Rudy Washington, What did he know? Options

[elcounte]

Rudy Washington, who was a deputy mayor to Rudolph Giuliani, was on his way into downtown Manhattan when he sees the smoking North Tower(neither the South Tower or Pentagon has been impacted at this time). His immediate response was to call Admiral Robert Natter, commander of the US Atlantic Fleet at Norfolk Naval Station and request air support over New York.

ALSO, he contacts Patrick Burns, who works in New York as the director of fleet support for the Navy, but, is in Norfolk for a 2 week Naval Reserve obligation. Rudy requests of Burns, "I need you here" and "I need that hospital ship".

At this point Dep Mayor Rudy Washinton had not been in contact with any Air Traffic Controllers, nor had he been in contact with Mayor Rudolph Giuliani, nor had ANYONE confirmed or announced that America was under attack in ANY way.

My Question;

WHY would Rudy Washington have any suspicion or reason to request air support for NYC, OR, why would he have any reason to believe that the North Tower was anything more than an accident that could not be controlled or taken care of by NYC Firefighters?

[amazed!]

Good question! Funny they both were Rudy.

Maybe Washington was playing his role in Tripod, asking for the hospital ship?

[paranoia]

according to this (published 2008), he made the call after news of a second plane:
http://www.hamodia.com/inthepaper.cfm?ArticleID=1020

Rudy Washington, deputy mayor in the Rudolph Giuliani administration of New York City, is arguably an unsung hero of 9/11. For two critical hours after the planes hit the Twin Towers, Washington had to take charge of New York City and make excruciatingly fast decisions. The city was in his hands and he was determined to protect it from more harm.
By David J. Glenn

At first Rudy Washington thought the plane might have been a sight-seeing craft that had veered off course, or at worst, the sort that officials had feared could happen during “Operation Sail,” commemorating the Millennium in 2000 - small planes carrying explosives flying into the ships in New York Harbor. (He had spearheaded two years of counterterrorism planning in the city for just such an eventuality.)

But as he approached the North Tower on that fateful Tuesday, “a wall of firemen and police came running out” of the building as it started to collapse,” Washington said. People were jumping or falling from the tower, and dense smoke and debris were all around him.

As he made his way to City Hall, he heard people shouting, “A plane is hitting! A plane is hitting!” It took him a moment to realize that they were talking about a second plane coming in.

He also heard shouts of “Where’s the mayor?” No one knew if the mayor had made it out of the North Tower - or whether he was even alive.

Rudy Washington held a “five-second discussion” in his head whether he would be violating protocol, whether he had the authority to seek military aid for the city, but in the end, “I was willing to accept whatever [disciplinary] consequences” would be meted out.

At City Hall - where it felt like it, too, would collapse from the tremors of the falling tower - Washington made the decision to call federal officials, including Admiral Robert Natter at the Pentagon

This was shortly before 9 a.m., before the South Tower fell. “The admiral was talking to me cheerfully, asking me how I was,” Washington recalled. “I said to him, ‘What do you mean, how am I? They’re killing us here!’ He didn’t know what was happening. I told him to ... see [news footage of] the towers (plural) burning."

A few minutes later, low-flying fighter planes were dispatched to the city. “They didn’t know if more attacks were coming,” Washington said.

What is his perspective ten years later?

“Looking back on it, I don’t feel I would have done anything differently. I had to make those decisions - quickly. I had to do it.”

related info:
http://www.historycommons.org/entity.jsp?e...dy_washington_1

http://www.historycommons.org/context.jsp?...trainingsession

(Late 1999): Counterterrorism ‘Tsar’ Clarke Holds Anti-Terrorist Training at the World Trade Center; 9/11-Style Attacks Not Envisaged
An anti-terrorist training session for the millennium celebration is held at the World Trade Center in New York. There are fears around this time that Osama bin Laden may want to launch attacks on the millennium, including within the US (see December 8, 1999). Representatives of 40 law enforcement and military agencies attend the meeting, which is chaired by counterterrorism “tsar” Richard Clarke. During two hours of brainstorming, no one envisages terrorists flying passenger planes into skyscrapers. New York City Deputy Mayor Rudy Washington is at the session, and will utilize what he learns on 9/11, so as to develop an emergency strategy in response to the attacks (see After 9:59 a.m. September 11, 2001). [New York Daily News, 5/20/2004]

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/special/st...9p-168509c.html
http://wayback.archive.org/web/*/http://ww...9p-168509c.html

video of rudy recalling that day:
http://cccinfo.org/pages/page.asp?page_id=...rogramId=107711