Unease and confidence among travelers on 9/11
SANTA ANA, Calif. (AP) - September 11, 2011
Passengers occupy themselves with smartphones, laptops and
fast-food breakfast. Travelers in line for security whip out
driver's licenses and boarding passes. Flight attendants call out
names of passengers to check in at the podium. Someone left a belt
at the X-ray. Could you please claim it?
Yet the date's significance is palpable, here and at other
airports around the world.
At Boston's Logan Airport, where the jetliners that brought down
the World Trade Center took off, ticket agents, baggage screeners
and other workers paused at 8:46 a.m. for a moment of silence to
mark the time the first plane struck the twin towers.
Matt Yates, a 44-year-old accountant traveling to Atlanta and
Florida for business, wore an American flag shirt that he dons on
patriotic occasions. Genevieve Mercier, a nurse who passed the time
with a French novel about a plane crash, arrived 3½ hours early for
her flight home to suburban Montreal in anticipation of heavy
security.
In Los Angeles, Kim Pinney, who operates her own daycare center
in Virginia, booked the latest flight home possible from a friend's
wedding in the belief that would minimize her chances of falling
victim to a terrorist attack.
"If something was going to happen, it would happen during the
day and then it would be over," said Pinney, 39. Since her flight
is at 11 p.m. Sunday, she added, "Technically, I'm flying for an
hour on 9/11 because it will be 9/12" for most of the flight.
The attacks altered the landscape of air travel, introducing an
era of body scans and 3-ounce restrictions on carry-on liquids. But
Americans from coast to coast were flying Sunday, some because they
had no choice, others with an air of defiance and a determination
to appear unfazed by the threat of terrorism.
"I spoke to many business people who would wince when they
heard I was travelling on 9/11, but I don't want to do that," said
Patrick Bienvenue, a native of Canada who dressed in red pants and
a blue-and-white checked shirt to show his affection for the United
States, his home for the past three decades. The Rockport, Maine,
real estate executive was flying from Boston to Miami.
John Hollenbeck, 49, of Canyon Lake, Calif., was flying for
business exactly 10 years ago, but his flight was canceled by the
attacks. He was flying again Sunday.
"I have no concerns over terrorism. Not that I have no concerns
over terrorism - I have no concern that security's inadequate," he
said.
It's hard to know exactly how many people were traveling Sunday
because airlines don't release information on how many passengers
travel on a given day, and none offered any information on Sept. 11
traffic trends when asked by The Associated Press.
But George Hobica, founder of Airfarewatchdog.com, said major
U.S. airlines have traditionally run one-day-only sales on the
anniversary of the attacks, indicating they expect fewer passengers
to fly. Those sales haven't been offered this year, perhaps because
Sunday is typically the busiest day of the week to fly, he said.
Dr. Pam O'Hara, a pediatric oncologist whose husband is a
retired New York firefighter who responded to the attacks on the
World Trade Center, was returning to Hazlet, N.J., with her
daughter, daughter-in-law and granddaughter from a nursing
conference in Anaheim. She said she was apprehensive enough about
flying on the anniversary that she avoided any flights from the Los
Angeles airport and Kennedy Airport, figuring that they would be
more desirable targets for terrorists.
"I would have preferred probably to fly tomorrow," O'Hara
said, but she said her husband reassured her.
In London, some passengers flying to New York said they weren't
concerned.
"You can get knocked down by a bus or a car any day. If it is
meant to be, it is meant to be, but my daughter won't be happy
about it," said Alan Jefford, of Wales.
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Associated Press writers Samantha Bonkamp, Denise Lavoie and
Patrick Cheung contributed to this report.
