Flight attendant who was first to report 9/11 hijacking remembered by brother ahead of 20-year anniversary
CBSN
Betty Ann Ong, an American Airlines flight attendant, was the first person to alert authorities that tragedy was about to unfold on Sept. 11, 2001.
Ong was on American Airlines Flight 11, from Boston to Los Angeles. Hijackers flew it into the World Trade Center's North Tower. It was the first of the two planes to suffer that fate at ground zero that day. She relayed vital information to a ground crew that led to the Federal Aviation Administration to close airspace for the first time in history.Ashley White received her earliest combat action badge from the United States Army soon after the first lieutenant arrived in Afghanistan. The silver military award, recognizing soldiers who've been personally engaged by an attacker during conflict, was considered an achievement in and of itself as well as an affirming rite of passage for the newly deployed. White had earned it for using her own body to shield a group of civilian women and children from gunfire that broke out in the midst of her third mission in Kandahar province. All of them survived. She never mentioned the badge to anyone in her battalion.