All air traffic, markets and most business in the down town New York area were closed. The nation is in mourning and the world reacts with support.

Deployed Members
Five members as of September 26.  Three OH-5 Communications Members were deployed Sept. 11 by ground as all air traffic is grounded.  Two additional members were deployed on September 26 to help with administrative duties.

Deployment History
 Three OH-5 Commo Group Members departed the afternoon of Tuesday, September 11 at 3:30 PM. The commo members arrived just after mid-night in Rockville, MD but found the warehouse had closed. After talking with the Emergency Operations Center, they were redirected to a local hotel for the night. 

Wednesday, the three found themselves the only staff at the Office of Emergency Preparedness communications warehouse. The trio worked at the warehouse for two days getting the communications cache ready for a deployment team to go to the crash scene in PA.  Work schedule is a lengthy 12 hour shift every day.

Thursday the 13th, Mark is assigned to the Pennsylvania MST command post and travels there with the deployment caravan. The remaining commo group continues getting equipment ready, checking and rechecking the contents of shipping boxes to make sure all that is needed is packed.

Friday, Dan and Bill continue putting together a third cache of equipment to deploy should it be needed. The two find they are the only communications personnel left to carry on the warehouse duties of getting equipment ready to ship out. We received word late in the day that Marks team is still setting up in PA.  Security was extremely tight and it took hours to get things worked out.  As Mark said, "you had to get into the armory to get your ID Pass, but you had to have the ID Pass to get into the armory."  Despite this "catch twenty-two" situation, the MST finally got set up but continued to struggled with what assignments would be given to the region V DMORT group.

Saturday things slow down a bit for Dan and Bill but then urgent requests were received for additional equipment to be shipped to NY as the deployment there was expanding. At 3 PM Dan leaves with a driver for NY to deliver a truck that is needed to transport a DRASH unit, leaving Bill as the lone manager of the communications warehouse. Mark reports that they have been busy setting up repeater, computers and telephone systems.

There are now over 500 NDMS personnel in NY and PA.  These consists of DMAT, DMORT, MST, VMAT, NMRT, Family Support Team, Mental Health Teams. The support of the Communications Specialist that have deployed is critical to the mission.

Sunday, September.  Mark reports from PA that things are getting busy, security is really tight and he expects to be there a while.  Mark is keeping batteries charged and is checking out phones and radios. 

Dan returns to Rockville Sunday afternoon, and within an hour, both he and Bill were assigned to drive two vehicles and a trailer back to NY City. 

Dan and Bill were then assigned to duty in  NY and helped the MST move to downtown Manhattan on Tuesday. Both are are working at the new MST. Long hours of up to 18 hours are being worked by both.  Both Bill and Dan were assigned duties from time to time in the  "ground zero" zone and saw much of the damage.  They report, "Television does not do justice to what was actually seen on the ground".  One of the most striking things that Bill reported seeing were hundreds of pictures on a wall of the missing that were posted by their families and friends. "It makes you feel the assault just that much more personally when you see the hundreds of face of the victims."  You stand in silence, with eyes moistend as you read a child's message in crayon, "I miss you daddy."

Both Bill and Dan found the people of New York did their best to make the workers feel welcome.  "From the cheering greeters that lined the road to the restaurants that would not take payment for meals, many New Yorkers succeeded in making us feel a part of their collective family.  While we were there, we felt like it was our city and our people that had been assaulted. We felt a bond that could not be explained."

On September 24th, Bill and Dan rotate out and flew home.  Mark stayed on at his duties in PA till the 26th and arrived home mid-day. 

Kenna and Gary left on the 26th and flew to NYC to assume data entry duties for medical records.  Their deployment makes this deployment an official deployment for the team as we now have 5 members deployed. There duties included transcribing the many hand-written data sheets on the victims to computers. They were assigned night duty at the pier command center. Both returned home on October 4 leaving  still over 400 NDMS personnel deployed in various areas to continue the work.  It is expected there will be a NDMS presence for some time to come. 

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