9/11 Reflections: Cary Warner, Technical Sergeant, US Air Force (Retired)

I was not in the military on 9/11.  I had ETS’d out of the Missouri Air National Guard’s 131^st Fighter Wing and I was working as a refueler at Lambert Airport in St. Louis.  On the night before the attack, I worked late into the night and awoke only after the planes hit the towers. When I went to see the manager of my apartment building to pay rent, she said ‘I guess you won’t be going to work today’…when I asked her ‘why?’, she mentioned planes had hit the towers and they had fallen. All I could say was ‘BS’, but then she then had me watch the news…

Because of what happened I got back into the Service with the 131^st Fighter Wing.  I eventually became a full-time Technician with the Air National Guard, retiring as a TSgt in 2012 with 26 years of service between the Army and Air Guard.  I now work as the Operations Manager at the USO of Missouri, giving back to the military and serving our brave men and women on the front line.

-Cary Warner, Technical Sergeant, US Air Force (Retired)