Pentagon Employees Remember Fellow Workers Who Died on 9/11

By Jim Garamone
American Forces Press Service

WASHINGTON, Sept. 10, 2004 -- In the chapel built at the point where American Airlines Flight 77 plowed into the Pentagon, employees today remembered their friends who died in the attack on the building on Sept. 11, 2001.

The simple ecumenical ceremony paid tribute to lives of the 184 people who died in the building and aboard the plane when terrorists turned the jetliner into a weapon of war.

Raymond F. DuBois, the DoD director of administration and management, recalled the original name of the area the Pentagon is built on was "Hell's Bottom." He said 60 years to the day after the groundbreaking for the building, it lived up to its former name. DuBois recalled the blackened halls, the flames, the sights, noises and smells of the day. He said it truly was Hell's Bottom on Sept. 11, 2001.

He recalled the sacrifices of Pentagon employees. He spoke of the bravery of those who responded to the attack in the building and of the firefighters and other first responders who arrived within minutes.

And, DuBois remembered, the next day, the employees of the Pentagon were back at work -- with the roof of the building still on fire and rescue workers still probing the rubble -- to help plan the counterattack on the terrorists.

The service included a listing of the names of those killed in the attack; a reading of the Kaddish, the Jewish Prayer for the Dead; a prayer from retired Army Chaplain (Col.) Larry Racster, who aided in recovery efforts after the attack; and a reading from the Quran. Navy Chaplain (Cmdr.) Shearin Winston said a prayer for the nation.

The ceremony ended with a bugler playing "Taps."

Biography:
DoD Director of Administration and Management Raymond F. DuBois

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