That jet then took off, Mike lined up a tanker from South Dakota to take off and refuel them over North Dakota, and they were able to get Ed back nonstop to Washington. He basically told him where everything was and then said "don't touch anything". He even had to act as a crew chief to get Ed Jacobe settled. Mike arranged a two-seater jet out to Montana to pick him up from the conference. He made his way down to the conference center and the emergency manager for New York is at that conference stating that he needs to get back ASAP. And when another plane hit, at that moment, he knew this was a very bad situation. Mike then proceeded to call Fargo, but no one knows what is going on. Mike hears that an airplane hits the Pentagon and his first thought is that it was someone who perhaps was not rated/qualified to fly and the weather conditions were not good.
He was in his hotel room and had the TV on.
You don't go more than 20 -30 miles away from the cap site. The two pilots set up a cap (kind of like being a goalie on soccer) around to defend the spot.There was a declaration to get all airplanes on the ground (not something they ever thought they'd use - but needed to on 9/11).When they got there, it was indeed the Pentagon. The pilots got a call when they were 60 miles out, asking if they can see smoke from Washington - and they did.
There orders were to "go as fast as possible" below 30,000 feet (but couldn't go super sonic under 30,000 feet or all the windows would break)
The pilots took off from Langley and took off to Washington.On 9/11, the military was watching airliners turning around and doing strange things, it was the FAA who finally said - "we think we've got a hijaking, you need to get MA air national guard on alert" (It was then that plane united 93 went off course and things started to unfold).National Guard and Air Force units on guard at all times - were working as a great team.The orders need to be validated and authenticated to carry out.A number and letter is issued every morning and only good for a few hours.Authentication - you can get something on a radio that is a spoof.The pilots talked about trusting the people on the ground, that what they are telling you to do is correct (shooting down a civilian plane).If the passengers would have not taken down the plane, the pilots would have needed to shoot the plane down.Their order was to "keep planes away from the house".The pilots had a goal to intercept flight united 93.The Pentagon was on fire, and the pilots reached it 12 minutes after it got hit.However, they could tell they were at war with the tone of voice being used when the call came in. They were not aware of anything going on, as the TV had not been on. 28 min after the first 9/11 attack, the Air National Guard pilots were going as fast as they could to Washington DC (combat air control).Luckily the pilots were sitting on alert at that time, as the 9/11 attack was about to happen.They were sitting fully loaded on alert in battle stations, with missiles, on the East Coast. The National Guard got a call on 9/11 that the Russians were going to fly by, and the two pilots were ordered to get ready.