The phone rang at 5:55AM waking me from a sound sleep in my small rented bungalow in Sacramento. It was my brother calling from his home in the rural Sierra Nevada town of Nevada City. He said, "Sorry to wake you, but you better turn on the TV, something is happening." I did, and immediately thought was a terrible accident. A few minutes later, the second plane hit. I took a quick shower and was able to make it to the station (KXTV, News10) before 7:00AM. The nightmare of 9/11 was fully underway.
Without even receiving a call to come in, already the newsroom was filling with reporters and photographers. Some were dispatched to the airport, some to the state Capitol, some to schools. I was sent to the Federal Building a few blocks away from the station. Federal marshalls were there turning people away. The fear was that perhaps Federal Buildings all across America had been targeted for attacks. After waiting there for a while, the station called and dispatched me and my photographer, Rich Kermickel, to a fire station, then to the Sacramento Army Depot, then to a staging area where the Sacramento Urban Search and Rescue Team was put on standby to be sent somewhere, exactly where they did not know.
We were out in the field and did not have access to television, except when we were at the fire station, and even then we were so busy we only caught glimpses of what was transpiring. So, throughout the day, we heard the almost unbelievable drama unfold on radio, listening to KCBS out of San Francisco. Very little of what we shot that day even made it on the air. What was happening in northern California was insignificant compared to what was happening elsewhere.
About 7:00 that night. The crews were called back to the station. There wasn't a lot more we could do. Local programming had been halted and only national broadcasts from the network in New York were being aired. A group of us went across the street to Jaimes Grill for a drink and a bite to eat and decompress. Few of us had seen much of the coverage.
That night, I went back to the bungalow, turned on the TV, sat there and finally saw what had happened. That's when the impact hit me. We will never forget.
