compiled by Patrick H. Moore
As we awake this morning and try to return to our everyday lives after the horror of yesterday’s D.C. Navy Yard massacre, it’s hard to shake off the uncanny feeling that we will never know for sure why Aaron Alexis ran amuck and shot and killed up to 13 innocent people and wounded several more. What we can take consolation in, however, is the selflessness and heroism displayed by so many during those hair-trigger moments as they fought to survive. It was decidedly not just another day at the office.
Just ask Terry Durham. Before Terry she could even see the gunman’s face, she could see the barrel of his rifle aimed straight at her.
“He was far enough down the hall, that we couldn’t see his face,” Durham told ABC News affiliate WJLA-TV. “But we could see him with the rifle, and he raised and aimed at us and he fired.”
Durham and her co-workers were just rubbing the sleep out of their eyes and settling down to work when they heard three distinctive “pops,” gunshots, getting louder and closer.
They ran into a darkened hallway on the third floor of Building 197, rounded a corner and there he was — the shooter Aaron Alexis, a tall man in fatigues carrying a long gun. Alexis sighted and fired, more dreadful “pops”. Fortunately for Terry and her companions, the shots sprayed “high and wide”. It was a close call but they were safe.
Just ask the witnesses who describe a scene of chaos cascading through the floors of the building, as co-workers confronted by the mounting horror helped each other take shelter or made the split-second decision to flee the building.
“We heard what sounded like muffled gun shots inside, and then we had a person telling us to get out of building,” said Tim Jirus, a U.S. Navy commander.
As Jirus was evacuating, he heard two gunshots:
“I looked at the direction where the gun shots were coming from. I looked down, and the guy next to me (who) was standing talking to me, was down in front of me on the ground. I feel very lucky to be alive… [the] guy next to me got shot and I didn’t.”
Just ask the employees who describe acts of quick-thinking, selflessness and team work that saved lives.
“Everyone said, ‘This is no drill, go, go, go,’” said Frank Putzo, an attorney. “And a whole bunch of us were able to make it to the emergency exits.”
Just ask the commissary customers who, when the shots rang out in the building’s commissary, were offered shelter and safety out of sight and out of harms way in the kitchen by the food service workers.
Just ask the third floor employees who, when the gunshots sounded, made the life-saving decision to barricade themselves rather than flee into the hallway into the line of fire.
Capt. Mark Vandroff and his colleagues stacked chairs and desks in front of a door and got down on the floor. Two bullets ripped through the plaster but sailed high above their heads, harmlessly striking the conference room wall. Vandroff and his people kept cool, covered their hair and eyes, and stayed down for 30 minutes before police evacuated them.
“We were hunkered down, we were on the floor because we had heard the previous gunshot. We heard gunfire and we looked up and there were two bullet holes in the top of the wall of the conference room,” Vandroff said.
Rather than give away their position by talking, his team texted each other from their smart phones.
Just ask the workers who outside the building, beyond the police barricades, comforted each other and were met by loved ones. One man found his daughter, who had been shot in the head, already being treated by paramedics. Doctors later described her being “very, very lucky.”
But there were others among the crowd who had not heard from their family members.
“I’m hoping and praying he [comes] back into my life like he left this morning,” said Jacqueline Alston, whose partner Ernest Johnston worked as a Navy yard janitor. ”I’m worried sick, I’m very, very worried,” she told ABC News early that day. “I’m numb, I’m numb.”
Later that evening, with the building still locked down, Alston finally heard from Johnston.
“At 12:00 or 1:00 p.m., I had tears in my eyes. Now I’m so happy I can’t even shed a tear. As soon as I heard his voice I was OK… This has been a trying day today and I’m just praying for those who have lost family.”
And just ask Lindwood, a visually-impaired employee who uses a walking stick. Omar Grant, a civilian employee, was with him on the first floor of the atrium when the shots rang out.
“We heard two shots and started wondering if that was the sound of someone dropping something or if they were really shots,” Grant told Yahoo News. “We heard three more shots, and that’s when people started running out of the building and getting the hell out of there.”
While others ran for the exits, Grant took Lindwood by the arm and carefully led him to safety. They walked slowly together from the base to the nearby Metro station. Grant held his colleague’s arm and carefully escorted him to the train.
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Everyday heroes. Survivors. Selfless men and women. Let us take this moment to honor them. They and those who fell must not be forgotten.