Nearly 25 years after the attacks on America, footage from the response to the crash of American Airlines Flight 77 into the Pentagon is being released.
Jude Coke, her cameraman Billy DeWeese and firefighter Christopher DeWolf were supposed to film an emergency responder training video with the Baltimore City Fire Department, but those plans quickly changed on the morning of Sept. 11, 2001, USA Today reported.
It was Coke’s first day on the job after being laid off from a corporate video-producing job and starting a new position making emergency training films, she said. The first attack had already happened at the World Trade Center when she arrived at the Baltimore firehouse. First responders there watched it unfold on television, like so many did that day.
Coke’s boss then urged the team to get as close to the Pentagon as possible.
“We were granted an immense responsibility to capture this event in the most responsible way we could,” she said, according to USA Today. “In the aftermath of that event, we couldn’t control what happened to us, but we could control how we responded to it.”
The trio embedded with the Arlington County Fire Department, documenting the response for three days.
Coke said her crew was the only civilian one allowed near the Pentagon as it burned.
The video her group recorded showed the charred hallways, the plane’s wreckage, a chaplain leading a prayer, and a Marine Corps flag near where walls had collapsed on the fourth floor, USA Today reported.
When her team’s job was done, she made the hourlong training video she was supposed to, then put the 9/11 footage away for almost 20 years.
Until the 20th anniversary approached.
After making a few calls, she realized she may have the only surviving video from the immediate Pentagon recovery efforts.
Some short clips of her footage were used in documentaries, but this year, to mark the 25th anniversary, longer clips are being uploaded to the 9/11 Legacy Foundation’s website, on its page, “The Pentagon Response Series.”
The website states, “Much of what they recorded has never been seen outside the emergency responder training community.”
The foundation shared a clip once a month starting in April and will end in September to “offer a firsthand look at the courage, coordination, and humanity of those who responded.”
The clips are:
- Part One: Called Into Service
- Part Two: The Threshold
- Part Three: Lines of Support
- Part Four: A Symbol of Resilience
- Part Five: Words Still Echo
- Part Six
Each video can be viewed on the 9/11 Legacy webpage or on the foundation’s YouTube channel.
© 2026 Cox Media Group
/cloudfront-us-east-1.images.arcpublishing.com/cmg/LH3JSJEF3VBLRJLJQESEAG34AM.png)
