Small firetruck from Woodsboro played critical role at Pentagon - From The Frederick News Post on this 25th anniversary of 9/11

At the end of the class, the instructor stated that there wasn’t a question if a major terrorism incident would occur, it
was simply when.
Not only was his prediction accurate just over a year later, but the cover of the student manual
had the twin towers in New York City featured in the bull’s-eye of a gun scope. Was it an ominous prediction?
I was later told the twin towers were picked for the cover of the terrorism class training manual because they had
already been hit with a major terrorist attack on Feb. 26, 1993.
After Sept. 11, 2001, the manual covers were quickly redesigned.
No training could have prepared our nation’s first responder community for the 9/11 attacks on our country, attacks that saw the first responders of America pull together like never before.
The fire/rescue response to the three separate incident locations included one of the largest fire departments in the world, the Fire Department of New York, to one of the smallest volunteer fire companies in New York.
The tiny Aviation Fire Company, one of several volunteer fire companies within New York City at the time, responded to the scene and had their only fire engine severely damaged.
Essentially, nearly every fire department within 500 miles of New York City was either on stand-by to respond or sent equipment or personnel to one of the locations of the terrorist attack.
Though Frederick County only sent one piece of apparatus directly to the Pentagon, hundreds of firefighters who
work in the metropolitan Washington region lived in Frederick County.
Many of these firefighters also served as volunteer firefighters in Frederick County. I’m certain that many firefighters
who responded to the Pentagon on 9/11 were from Frederick County.
The officer of the first arriving fire engine from Arlington, Va., also served as a volunteer firefighter in Frederick
County.
Coincidentally, I was the instructor in a fireofficer class this firefighter attended just months before 9/11.
On Sept. 11, 2001, the fire and rescue service in Frederick County was still predominantly staffed by volunteers.
As the events of 9/11 unfolded, all available volunteers were requested to report to their respective fire and rescue
stations to staff equipment. I left my job at the time in an insurance office and responded to the Libertytown Volunteer
Fire Department to help.
The national news media initially reported that a plane crashed near Camp David. I was in the firehouse when I received a concerned phone call from my son at Washington University in St. Louis knowing that Frederick County fire companies would be responding.
Though the news media announced an incorrect location, tragically, United Flight 93 crashed near Shanksville,
Pennsylvania, some 80 miles west of Frederick County.
The Brunswick Volunteer Ambulance and Rescue Company was called into service to meet MARC trains at the
Brunswick train station to assist wounded and disoriented rail passengers who were inside the Pentagon when American
Airlines Flight 77 was weaponized and flown intentionally into the building.
A large number of Frederick County residents worked in the Pentagon. Many used MARC trains from Brunswick to
travel to and from work.
As more trains arrived, additional EMS units were summoned to assist. EMS units stood by throughout the evening to await arriving rail passengers in Brunswick. Members of the Brunswick community rallied, helping the uninjured as they
alighted from trains.
At the Pentagon, fire department incident commanders faced a massive fire created by the airplane crash and enhanced by a nearly full fuel tank of the aircraft.
One critical area of fire that was almost totally inaccessible was the interior of the structure, accessibly only through narrow passageways.
The size of the hook and ladder trucks in the Washington area were too big to make it through the entrance. The top of a
new ladder truck was cut off in an attempt to make apparatus small enough to clear the tolerances to get to the interior.
Incident command considered flattening tires on a ladder truck and running the truck on rims, but feared the truck could get stuck trying to enter the tunnel, blocking any potential entry.
At the time of the 9/11 terrorist attack, the Woodsboro Volunteer Fire Company in Frederick County owned Truck 16, an
open cab, 1955 B-85 Mack ladder truck with an 65-foot aerial ladder.
Woodsboro purchased the unit nearly 20 years prior from the Always There Hook and Ladder Company of Waynesboro, Pa. This extremely low-profile vehicle would become a part of our nation’s history.
Commanders at the Pentagon put out a call to surrounding counties asking if any department had a small ladder truck.
With so many firefighters on the scene at the Pentagon, most likely someone, probably from Frederick County, knew of
the small ladder truck in Woodsboro that could possibly get into the interior of the Pentagon interior.
The Frederick County Emergency Communications Center was contacted to determine if this old ladder truck was
available and if the measurements of the apparatus worked to get into the narrow passageway.
It was determined that Truck 16 could be the only unit in the immediate area that could be used to make interior entry.
On Sept. 12, 2001, at 2:08 a.m., Truck 16 was dispatched by the Emergency Communications Center to respond
mutual aid the Pentagon.
Woodsboro Chief Mickey Fyock worked full time as a shift supervisor at the Emergency Communications Center
and was a U.S. Air Force veteran. He was well aware of the magnitude and importance of this moment, a moment in
history.
Since Truck 16 was a completely open- cab firetruck with just two seats, Fyock also sent a duty vehicle with additional
personnel to respond.
The five volunteers of the Woodsboro Volunteer Fire Company who responded that night were Fyock, Michael Cornell,
Rob Compton, Michael Strausbough and Steve Devilbiss.
Not knowing what awaited them upon arrival at the Pentagon, they responded in the dark of night, traveling 68 miles
on Interstate 270 and the roadways that led to the one of the scenes of the worst terrorist attack in our nation’s history.
At the scene, one of the incident commanders introduced himself to Fyock and simply asked, “How can we help you
help us.”
The Woodsboro crew took orders to attempt to enter the interior section of the Pentagon. If they could get in, they were
to extend the aerial ladder to help fight the fire blazing in an inaccessible area of the roof.
The truck was able to squeeze through the entryway, barely clearing the tunnel. Once in the interior, the aerial ladder
was raised and ladder pipe operations were conducted, spraying water on the fire from the top of the extended ladder
to extinguish the fire in the area not accessible from the ground.
The crew from Woodsboro returned home later in the day on Wednesday, after a job well done.
Years later, Fyock would again meet one of the incident commanders from the Pentagon attack when Chief Tom Owens
became director/chief of the Frederick County Division of Fire and Rescue Services.
Owens was chief of the City of Fairfax Fire Department on 9/11 and assisted in directing incident operations.
Shortly after responding to the Pentagon, Truck 16 received a well-deserved retirement. The historic ladder
truck was sold to Kyd Dieterich, a retired chief of the Hagerstown Fire Department.
He still owns the ladder truck that was recently on display at the Frederick County Fire & Rescue Museum “Mini-Muster” held during the Francis Scott Key Antique Car Club at Rose Hill Manor.
On the 10th anniversary of the 9/11 terrorist attack on the Pentagon, then-Vice President Joe Biden spoke of the
actions of Truck 16. It was a story of how a small ladder truck from a small, rural volunteer fire company answered its
nation’s call and the “Little truck that could” became etched into history.

Clarence “Chip” Jewell, a Frederick County native, has been involved in the county fire-rescue service since 1969. He
retired in 2017 as the director/deputy chief of the Division of Volunteer Fire and Rescue Service. He served eight years as the director of the Department of Emergency Communications. He is the president of the Libertytown Volunteer Fire
Department.