Flight 93 The Courage of Everyday Americans

Lieutenant Adam Schwarze serves in Honolulu, Hawaii, as a member of the United States Navy’s elite SEAL special-operations team. Adam Schwarze is also a former US Marine who has been awarded three medals of valor. His decision to join the military came after a friend’s father died aboard United Airlines Flight 93 on September 11, 2001, while stopping terrorists’ attempt to crash the plane into the Pentagon.

On that day, hijackers took over four passenger planes with the goal of crashing them into symbolic American targets while committing mass murder. Two terrorist-controlled planes crashed into the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center in New York City, killing some 3,000 people. A third dove into the Pentagon, killing 125 in the initial explosion. Thanks to the Pentagon’s reinforced concrete design, the loss of life stopped there.

The Flight 93 hijackers planned to direct the fourth aircraft to Washington and were said to be targeting the White House. Instead, they met with the steely resolve of a group of crew members as well as passengers consisting of businesspeople, government officials, and other everyday Americans who decided their own deaths would tell a different story.

As Flight 93 traveled over Pennsylvania, the hijackers overpowered the pilots and changed course toward Washington, DC. Passengers and crew, forced to the back of the plane, made frantic calls on mobile phones to report the hijacking and say agonizing good-byes to loved ones. When they realized that the hijackers’ goal was part of a larger strategic attack on major defense and population targets, they voted to fight back.

After their vote, the group rose up against the terrorists, causing the hijacker in command of the plane to veer out of control and crash into a field, killing all aboard. The Flight 93 National Memorial in Shanksville, Pennsylvania, commemorates this brave act of resistance.

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