More than 21 years on from the horrific events of 9/11, one man is still wracked with guilt from his part of what happened that fateful day.
Vaughn Allex was working at the American Airlines check-in desk at Dulles International Airport in Virginia when he unknowingly checked in two terrorists onto Flight 77.
The pair were part of the group of five terrorists who later hijacked the plane and crashed it into the Pentagon, killing everyone on board and a further 125 people in the building, as part of the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001.
READ MORE: Sarah Ferguson was almost killed in 9/11 but was saved by astonishing twist of fate
Vaughn says he clearly remembers the two men, brothers Salem and Nawaf Al-Hazmi, arriving late for the flight as one of them looked incredibly giddy and was “almost dancing” with excitement.
He said in an interview to ABC News: “The check-in was odd. The two that I checked in, two brothers, one was kind of gruff and the other one was standing a couple of paces behind him.
"And this sounds odd, but this is what caught my attention. He was almost dancing, he was moving from foot to foot and grinning and looking around, and my thought was, here's somebody that's never been on an aeroplane and boy is this guy excited.
"And I kind of watched him for a couple of minutes as we went through the whole check. And he was totally unresponsive as far as whatever we asked him to read, to look verbally. He just smiled and danced and was oblivious to what was going on.”
Vaughn said he remembers the other people he checked into Flight 77 as well including a retiree and his wife, who he chatted with, as well as a student group of kids, parents, and teachers.
It was only the next day when the FBI came to interview him that he realised the final two passengers he checked in were two of the terrorists.
He said the guilt of knowing he let the terrorists onto the flight continues to haunt him years later as he felt responsible for the events of that day.
“I had this wild kind of thing in my mind that everything that happened on September 11th was my fault personally. That I could’ve changed it,” he revealed in an interview with Story Corp years later.
“I felt there was no place for me in the world. There were all these support groups and I didn’t belong there because how do I sit in a room with people that are mourning and crying and they’re like, ‘What’s your role in this whole thing?’ ‘Well, I checked in a couple of the hijackers and made sure they got on the flight.’”
However, ultimately he said he has come to terms with his accidental role in 9/11 as he knows there was probably nothing he could have done to prevent it from happening.
READ NEXT:
- Love Island's Jacques makes explosive admission on what viewers didn't see in Casa Amor
- Man lay dead in Dublin drug den for a week as others came and went before grim discovery
- Woman living in her car with cats on Irish beach for months has to wash in the Atlantic daily
- Queen's generous gesture to closest staff member with Irish roots who was always by her side
- Garth Brooks pulls pint and sings If Tomorrow Never Comes on visit to famous Kerry pub
Get breaking news to your inbox by signing up to our newsletter
