Rick Rescorla: The "Fire-Drill" Hero of 9-11
Created for use in K-12 Public Education Settings by Joseph Baptist
Rick Rescorla took fire-drills and other emergency drills very seriously. He insisted that those who he supervised treat every drill like it was the real thing, and made sure everyone took them very seriously. His attitude about emergency drills ended up saving thousands of lives.
Rick Rescorla was born in 1939, in Cornwall, on the southwest tip of England. As an adult, he immigrated to the United States and enlisted in the U.S. Army. He did not become a citizen until after being commissioned as an officer and serving in combat in Vietnam. As an army officer, Rescorla participated in the battle of the Ia Drang Valley, which you may have seen depicted in the film “We Were Soldiers”.
When the situation seemed most serious, Rescorla would sing to his men to inspire confidence and keep them from thinking about being afraid. One of the songs he sang was a personalized version of a Welsh battle song, “Men of Harlech”, that he renamed “Men of Cornwall”.
His leadership was inspirational to the tired, hungry, and thirsty men of his unit who were deep in enemy territory, outnumbered, and cut off from supplies and reinforcements.
Rick Rescorla at the Battle of the Ia Drang Valley, November,
1965
Photo by Joe Galloway
Rescorla was awarded both the Silver Star and the Bronze Star for his service in Vietnam, but his deeds there are not the reason we are remembering him today. It is what he did after the war that make Rick Rescorla a true American hero.
Rescorla got a job as director of security for Morgan Stanley Dean Witter, where he was tasked with ensuring employee safety for one of the world's largest financial institutions, and one of the World Trade Center’s largest tenants. He was a stickler for emergency preparedness, and for emergency drills – including evacuation drills – much like the fire drills we have at school.
Rick Rescorla died 19 years ago today. He saved at least 2700 lives by his actions on that day, making him one of our nation’s greatest heroes.
When terrorists flew a hijacked passenger airliner into Tower Two of the World Trade Center at 8:46am on September 11, 2001, Rescorla was in his office on the 44th floor of Tower One.
When the first plane hit Tower Two, Rescorla ordered the employees in his care to evacuate the building, just as they had practiced many times before. It wasn't his first time dealing with a terrorist attack on the Twin Towers – in 1993, when a truck bomb went off in the basement of the Tower, Rescorla had evacuated his company’s offices, helping everyone out until he was the last man to leave the building – and he wasn't taking any chances this time either. He picked up his bullhorn and moved up and down the 22 floors that included Morgan Stanley Dean Witter offices, quickly and calmly getting everyone out of their offices and cubicles and down the stairs.
When the building management told those in Tower One that they were safe, and didn’t need to evacuate, Rescorla chose instead to stick with the emergency evacuation plan. Since Morgan Stanley Dean Witter was a major presence in the tower, people from other companies also continued to evacuate, and WTC management changed their minds and restarted the evacuation.
Because of his decision, many of the employees in Tower One were able to make it to safety, despite the crash of a second hijacked airliner into their building at 9:03am – which cut off many people on the higher floors from any chance of escape.
The second plane strikes Tower One. Photo .History.com
Despite being 62 years old, Rescorla didn't even consider slowing down until all 2,700 of his coworkers were safely out of the burning building. When he saw how terrified the men and women he worked with were, he went back to his old standby of singing to boost their spirits. As the employees he was charged with evacuating escaped the building, Rescorla and his staff checked the names off their rosters, when he found that employees were still unaccounted for, he and some of his security staff reentered the building, to find them and make sure all of their coworkers made it out to safety.
He was last seen on the tenth floor of the World Trade Center, Tower One, headed up the stairs.
Tower One collapsed at 9:59am, followed by Tower Two at 10:28am. Almost three thousand people died in the collapse of the Twin Towers.
Tower One begins to collapse. Photo www.popularmechanics.com
Of the 2,700 people Rescorla had been charged with protecting, all but 13 survived the terrorist attack. Thousands of other survivors only escaped because of Rescorla’s decision to continue the evacuation, even after officials declared the tower to be safe. Some estimates are that over twelve thousand people were already following Rescorla's lead and evacuating Tower One when Port Authority officials decided to call for the evacuation to proceed.
Photo: theblaze.com
"Men of Cornwall stop your dreaming;
Can't you see their spearpoints gleaming?
See their warriors' pennants streaming
To this battlefield.
Men of Cornwall stand ye steady;
It cannot be ever said ye
for the battle were not ready;
Stand and never yield!"
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