Deserving the highest honor: US must honor the anonymous 9/11 heroes of Flight 93 - opinion

Twenty-five years after making the ultimate sacrifice to save untold lives, 40 anonymous men and women have yet to receive the United States’ highest civilian award.

They were the passengers and crew of United Airlines Flight 93, one of four airliners hijacked by Muslim terrorists on September 11, 2001. 

Two aircraft plowed into the World Trade Center while a third hit the Pentagon, murdering more than 3,000 innocents.

But the 40 aboard Flight 93 tried to prevent a similar attack by attempting to overpower the hijackers and take command of the Boeing 757. The hijackers responded by crashing the plane into a field, killing all on board.

Twenty-five years later, the United States has yet to honor that heroism by bestowing the Presidential Medal of Freedom on those 40 brave souls.

The honor, which former US president John F Kennedy instituted, can go to anyone “who has made an especially meritorious contribution to (1) the security or national interests of the United States, or (2) world peace, or (3) cultural or other significant public or private endeavors.”

The medal has been awarded posthumously to such recipients as Kennedy, the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., and Babe Ruth.

Since the award can be given for “an especially meritorious contribution” to national security, the 40 passengers and crew members of Flight 93 obviously qualify – especially given the details of their heroism.

On September 11, 2001, Flight 93 left Newark, NJ, for San Francisco at 8:42 a.m. At 9:28 a.m., four al-Qaeda terrorists commandeered the Boeing 757.

Wielding knives, they claimed to have a bomb, forced passengers to the back of the aircraft, breached the cockpit, and stabbed pilot Jason Dahl, co-pilot Leroy Homer Jr., flight attendant Deborah Walsh, and passenger Mark Rothenberg.

Walsh and Rothenberg immediately died from their wounds.

“Uh, is the captain,” Ziad Jarrah, the terrorist flying the plane, said over the intercom. “Would like you all to remain seated. There is a bomb on board, and (we) are going back to the airport and to have our demands ... Please remain quiet.”

Flight 93 was traveling over Ohio when it turned east toward the Capitol, the intended target. Meanwhile, passengers were calling their loved ones to explain what was happening. Through those calls, they learned about the World Trade Center.

“It’s Lynn,” Linda Gronlund told her sister. “I’m on United 93, and it’s been hijacked ... Apparently, they’ve flown a couple of planes into the World Trade Center already, and it looks like they’re going to take this one down as well.

“Mostly, I just wanted to say I love you ... and ... I’m going to miss you ... and please give my love to Mom and Dad, and (sigh) mostly, I just love you, and I just wanted to tell you that.

“I don’t know if I’m going to get the chance to tell you that again or not,” Gronlund continued before giving her sister the combination to her safe.

Todd Beamer surreptitiously called Lisa Jefferson, an operator for an airline telephone service, and in the midst of tears, asked her to call his wife.

“You have the same name as my wife,” he said. “We’ve been married for 10 years. She’s pregnant with our third child. Tell her that I love her ... (choking up) I’ll always love her ... (clearing throat)

“We have two boys. David, he’s three, and Andrew, he’s one. Tell them ... (choking) tell them that their daddy loves them and that he is so proud of them ... (clearing throat again) Our baby is due January 12. I saw an ultrasound. It was great. We still don’t know if it’s a girl or a boy.”

Hijacking the hijackers

But the passengers refused to submit to the inevitable.

“We have decided we would not be pawns in these hijackers’ suicidal plot,” Beamer told Jefferson. “We’ve hatched a plan. Four of us are going to rush the hijacker with the bomb. After we take him out, we’ll break into the cockpit.

“A stewardess is getting some boiling water to throw on the hijackers at the controls. We’ll get them ... and we’ll take them out.”

Beamer then asked Jefferson to pray the Lord’s Prayer and Psalm 25 before turning to his fellow passengers.

“Are you guys ready?” he asked. “Let’s roll.”

Jefferson, who described Beamer as “a soft-spoken, calm gentleman,” believes he “played a great role because when he told the guys ‘Are you ready?’ I assumed that they were waiting on his cue,” she said.

Alice Hoagland, the mother of passenger Mark Bingham, described what happened next.

“They ran up the length of the 757 with all their improvised weapons,” Hoagland said while listening to a recording of the flight’s final moments. “You could hear them coming. It became louder and louder, people yelling, ‘Get ‘em!’

“They rattled the heck out of those guys in the front. They were terrified.”

Deena Burnett Bailey, widow of passenger Tom Burnett, elaborated.

“You could hear the scuffling,” Bailey said. “There were several people working together. You could hear a hijacker being hit with some type of object, and you could hear the pain that he felt when he was hit.

“It was a cry, a wail, as if he had been fatally struck. They were realizing that the passengers and crew members were coming to get them.

“Then we all heard Tom’s voice. All of us just jolted. Tom said, ‘I’m injured.’ It was in a way that you had the sense that he was saying, ‘Don’t wait for me. Keep going.’”

The frightened terrorists responded by violently maneuvering the 757 up, down, and sideways to try to throw the passengers off balance. When the passengers remained undaunted, the hijackers – amid cries of “Allahu akbar” – chose to crash the plane in a Pennsylvania field.

At 10:03 a.m., frenetic activity turned into morbid silence.

All too often, the Presidential Medal of Freedom becomes just another token of political patronage.

But US President Donald Trump can validate the award’s original intent by bestowing medals on 40 ordinary men and women who performed an extraordinary act that must never be forgotten.

The author is a freelance writer from California who publishes on religion and morality.