Former North Dakota Adjutant General Mike Haugen, retired ANG. Col. Brad Derrig, and U.S. Sen. John Hoeven, who was North Dakota governor on 9/11. (KVRR)
FARGO (KFGO-KVRR) – Many people remember exactly where they were on Sept. 11, 2001, but for an entire generation, the events are merely a part of history.
25 years ago, the nation changed forever when radical Islamic terrorists hijacked four civilian airliners and crashed them into the World Trade Center, the Pentagon near Washington, DC and into a field in rural Pennsylvania.
2,977 victims died.
KVRR Local News spoke with a former North Dakota governor, a retired adjutant general and a North Dakota National Guard fighter pilot about their personal experiences on that day.
“The word I can only use is just how surreal it was that day,” said retired Col. Brad Derrig, a North Dakota National Guard fighter pilot who was stationed at Langley Air Force Base in Virginia.
Derrig is one of three pilots from the National Guard’s 119th Fighter Wing who were stationed at Langley on 9/11.
Derrig recalls looking down from his F-16 over Washington, DC–and seeing the Pentagon was in flames.
“We didn’t, at the time, know what had happened…whether it was another airplane or maybe we initially thought it was a truck bomb or something hit it,” Derrig said.
On the same morning, the 119th Wing’s top commander, retired Adjutant General Mike Haugen was in Montana, attending a national conference on terrorism.
“And I have the TV on, and I’m in the bathroom and I hear that an airplane has hit the World Trade Center,” Haugen said.
“I called Fargo and said ‘what’s going on in Langley?’ And they said ‘we’re just going to battle stations.’ And battle stations is a term that is used for, they want the pilots in the airplane.”
Sen. John Hoeven was North Dakota’s governor on 9/11. Hoeven says the threat of yet another terrorist attack was considered a very real possibility.
“All those kinds of things, because remember, all flights are grounded now not only to make sure we are securing the airports, but also energy facilities, bridges, anything that was vital infrastructure,” said Hoeven.
One of the more urgent issues in North Dakota was preparing for a possible aerial attack against Minot Air Force Base. Haugen ordered the National Guard’s Air Defense Artillery Unit to protect the base from that possibility.
“The wing commander at Minot, who has the B-52’s…called me up and said ‘I have airplanes on the ramp, loaded with weapons because we were doing an exercise and I’m concerned that we’re going to have someone fly into the airplanes I have on the ramp.'”
Meanwhile, Hoeven recalled that the North Dakota pilots protecting Washington were prepared to take out any aircraft posing a threat to the nation’s capital.
“And knowing the power and the speed of those planes, and thinking of those pilots being up there and potentially having to shoot down an airliner was a pretty sobering thought.”
“We had weapons on board,” Derrig said. “And given that order, it would have been a tough order to carry out…you have to put your trust in them. They’ve made the decision for you, essentially and then you have to carry out that decision.”
Derrig spent upwards of 8 hours, isolated in his F-16 patrolling the skies on 9/11. He was finally able to catch up on news reports later in the evening.
“You sat down and said wow. The world is changed forever now.”
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