McGUIRE AIR FORCE BASE, N.J. — Anxious to save lives, about 500 medical personnel from six Air Force bases set up an Expeditionary Medical Support unit here two days after terrorists destroyed the World Trade Center in New York.
Two other medical support units, still in their boxes Sept. 13, could be trucked about 60 miles to New York City and set up as a mobile hospital. Each is a series of nine connecting 20-by-30-foot tents that serve as 25-bed trauma centers and operating rooms.
“Me, personally, I feel kind of useless,” said Senior Airman Vernon Davenport, an emergency room technician from the 74th Medical Group.
He was part of a 22-member medical team from Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, Ohio, that boarded a C-141 Starlifter about 3 a.m. Sept. 13 and flew to McGuire.
Other units that deployed to McGuire starting Sept. 12 were the 59th Medical Wing at Lackland Air Force Base, Texas; the 1st Medical Group at Langley Air Force Base, Va.; and the 81st Medical Group at Keesler Air Force Base, Miss.
Also sent to McGuire was a rapid-response medical team from the Air Force Center for the Sustainment of Trauma and Readiness Skills in Baltimore.
No patients had arrived as of Sept. 13, and the airmen were anxious to put their medical skills to work.
“It’s a little bit frustrating,” said Air Force Lt. Col. Tyler Putnam, a trauma surgeon and instructor at the Center for Sustainment of Trauma and Readiness Skills.
“But on the other hand, we know the casualties are getting good care.”
It’s a feeling that McGuire’s medical personnel share.
Col. Carol Lunger, commander of the Air Force Reserve’s 514th Aeromedical Staging Squadron at McGuire, was working out at home when she saw the broadcast of one of the World Trade Center towers on fire.
“When the Pentagon got hit, that’s when I got scared that the potential magnitude [of people injured and killed] was unimaginable,” she said.
But before she even got a call to go to McGuire, Lunger was formulating plans for organizing medical teams to provide support.
Members of McGuire’s active-duty 305th Medical Group were having the same thoughts, said Capt. William Magee, the unit’s medical readiness commander.
Within three hours, he said, the unit officials had identified at least 50 people who could be sent to New York quickly, and buses were in the group’s parking lot ready to go.
Agonizingly out of touch
Things were tougher for the Reserve unit. It was difficult to get in touch with some of the members.
“We have a lot of people who live in New York,” Lunger said, adding that one member of her unit worked at the World Trade Center and got out safely before the buildings collapsed.
By the evening of Sept. 13, two days after the attack, 305th officials still hadn’t made contact with everyone.
But at least 60 people who don’t live near Manhattan volunteered to come to the base and help set up 120 litters in a base gymnasium in case any victims were sent to McGuire Air Force Base.
Lunger said 130 more litters could be set up if needed.
Casualty recovery mission
By Sept. 12, several Air National Guard units outside the New York and Washington, D.C., areas were taking some of their members off stand-by status as the chances of finding survivors dwindled.
But while it seemed less likely the troops at McGuire might be tasked to save lives, that didn’t mean they would have no purpose.
“They may need us for deceased casualty assistance,” said Col. Jay Neubauer, commander of the 1st Aerospace Medical Squadron.
The deployed airmen’s medical backgrounds make them well suited to help recover remains as well as help prepare them for transport, he said.
In addition, among the deployed medical personnel are dentists and radiologists who could help identify victims.
The medical people also stand ready as backups and replacements in nonmedical jobs in Manhattan, said Brig. Gen. Klaus Schafer, Air Force assistant surgeon general for science and technology.
Just knowing that he and his fellow airmen can help at a moment’s notice makes waiting a bit more bearable, said Davenport, the emergency room technician.
“But I feel I should be doing more,” he said.
