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You are here: Home / Political History / The Only Plane In the Sky

The Only Plane In the Sky

September 5, 2019 at 11:35 am EDT By Taegan Goddard Leave a Comment

Out next week: The Only Plane in the Sky: An Oral History of 9/11 by Garrett M. Graff.

Politico runs an excerpt: “Nearly every American above a certain age remembers precisely where they were on September 11, 2001. For a small handful of Americans—many of them among the most senior officials in the U.S. government—that day conjures memories of a bunker underneath the White House, built for the Cold War but never used until that Tuesday morning 18 years ago.”

“What had begun as an odd incident, with the crash of American Airlines Flight 11 into the North Tower of the World Trade Center at 8:46 a.m., quickly escalated 17 minutes later when United Airlines Flight 175 crashed into the South Tower. As the world realized the country was under attack, Vice President Dick Cheney and senior White House aides were rushed to that bunker under the White House, known as the Presidential Emergency Operations Center. There, underneath the executive mansion’s north lawn, they tried to figure out how many more hijacked planes were in the air. They knew of at least one: United Flight 93.”

The Only Plane in the Sky: An Oral History of 9/11
The Only Plane in the Sky: An Oral History of 9/11
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About Political Wire

Taegan Goddard is the founder of Political Wire, one of the earliest and most influential political web sites. He also runs Political Job Hunt, Electoral Vote Map and the Political Dictionary.

Goddard spent more than a decade as managing director and chief operating officer of a prominent investment firm in New York City. Previously, he was a policy adviser to a U.S. Senator and Governor.

Goddard is also co-author of You Won - Now What? (Scribner, 1998), a political management book hailed by prominent journalists and politicians from both parties. In addition, Goddard's essays on politics and public policy have appeared in dozens of newspapers across the country.

Goddard earned degrees from Vassar College and Harvard University. He lives in New York with his wife and three sons.

Goddard is the owner of Goddard Media LLC.

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