The black smoke.
Stop.
I took Tom Kinton aside in the hallway outside the conference room. “Tom, this isn’t a fucking snowstorm,” I said, the still-simmering frustration detectable in my voice. “That’s not what this is about.”
Tom looked me in the eye for a long second and then nodded in agreement. “You’re right,” he said.
We reconvened around the conference table. “Reopening quickly is not the priority,” I said. “Reopening safely is.”
Joe and John immediately suggested developing our own checklist of security measures beyond what the FAA had required.
“We should station uniformed state troopers at every security checkpoint,” Joe said.
“What else?” I picked my pen back up and started writing.
“Random checks of passenger identification beyond the checkpoints.”
Everyone around the table started contributing ideas.
“Security sweeps of all ramp areas, crawl spaces, construction sites, air vents on the roofs of the terminals.”
“Inspection of vehicles.”
“Increased patrols of perimeter roadways.”
The list grew. I excused myself and stepped out of the room to make a private call to Acting Governor Jane Swift. I wanted to fill her in on our strategy. I wanted to make sure she agreed keeping Logan closed was the right thing to do.
Jane was elected lieutenant governor on a ticket with Governor Paul Cellucci in 1998. She had made national news because she was pregnant during the campaign. We were the same age, and though not necessarily close, we at least became friendly colleagues. She had lent me maternity clothes when I was pregnant with Jack. I had a picture of her holding him in the hospital. Then, shortly before I took the job at Massport, an agency where she briefly worked herself between elected roles, she took me aside. She suggested I reregister to vote under my maiden name—Buckingham—which I used professionally, instead of being registered under my married name. “You could run for office someday,” she said. “You’re in a different category now.”
When Cellucci was named US ambassador to Canada in 2001 and resigned, Jane became the state’s first female governor.
My call was put right through to her office. “Jane, most airports will reopen tomorrow, but I don’t think we should,” I said. I shared our plan to go beyond federal security requirements. I told her Joe’s suggestion to position uniformed state troopers at the security checkpoints.
“I’ll tell the media you directed us to do it,” I offered.
Swift agreed while imposing this caveat: “I don’t think I should be involved in the actual decision to reopen the airport.”
I instantly understood her unstated message. Insulating political leaders from the fallout of damaging events was Politics 101. Yet this wasn’t politics as usual. Or, for her, was it? I was uneasy as I replaced the receiver.
A day after our call, she told the media, “When a tragedy of this enormity happens, it is obvious to all of us—two terrorists got on a plane at Logan—there was a problem. Once we have the facts at our disposal, there’s no doubt in my mind that changes will be warranted.”
Sources at the State House told reporters these “changes” might include my firing.
September 13, 2001—Emergency Operations Center
When I read the comment about my potential firing, I swallowed my surprise and resolved to dismiss it out of hand if anyone on the staff brought it up. There was too much to do, and I wasn’t going to let the political swirl take any of our energy or attention.
Commercial airports were allowed to reopen at eleven o’clock. Logan remained closed. I entered a large meeting room in the Emergency Operations Center. The top federal, state, and local public-safety experts in the region filled every seat. We’d invited them here to review and, we hoped, add to the extra security measures we were implementing.
Joe went through the more than thirty items on our Logan-specific checklist.
“We’ve asked the FBI to conduct terrorist background checks on all contractors working at the airport.”
“Ongoing security sweeps of all ramp areas.”
“Random inspections of all vehicles.”
As Joe talked, I looked around the room. Oddly, to a person, the attendees looked uncomfortable. Like they’d rather be anywhere but here.
As the meeting ended, I went through the room and tried to thank everyone personally for participating. One State Police detective took me aside.
“I want you to see this,” Detective Marty Robichaud said. He was holding a ballpoint pen. When he took the cap off, I took an involuntary step backward. Where the nib of the pen should have been was a tiny, sharp blade. The pen had been converted into a weapon.
“How are you going to stop this from getting through security?” he asked.
I thought about that moment often. In retrospect, maybe that’s why all those experts looked so uncomfortable. We were asking them to help us develop a foolproof plan to reopen Logan safely. Perhaps they understood, better than most, that there was no foolproof plan. Not against suicidal terrorists.
September 13, 2001—Emergency Operations Center
“Thanks for joining, everyone,” I said into the speakerphone. On the conference call were the members of the Massachusetts congressional delegation and FAA administrator Jane Garvey.
I outlined the additional security steps we were taking before reopening and invited the legislators to ask questions.
“What are the hiring standards for security checkpoint employees?” one said.
“Was this an inside job?” asked another.
“What triggers additional screening of passengers?”
“How soon after takeoff did the planes go off course?”
The questions continued. After Garvey and I answered all we could, I sensed the leaders seemed comfortable with our approach to reopening. I ended the call, promising to continue providing them and their staff as much information as we could.
“I’m satisfied that in the circumstances we’re in, the measures are good and that they are erring on the side of caution,” senior congressman Michael Capuano told the media afterward.
But one of his colleagues admitted anonymously, “We are embarrassed the planes came from Logan.”
September 14, 2001—Marblehead
“Happy Birthday,” David whispered when he woke me before dawn with a kiss. His birthday wish jarred me. I’d forgotten that I was turning thirty-six.
“Shh, let’s talk about it next year,” I answered, putting my finger to his lips. Celebrating anything seemed obscene.
As I got ready to go back to work, I glanced at the headline in the Boston Globe. “Political Ties Strong at Airport.”
The story was about my background as an adviser to Massachusetts’s governors. It also described Joe Lawless’s experience as the head of Governor Weld’s security detail as akin to being the governor’s driver. I read that Jane was asked whether political appointees at Massport would be reconsidered.
“In the days and months ahead as the investigation gets us more information, there will be no question that isn’t explored as to how we can avoid these tragedies in the future,” the acting governor said.
After reading the paper and before leaving for the airport, I sat on the family room floor and played with Jack. We lined up his Batman characters, “bad guys” on one side and “good guys” on the other. “Bam!” “Bang!” Jack hit his figures into mine. One by one my “bad guys” fell to the ground.
“Batman win!” Jack said with glee.
It was time to go to work. After getting changed, I came back into the family room, with my briefcase in one hand. Jack got visibly upset.
“Don’t go, Mama. No go to airport,” he said. “You no save people anymore.”
His words brought me up sh
ort. Someone, probably David, must have explained my recent absence by saying I was at the airport “saving people.”
“No, Jack,” I said softly, stroking his blond hair. “I’m not saving people. It’s too late for that.”
Four years would pass before Jack would ask me what happened on 9/11 and why I left my job at Logan. “Some bad guys took some planes,” I began, trying to figure out, even as I spoke, how to explain to him how these “bad guys” had any connection to me, to us.
US senators Edward Kennedy and John Kerry asked to receive a personal briefing at the Emergency Operations Center later that day. I had invited Acting Governor Swift, too, but she had declined. I was grateful the two senators were willing to come.
Tom Kinton, Joe Lawless, John Duval, and I sat across from the state’s two senators in a conference room.
“Just tell us what you need,” Kennedy said without hesitation.
We, again, detailed the added security measures. “We may need additional federal funding,” I said. We also discussed our support for turning the checkpoints over to federal security agents, a controversial initiative Kerry, in particular, was pursuing.
They’d been at the State House before coming to Logan. “Take a look at what I said to the media,” Kennedy said. “It’s just not productive to try to assign blame.”
“I appreciate that, Senator,” I answered. I suggested the two go downstairs to the auditorium to address the first responders still working there.
As we started to leave the room, Kerry paused in the doorway. Despite the fact that I ran former governor Bill Weld’s tough campaign against him in 1996, there was nothing but kindness in his eyes. He squeezed my shoulder. “I know it’s hard,” he said gently, “but at some point you have to make the call on reopening the airport.”
He was right. It was my call to make and it was time to make it.
Through the rest of the afternoon and evening, the Massport team and I scrubbed the security checklist to ensure we and the airlines had complied with every item. One airline had not yet provided us certification it was in compliance with the new FAA directives, arguing it didn’t have to under federal law.
“Fine,” Tom Kinton said bluntly. “Tell them we’ll reopen but they’re not operating.” Soon after, we got its certification.
Joe had one final idea to add to our expanded security list. “I want to deploy State Police troopers armed with submachine guns in the public areas of the terminals,” he said. “But, it will be controversial.”
Joe didn’t have to remind me that we used to get regular complaints from state tourism officials about the traditional uniform of the Logan police. “It’s too militaristic,” they’d say. “It’s off-putting to foreign tourists.”
Referring to the submachine guns, Lawless noted, “It’s never been done in an American airport.”
“Do it,” I told him.
I placed two more calls before giving the final okay to reopen the next day at 5:00 a.m. My question was the same to both the FAA’s Jane Garvey and Charles Prouty, the FBI’s special agent in charge of the Boston office. “Do you know of any specific threat to Logan or any reason at all that should keep us from reopening tomorrow?”
Each answered, “No, there’s nothing.”
The Logan team completed the security checklist in the wee hours of the morning. The terminals were evacuated and searched one last time. Tom held a final briefing with the aviation staff at the Emergency Operations Center. “In the past,” he said, “when we got the airport reopened we would feel relieved.”
“Now,” Tom said before he paused and looked every person in the eye and perhaps in his own mind’s eye at this:
The second plane.
The explosion.
The ball of fire.
The black smoke.
“Now, it should just make us feel sick.”
September 15, 2001, 6:50 a.m.—Logan Airport
United Airlines Flight 168 was the first plane to land. As the pilot taxied from the runway to Terminal C, he saw the familiar ramp workers. They waved him into the aircraft’s assigned gate. But there, on the tarmac, just beyond the jet bridge were more than a dozen United Airlines and American Airlines employees. They stood in a horseshoe shape, as if to give the giant aircraft and its passengers and crew a simultaneous embrace. Many were crying. All were waving tiny American flags.
“Welcome home,” they mouthed. “Welcome home.”
As plane after plane touched down through the morning, passengers on board burst into spontaneous applause. Some joined together singing the national anthem. One pilot opened his cockpit window and, with a grin as wide as a Boeing 757, set an American flag flapping in the breeze.
In all there were more than three hundred arrivals and departures that day, some one thousand less than normal. That evening, I briefed the press on the opening day’s operations. “Given the circumstances and significant changes we’ve made to Logan operations, I think the first day went very smoothly,” I said.
In a nearby terminal, a state trooper patrolled. He was dressed all in black. His expression inscrutable, his eyes intense. In his hands was a submachine gun.
***
Four days after 9/11, I had reopened Logan.
For many, many more years, I stayed shut down.
To get through those first days, I had closed myself off emotionally. Probably as soon as I got the call reporting “two planes are off the radar.” At first, it was intentional, necessary. Intellectually, I had to remain intensely focused. I couldn’t let in the horror of what had happened to the people on the planes and the people in the towers. And then being shut down became something less deliberate and more reflexive.
The ability to dissociate—to erect a wall between your heart and your head—I’ve since learned is common. Common, that is, among people exposed to intense stress and trauma, be they soldiers in a war, victims of a violent crime, or, as it turned out, me.
It is also common to stay shut down for a very long time, if not forever.
Chapter Five
Blamed
The search for a scapegoat is the easiest of all hunting expeditions.
—Dwight D. Eisenhower
Massport Chief Pledges Accountability
“If there are specific flaws that are unique to Logan, people here, including myself, will accept responsibility and whatever consequences there are,” Buckingham said. She said she has not focused on whether her “personal future” is at stake. . . . Asked whether she believes Massport is a victim of a search for scapegoats, she said, “No. It is simply that everyone is trying to deal with and understand a tragedy of extraordinary proportions.”
—Boston Globe, September 16, 2001
September 16, 2001, mid-morning—Logan Airport, Delta Airlines hangar
The song “God Bless the USA” by Lee Greenwood echoed through the vast concrete expanse of the aircraft hangar.
Tom, Joe, and I stood in the back of the cavernous space. It was large enough to shelter a Boeing 767. Now it was filled to overflowing with airport and airline workers. Massachusetts State Police trooper Dan Clark, in full dress uniform, stood alone at the microphone, summoning the depth of the feeling in the space with his soaring voice.
Many of the gathered employees clutched one another’s arms, as if standing erect alone wasn’t possible. Others tightly held small American flags, as if the red, white, and blue cloth, too, was transmitting some kind of temporary strength. I fingered the tiny red, white, and blue ribbon pin on my lapel. “I made it in honor of the New York firefighters,” I was told by the Massport employee who handed it to me in the Emergency Operations Center a day or so earlier.
My tone in that morning’s Boston Globe story had “pleased” the governor, my deputy Russ told me before we headed to the service in the hangar. I understood immediately why. The public’s anger
and fear in the aftermath of the attacks, combined with three days of mounting criticism of my qualifications to run Logan and its past security record, amounted to a demand I step up and accept responsibility. I’d meant what I’d said. I would take responsibility if Logan was found to be at fault. I would accept the consequences.
The second plane.
The black smoke.
Bodies falling.
How many dead?
Six thousand? Seven thousand?
Joe put his arm around me. My shoulders began to shake with the effort of trying not to weep.
Trooper Clark’s voice built to a crescendo.
Joe squeezed harder. I saw Tom wiping away tears under his dark sunglasses. I closed my eyes tightly.
Stop.
I couldn’t.
Tom stepped to my other side and took my arm.
I couldn’t stop.
My entire body was wracked with sobs.
Oh my God, what possible consequences could be harsh enough if I was responsible for this?
Management at Reopened Logan Airport Under Scrutiny
—Washington Post, September 16, 2001
Massport Records Detail Security Breaches
—Boston Globe, September 16, 2001
September 16, 2001, late afternoon—Emergency Operations Center
US Transportation Secretary Norm Mineta’s press conference was being carried live on TV. I watched as he announced the formation of two rapid-response task forces to make security recommendations, one on airports and one on aircraft. My neck stiffened as he read the roster of appointees. All were veteran Washington or industry figures long involved in aviation debates. “What about counterterrorism experts?” I asked out loud, my voice rising. “Jesus, these are the same people he would have appointed if September 11th hadn’t happened!”
Jose Juves, Massport’s media director, looked around the room at the rest of the gathered senior staff. “We’re on our own, guys,” he said.
He voiced what I was thinking. We weren’t going to get the guidance we needed from Washington on further security improvements.
On My Watch Page 7