in "Noble Eagle"

By Spc. Casondra Brewster

FORT BELVOIR, Va., (September 19, 2001) -- The Military District of Washington Engineer Company was alerted at 9:30 a.m., Sept. 11 to stand ready after two planes crashed into the World Trade Center towers. The alert heightened at the first news of a third plane crashing into the Pentagon.

Things "were moving too fast to even think about it; just react," said the engineer's operations sergeant, Sgt. 1st Class Paul Melendez.

By 11 a.m. the unit's Initial Response Team -- an advance party of rescue engineers -- was staged at Fort McNair, Washington, D.C., then airlifted to the Pentagon attack site. By 1 p.m. teams had initiated rescue efforts and conducted a reconnaissance mission for the remainder of the unit that would arrive a few hours later. This initial search was to try to find survivors locatable on the surface, according to Sgt. 1st Class David Steffenhagen, the heavy-rescue team's platoon sergeant.

Many of the engineers recount that scenes inside the Pentagon, even away from the impact site, were pictures of urgent mass exodus. They talk of cups of coffee and breakfast sandwiches left on desks; an abundance of personal belongings such as purses, briefcases and eyeglasses deserted; even a virtual path of papers leading toward primary escape exits.

Five hours after the plane crashed into the Pentagon, by 2:30 p.m., the remainder of the company's main body arrived at what later would be dubbed "Operation Noble Eagle." With the bulk of the engineer rescuers in place, and the mid-day hour of 3 p.m. approaching, "The Extractors" started initial searches of the first, second and third floors in the three outer rings of C, D and E.

"The scene was simply ghastly; it was ghastly," said Sgt. 1st Class Fred Brown. "That's the only way I can describe it. You can imagine the worst-case scenario of what you think it would look like. It's worse than that.

Then at 2:30 a.m. the next day, once the fire had been contained to a more controllable degree, the engineers assisted with and conducted joint operations, most praying and hoping to see a miracle, to find a survivor at America's defense landmark.

"It was a disappointment to us that we have been unable to find any survivors," Sgt. Ray Gould said.

The Fort Belvoir soldiers, maintaining 24-hour operations, are partnered with men and women of other urban search-and-rescue units from the immediate area, including Fairfax and Montgomery Counties. They all went to work as soon as it was determined further attacks would not be a concern and the immediate task of quelling the intense and raging fire caused by the plane-turned-bomb was achieved.

"We were actually the only team, until today [Sept. 18], that was running 24-hour ops," said Steffenhagen, a week later as the unit began relief rotations.

"Fort Belvoir Fire Department has been supplementing our teams throughout the work shifts," Steffenhagen said. "They brought their special services truck out there. They're running power lights, refilling (self-contained breathing apparatuses) packs, refilling fuel tanks. They rotate 12-hour shifts, just like us. We usually get two-to-three guys, because they still have to maintain operations [at Fort Belvoir].

(Editor's note: Spc. Casondra Brewster is the assistant editor of the Belvoir Eagle, Fort Belvoir, Va.)