Andersen Air Force Base sits on what I’ve always thought of as the Western end of Guam. I say thought of, because it occurs to me that I have absolutely no idea how the island is situated in the ocean. I’m not sure where I got the notion that Tumon Bay faces south, or that Nimitz Hill was on the East side. I guess those are just details, but if my impression is wrong, its pretty shoddy storytelling to not know which direction I traveled to get to the moment that changed my life forever.I suppose that after I finish this entry, I’ll use the considerable power of the internet to check my facts ... but for now, I’ll rely on my memory and impressions for this document. If an error in fact should make it to the final draft ... charge that to artistic license, not laziness. These moments don’t hit all the time, I don’t want to lose this one ... it’s taken a long time to get here.
I think of Guam as being a kidney-bean shaped island that sits out in the middle of the Pacific Ocean. I’ve driven it end to end dozens of times, and in my mind’s eye, it’s about 30 miles from Western edge to Eastern. I know that from a geographic standpoint, it’s the top of a collection of submerged volcanoes that sits near the Marianas trench. It’s the largest island of Micronesia.
In my mind, we drove from West to East that morning; beginning at Andersen, and ending closer to the Navy’s headquarters at Nimitz Hill. (For an exciting story, check out the history of Nimitz Hill sometime. It played a fascinating, and sorta tragic role that no one ever talks about in World War II.)
I was nervous for the entire ride.
Strangely, Dan and I have never talked about this experience, one-on-one, after the fact. He has his story. This is mine. I believe he was as nervous as me. I’d never been to a crash site of anything larger than a car before.
Nimitz Hill is actually a collection of rolling hills that dominate the eastern part of the island. From their westernmost point, you can stand on top and look over at Central Guam.
That’s where you’ll see the Won G. Pat international airport.
To land there, a pilot has to clear Nimitz Hill in his final approach from the East.
They’re not gigantic peaks, but for this particular flight, trying to land on this particular morning, in this particular storm, they were tragically perfect. In the early morning darkness, the pilot ... unaware that his altitude wasn’t higher than the top of the big hill in front of him, flew his fully loaded passenger jet directly into the side of Nimitz Hill at a speed of several hundred miles per hour.
The plane broke into several large pieces, which spilled their mechanical, corporate, and suitcased guts across the hill, while keeping many of the still-sleeping passengers safely belted in to their useless seats as jet fuel-fed flames licked from one side of the wreckage to the other.
Rescuers were able to get to 25 people from the bunch. The last was a six or seven year-old girl. Video showed her screaming for her mother, who also survived.
By the time the Tech Sergeant, Dan, and I arrived there that morning, the scene was an organized, smoldering shrine. Firefighters and medical technicians were finished with their part of the response effort. The airport was still closed.
We passed the commercial photographers stand at the top of the hill several miles from the actual site. Everyone seemed to be shooting with high-powered lenses; the kind I’ve always equated with stalking celebrities.
On this day, all those optics were pointed to the valley between two hills, at the big metal pile. I asked if we could stop. I whipped out our camera, set it up, and asked Dan to shoot long-shots while I talked to the only reporter I could see.
A couple of minutes with the lone photog who’d slept through part of the night, and was now manning all of the cameras ( a fact many people don’t realize ... in the field, especially foreign correspondents share virtually everything, including tape, cameras, and photographers. CNN, Fox, ABC, CBS, and NBC might be competitors, but that’s not something you’d EVER learn from watching their grunts do work. They frequently share the work of covering an event so everyone can get some sleep. It always makes me kinda giggle when they leave the impression that one station or another has some sort of "exclusive" ) caught me up to where the story had evolved in the hours I’d been traveling.
He gave me the reporter’s skinny on how the military wouldn’t let anyone down to the site (seemed reasonable then and still does today. I wish someone had kept me away.) He talked about the start of rumblings about one of the island’s higher ranking officials who’d wormed his way down to the scene for what was generally considered a photo op, rather than mission support. He gave me "confirmed" numbers about fatalities and casualties, and off the record stuff about early speculation about the cause of the accident.
He asked if I’d be willing to share any of the footage we were able to get from closer in exchange for some of the early shots of the crash. I told him I wouldn’t be able to do that, but traded cards with him anyway. He was a nice guy.
I remember the TSgt driving us past a Red Cross tent about a quarter mile from the makeshift site entrance (an access road built directly to the side of the wreckage by a team of Seabees, working as survivors were being pulled from the plane) already staffed with volunteers who were handing out sandwiches and bottled water to the clean-up teams.
I remember passing the checkpoint, and sliding/driving down a muddy, 45 degree slope as far as the Sergeant felt comfortable trying to control the vehicle.
I remember getting out, checking the camera, telling Dan to start finding out whatever he could and setting up interviews while I started to shoot, and walking up the slope of the other hill to get the highest angle I could get. I remember standing next to a gigantic metal chimney that looked directly down to the runway below and realizing that it was part of the radar system that rumor said may have failed.
I remember starting to shoot video and getting into that zone I always find when I look at the world through an eyepiece. Behind a camera, I’m not afraid of heights, or depths, or wild animals. It feels a lot like I imagine Harry’s invisibility cloak must feel.
Usually, the lens allows you to see life’s moments almost as art. You’re not really paying attention to what is being recorded as much as how. Is it framed well, does it look well composed? Is it in focus? What’s the most logical move to make? Should I pan, or zoom, or rack focus? Am I close enough? Do I have enough angles for a sequence? The fact that it’s a beautiful flower is left for the poets and botanists who’ll come behind.
That’s what makes it beat back my acrophobia most of the time. It makes the fact that I’m at 10,000 feet and leaning out the side of a helicopter by my safety harness feel like I’m watching television. Fate forbid that I open the other eye and put the camera down for a moment–I freak. But for as long as the camera is unblinkingly filtering things for me, I’m "ten feet tall and bulletproof."
There is one thing I’ve learned pierces that sense of security for me.
Recording scenes of death.
It shoots right through my invisibility cloak like a Hogwarts spell. It makes me human at the most inopportune times. After documenting the obvious connection between this final peak of this final hill and how close it was to the runway, I carried the camera and sticks to the other side of the hill to start shooting shots of the actual wreckage. It wasn’t real to me that there were still hundreds of bodies inside. It was television. I had no way of knowing that I’d arrived during a planned break in activity. Or that things were going to pick up very quickly, very soon. I was just a young reporter on a beautiful day in Guam.
For the moment.
(originally posted 29 Jan 07)
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