Bonnie Carroll, president of the Tragedy Assistance Program for
Survivors, assisted family members of the fallen in the wake of the
terrorist attack on the Pentagon on Sept. 11, 2001. TAPS provides
resources and support to family members with a fallen military loved
one. Courtesy photo
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WASHINGTON, Sept. 6, 2011 – It's been a decade since American
Airlines Flight 77 struck the Pentagon on Sept. 11, 2001, but Bonnie
Carroll vividly recalls the aftermath.
As a family-support
volunteer, she spent hours “listening and sharing” with families who
were waiting to be notified about a missing loved one.
Carroll, president of the Tragedy Assistance Program for Survivors,
was among a team of volunteers who responded in the wake of the
devastating terrorist attack that took 184 lives at the Pentagon.
That day “changed everything about the world in which we live,”
she said. “It gave every American an appreciation of those on the
front line protecting freedom -- a renewed sense of appreciation.”
Carroll was at home in Anchorage, Alaska, when the news broke
about the terrorist attacks here and in New York, and she
immediately felt compelled to help -- both as an Air Force reservist
and as the president of TAPS. She had founded this organization to
offer support to survivors of fallen military loved ones after her
husband, Army Brig. Gen. Tom Carroll, died in an Army C-12 plane
crash in 1992.
In her reserve capacity, she was assigned to
the Pentagon's office of national security and emergency
preparedness and had just wrapped up reserve duty there and returned
home. But |
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when she heard the news, she put on her uniform and was on the first
plane out of Alaska. |
Carroll put a call out to her TAPS peer mentors to come
to Washington at their own expense to help. More than 200
responded in a “tremendous response,” she said. She arranged
to have them serve six to 10 at a time in weeklong shifts
offering 24/7 support to family members in the Pentagon
Family Assistance Center at Crystal City's Sheraton Hotel in
Virginia.
The center opened the morning of Sept. 12
and remained open around the clock until Oct. 12, helping
both Defense Department victims' families and families of
the passengers aboard Flight 77. Along with TAPS volunteers,
the center was staffed by military community and family
policy specialists, plus thousands of volunteers.
“We
had folks who were surviving family members there to just be
a comfort, to sit and hold hands,” Carroll said. “We had
really, really tremendous people who stepped forward.
“It was just beautiful,” she added. “So much healing
took place in that little closed environment. So much love
and care and support, and the bonds that were formed exist
to this day.”
To avoid burnout, Carroll scheduled the
volunteers in one-week blocks so the peer mentors and
survivor support team were “alert, fresh and ready,” she
said.
“A big part of the effort ... was providing
tremendous care to those 500 families at center, but also
care to our team members who also were survivors,” she
noted.
The organization also brought in grief and
trauma experts from around the nation. “We were focused on
getting the best, most appropriate support in place that
would complement the support provided by the DOD,” she said.
In time and as reports rolled in, Carroll said, the
atmosphere of hope shifted into a time of solace and
support.
Twice a day, she recalled, now-retired Army
Gen. John A. Van Alstyne, then deputy assistant secretary of
defense for military personnel policy, briefed the families
and take their questions.
The general offered
families a fact-based, sometimes graphic briefing, and on
some days, asked everyone to stand up and sing “God Bless
America,” Carroll said. And then “he would remind everyone
to breathe. People didn't realize they were holding their
breath.”
Carroll said the general often remarked,
“Regardless of their job -- whether a contractor, DOD
civilian or military member -- the day of their death, they
were on duty for America.”
Carroll vividly recalls the
family members she met and their reactions in the aftermath
of the attack on the Pentagon.
She remembers standing
in the hall with Pat Hogan, an Air Force doctor who lost her
Army major husband in the Pentagon. They were talking, when
then-Army Chief of Staff Gen. Erik K. Shinseki and his wife,
Patricia, walked up.
Carroll said Hogan looked
Shinseki in the eye -- just days after her husband had been
killed -- and said, “I have no children; I have no husband.
Nothing is holding me back. I want to transfer to the Army
and I want to go to the front lines.”
“I would have
thought he would have patted her on the head and told her to
take time to grieve,” Carroll said, choking up. “But he
said, ‘You got it.'”
However, the Air Force chief of
staff at the time, now-retired Gen. John P. Jumper, got wind
of the conversation and asked her to stay in the Air Force.
He said he'd send her with pararescue personnel to
Afghanistan so she could serve as their doctor.
“She
left soon after,” Carroll said. “She's amazing.”
Carroll also recalls the Hemingway family from Kansas, who
lost their son, a father of two.
“They hung in there
all day every day for six weeks,” she said, “and then they
were the last family to be told that nothing of their son
could be identified. There was nothing found.”
After
six weeks, the support center closed down, Carroll said, but
TAPS volunteers continued to support the families of the
fallen -- the same mission that continues today. The
organization's support includes peer-based emotional
support, a 24/7 help line, support groups, seminars and
one-on-one counseling.
In turn, many of the 9/11
surviving family members became staunch supporters of TAPS,
she said. Lisa Dolan, whose Navy husband died in the
Pentagon, started a therapy dog program for TAPS' Good Grief
Camp, which offers support to children of fallen service
members.
Another survivor, Joyce Johnson, who lost
her husband, works for TAPS as part of the adult survivor
support team, which reaches out to those with newly lost
loved ones.
Their contributions speak to their
resilience, she said, as well as the resilience of the
nation.
This year marks a decade since the tragedy
occurred, but Carroll said Americans are reminded of the
attacks every day.
“Every time we go through airport
security or see a flag-draped coffin on the front page of
the paper, every time we hear about security concerns,” she
said, “we're reminded of where this journey began and the
precious nature of our freedom and the fragile world in
which we live.”
By Elaine Sanchez
American Forces Press Service
Copyright 2011
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