Mike Neri is now a civilian working for Bank of America, but he was an Army Captain working in the Pentagon on 9/11.
We featured Mike Neri of the M Streets last year for a cover story about neighbors who had experienced a historical moment. Neri was a U.S. Army Captain working in the Pentagon on Sept. 11, 2001, when about 125 people were killed.
Here is his story:
“I was sitting in an office with no windows when my wife called. She worked on Capitol Hill, but she was home with our new baby at the time. She said, ‘Turn on the TV.’ Like a lot of people, we were watching news coverage about the first tower when the plane hit the second tower. I turned to the colonel, and I said, ‘This isn’t an accident.’
Then we heard and felt the impact of the plane that hit the Pentagon. We knew it was related, and the smoke alarms started going.
There are five rings to the Pentagon, the A through E rings. Just about five months earlier, we had moved our office from the E ring, which was ground zero, to the A ring, which was near the center of the building. We evacuated the building, and everyone in my office got out. But if people weren’t immediately evacuated, they didn’t make it.
We were standing about 80 yards from where the plane hit, and we stayed there all day hoping to be a part of the recovery. We didn’t know if there was going to be another plane, another attack, or what would happen. In the end, there wasn’t much we could do.
At the end of the day, I was lucky. I didn’t do anything heroic.
The experience shaped me a lot in terms of what’s truly important. Afterward, there was a lot of introspection. We had a brand new baby, and it reminded me of the importance of family and friends.
My testimony is in the 9/11 Commission Report. But over the following couple of days, I wrote my own narrative about what happened and my feelings at the time. It’s something I go back to and read at least once a year to remind myself. I read it to make sure that I haven’t forgotten, that I’m not being too petty.”
