"I think we're under attack"

Sgt. 1st Class Ed Bonilla, U.S. Army

I slug into work every day from the Woodbridge area, and I was running a little bit late that day, and I remember arriving at the Pentagon at 8:45. The room that I worked at in the Pentagon doesn't get radio stations, so I usually go into the Internet and get a radio station from there. This time, I got a live radio station from Puerto Rico. All of a sudden the music stops playing, and I hear someone saying, "How can this be happening here?... It's incredible, an attack of this magnitude." And I'm asking myself, "What are these guys talking about?"

So I listen real closely to the deejay, and I thought at first he was referring to a terrorist attack in Puerto Rico. But he had a correspondent in New York talking to him on the phone, so he started saying, "The World Trade Center just got hit by an airplane, and we think it's a terrorist attack." Then he said, "Here's another airplane." And by then, I was in shock. So I called my wife on the phone, saying I heard this, and she said, "Yes, it's true."

We worked for the logistical support agency for the secretary of the Army, in Room 1D-619. We're on the first floor of the D Ring, that's the second ring from the outside of the Pentagon, about 70 yards from the impact. No windows, seven desks, and two little offices in the back. At the time of the attack, there were only four of us in the office, two civilians and two military. My boss was at the gym.

The people in my office did not know what was going on, so I told them, and so we went into The Washington Post's Web site and we found news there. Across the hall from us was the Computer Services office, and I went across the hall to let them know.

I went back to the office and was talking to my co-workers, Oscar and Vincent, both civilians. We couldn't believe it. By then a guy we've known for years at the carpentry shop came in, and I said, "You know, the same thing that is happening in New York could happen here." And he said, "There's no way, Ed, there's no way that could happen." He leaves, and I just had this strange feeling we could be hit next.

I was sitting at my desk, in front of my computer. Oscar and Vincent are standing right next to me, and we're talking and I'm looking up at them, and I said, "There are so many people in this building, this has to be one of their targets."

Not more than five minutes have passed when we hear this loud whistling sound and all of a sudden this smash of metal and concrete. It was so quick, it was like a whistle, then a jet sounding at full throttle. You heard it, and then, all of a sudden, like a big bomb.

The impact-us three are thrown to the ground, and as I'm falling down to the ground, I look back to the room at the back of our office and I see all this debris flying across the room-including computers. And I'm like, "My gosh, what just happened?" I'm looking at Oscar and Vincent, we're all looking at each other, and I've never seen anyone so scared.

The first thing we said was, "Where is everybody? We need to make sure everybody is accounted for, then let's get out of here." I knew we had been hit by an airplane.

I picked up the phone and dialed my wife. I said, "I don't know what just happened, I'm OK, I'll call you as soon as I can. I think we're under attack also." I picked up my cell phone, and the second I stepped through the hallway, I looked to the left, and I could see this thick cloud of black smoke approaching my way. It was so thick that you could not see anything past it. It was like a wall, moving at a walking pace, real thick black, like when you burn tires. The hallway is 10 feet wide by 10 feet high, and it was completely filled with black smoke that was moving at a walking pace our way.

There were a lot of people that did not know what was going on, that had not heard about the attacks in New York. I remember this lady asking, "What is going on?" I said, "I think we're under attack." She said, "What do you mean, we're under attack?" She started crying, and I said, "We're going to walk away from here." More people started screaming and running.

We went through one of the emergency exits. It let us out near the north part of the Pentagon, an open area at the River Entrance close to the highway, with the impact to our left. The minute we walked outside, I looked to the left, and I could see flames and smoke. I was totally in shock, people were running all over the place, and all I could think of was the people I knew who work in that area of the building.

Afterward, I volunteered to be the liaison between the Army and the family of a friend and co-worker, Jose Calderon, who was killed in the attack. I don't think that anything that I have ever done in the military could prepare me to do the job that I did with his family.

I'm not a very religious person, but I found that my relationship with God enabled me to be strong for the Calderon family and also with myself. Working with the family was tough, because Jose's mother was in complete denial. A week had gone by, and she said, "He's still there, and they'll find him." I couldn't tell her. His wife, she knew. The next day, she said, "He's not coming back." I said, "Have faith, let's put everything in the hands of God and hope for the best." But she knew he wouldn't make it.

Jose always said he that he would like to be buried in Arlington Cemetery. He had only lived in this area for two years, and he told his mother that he wanted to be buried in Arlington. He told a co-worker that he wanted to be buried there, and his wife told me the same thing. When he was finally identified, he was buried there, across the street from the Pentagon.

A lot of people I knew died in the attack, and this year, on 9/11, when we go to the ceremony, it will be very emotional for all of us.