Former Tri-Cities air traffic controller saw 9/11 from different perspective

Mark Ireson, a retired air traffic controller who worked at Tri-Cities Airport, has vivid memories of the terrorist attacks on America via hijacked passenger planes in 2001. But they are not what you might think. Instead of being at the airport serving Tri-Cities and helping guide planes out of the sky to land when the U.S. cleared its airspace of commercial and civilian aircraft that morning, he was in another time zone Sept. 11, 2001. Specifically, he was attending a conference in New Orleans with a front-row seat from a different and wider perspective. Ireson, a former Sullivan County school board member who just started his second four-year term on the Sullivan County Commission, was among a group of air traffic controllers from across the nation attending a National Air Traffic Controllers Association or NATCA meeting. Jane Garvey, head of the Federal Aviation Administration, turned the meeting into something akin to a command post, giving Ireson and other air traffic controllers there a glimpse of civilian aircraft being cleared from the air in a hurry, all 4,000 or so of them. WHAT HAPPENED American Airlines Flight 11 crashed into the World Trade Center at 8:46 a.m., followed by the United Airlines Flight 175 crashing into the center at 9:03 a.m. Eastern time. Ireson recalled that he and the other controllers were in a convention center, on Central time, getting ready for the day's conference events when one plane hit the World Trade Center in New York City, and then another hit. The room quickly became a Federal Aviation Administration command post of sorts for Garvey. "The (video) screens became maps of the United States," Ireson said. "We got to watch everything that happened." At 9:45 a.m., Operation Yellow Ribbon ordered all commercial and civilian, non-military aircraft in the air to land at the nearest available airport, accomplished by 12:25 p.m. Meanwhile, the South Tower collapsed at 9:49 a.m. from the first crash, the North Tower at 10:28 a.m. from the second. United Flight 93 crashed in Pennsylvania at 10:03 a.m., short of its likely target in Washington, D.C., after passengers charged the cockpit, while American Flight 77 crashed in a Pennsylvania field at 9:37 a.m. The FAA decision to order 4,000 aircraft over the U.S. to land immediately at the nearest airport was a first. Garvey, the 14th FAA administrator and appointed by then-President Bill Clinton in 1997, was the first person in that position appointed to a five-year term, the first female administrator and the first civilian appointed to the post who was not a licensed pilot. Two other retired military appointees without a pilot's license served before her. NO IMAGES Ireson has no photos from the time or place beyond his memories. For one thing, cell phones with built-in cameras were not ubiquitous like they are now as part of smart phones. For another, the information and images before the controllers was under tight security clearance. Also back then, the Tri-Cities Airport was called the Tri-Cities Regional Airport and governed by an Airport Commission, unlike the current Airport Authority Board. "They (FAA officials) shut the (civilian) air space down completely," Ireson said. For hours, Ireson said those in the room watched as Garvey oversaw and reviewed the unprecedented. Eventually, Garvey managed to fly back to Washington, D.C. and the command post was dismantled, so to speak. However, that left the question of how the controllers would get back to their homes, their families and their jobs. The solution came via a van, which he described as the last one available to rent out of New Orleans. "Our group basically got the last van they (the rental agency) had," Ireson said. The drive from New Orleans to Blountville was a more than a 700-mile, 10-hour drive, even longer for the controllers to the north and west of Tri-Cities. He said that van was rented late in the day of Sept. 11. As a Tri-Cities controller, he joined one controller each from Chattanooga and Knoxville in Tennessee, Lexington and Louisville in Kentucky and Cincinnati, Ohio. The group started the trip back, dropping off controllers at or near their destinations. Ireson's drop off was on Interstate 40, where his wife, Sharon Ireson, picked him up. By this time, it was Sept. 12, and she drove him back home. "When I got back on the 12th, I had to go back to work," Ireson said. He got back to work before departing flights were able to resume at Tri-Cities, the first flights that landed in a hurry allowed to leave and then regularly scheduled flights allowed to resume service. He said he was back when "normal" air travel resumed, although airport security has changed drastically since then with upgrades that in part responded to the terrorist attacks. CAREER Ireson ended up spending 32 years combined in air traffic control, including time at the Asheville, Myrtle Beach, Greensboro and Tri-Cities airports. That last stint lasted from 1997 to his retirement in 2021. At the Myrtle Beach airport, he was among the first civilian air traffic controllers there after the airport went from military supervision to FAA supervision. A graduate of Dobyns-Bennett High School in Kingsport and now a resident of the Colonial Heights community, Ireson attended Devry University in Atlanta with plans to get an engineering degree, but he eventually decided to become an air traffic controller. He serves on the Tri-Cities Airport Authority and serves as president of the Republicans of Kingsport. Although he said he and the others in his group wanted to get back home to help reestablish air traffic in the aftermath of 9/11, he also said they got a unique perspective on the terrorist attacks, albeit by happenstance.