Staffordian probes emergency response

From STAFF and WIRE REPORTS

Date published: 6/16/2003

Staffordian probes emergency response

Of the 30 people on duty in the Pentagon's Navy Command Center the morning of Sept. 11, 2001, only one--Lt. Kevin Shaeffer--survived the crash of a hijacked airliner.

The Stafford County resident is again standing out, now as one of 60 employees of the independent commission studying the events of that day.

His scars testify to the fireball that engulfed his section of the Pentagon. His resolve is a reminder that those most affected by the terrorist attacks hunger for answers.

"He brings a passion for telling the definitive account of what happened," said John Farmer, a former New Jersey attorney general who is working with Shaeffer. "He has a million ideas about everything we're doing and is incredibly focused. He brings sort of a spiritual energy to the work."

During a grueling recovery that included 18 operations and two near-fatal cardiac arrests, Shaeffer set a goal of resuming full-time work this September. He willed himself to get well faster, he said, so he could join the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States when it began work early this year.

Now medically retired from the Navy, he hopes the experience will lead him into a career in homeland security and counterterrorism.

"I think every day of all the co-workers who were killed, my close friends and office mates," said Shaeffer, 31, who lives in southern Stafford near Ferry Farms subdivision.

"They all had families. Two of them had pregnant wives on Sept. 11. I know in this life that I'm not going to have any answers of why I survived the attack, but what I do know is that I can hopefully make a difference in the future."

Shaeffer works on a task force, led by Farmer, which is investigating the emergency response to the jetliner crashes at the World Trade Center, the Pentagon and a field in Shanksville, Pa.

The goal, Farmer said, is to find lessons that will improve the reaction to future attacks, should they come.

The commission has until May to report on topics including intelligence, diplomacy, aviation and the flow of assets to terror organizations. Even as he focuses on his task force, Shaeffer--whose wife, Brenda, works at the Naval Surface Warfare Center, Dahlgren Division--immerses himself in the full scope of the inquiry.

He watched from the audience, quietly and intently, as the commission held a two-day hearing last month on aviation security.

The office in his Stafford home, 45 miles from the now-repaired Pentagon, features a shelf of books he has read, including "Report from Ground Zero," "Who Becomes a Terrorist and Why" and "Inside Al Qaeda."

"Being a survivor," Shaeffer said, "I'm trying to learn every lesson I can."

Other commission staffers also suffered personally on Sept. 11. Elinore Hartz, a liaison to victim families, lost her husband at the World Trade Center. John Azzarello, a former federal prosecutor working as a commission counsel, lost two brothers-in-law.

Date published: 6/16/2003