Steve Burns
WMAL.com
WASHINGTON – (WMAL) The stories out of Manhattan were well-documented. The planes flying into the World Trade Center towers were captured on camera by an unwitting documentary crew. Stories of tragedy and heroism out of Ground Zero have emanated out over the last fifteen years. But less is known about what happened at the Pentagon that day, in an era before ubiquitous cell phone cameras.
Documentary filmmaker Kirk Wolfinger wants to change that with “9/11 Inside the Pentagon,” airing Tuesday night at 8pm on PBS.
“They certainly felt they had been overlooked,” Wolfinger tells WMAL. “These people did some incredible things that day, and nobody knows about them.”
His initial proposal to one television network got denied, with the producer insisting the documentary would either focus on New York or it wouldn’t be done. It eventually found a home, and Wolfinger says he found staff at the Pentagon welcoming and helpful after he approached them with his idea to focus solely on the events there.
“They said, ‘we’d love to help you identify some of those people. Let us know what you need.’”
The documentary explores some stories that are being heard for the first time, Wolfinger says, because nobody has examined the events at the Pentagon this closely.
“I think it’s an ‘everyman’ story, and that people don’t understand. They think Pentagon, military. And while many military people there did heroic things that day, they were not alone,” Wolfinger says. “First responders, and just regular folks there putting in their 8-hour day also responded.”
The documentary tells the story of the frantic evacuations as radar indicated what they thought was a second plane headed in their direction, and the people who stayed behind to finish their rescues and continue the water supply for firefighters.
“I think their telling their story, at least in two or three occasions in the film, was therapeutic. I don’t think they’d ever told it in any kind of public way. I know one guy had not even told his family,” Wolfinger says. “The people who were in the building that day deserve to have their story be heard.”
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(Photo: CNN)
