All the while that morning, 19 terrorists were hijacking four airliners after they took off from Boston, Newark, N.J., and Washington, D.C.

The day that began so clear and so mild is seared into the memories of many Americans, regardless of how far they were from the terrorist attacks that ended that day in New York, Washington, D.C., or Somerset County, Pa., where United Airlines Flight 93 crashed after a passenger rebellion. All aboard died: The 37 passengers, the seven crew members and the four hijackers, whose intended targets were later believed to be the White House or the U.S. Capitol.

At 8:46 a.m., American Airlines Flight 11 crashed into the World Trade Center's North Tower, between the 93rd and 99th floors. It carried 81 passengers, 11 crew members and five hijackers. Television news networks began reporting within five minutes.

Parker was sitting at her desk facing the branch lobby when a co-worker poked her head in the door and told her a plane had just crashed into the World Trade Center, closed the door and walked away.

"It didn't register," she said.

Kim Parker

Some TV broadcasters were reporting that this might have been a small plane that went off course. People started gathering around TVs, including those in the Navy Federal branch and PenFed headquarters.

XCEL Federal Credit Union, formerly Port Authority of New York and New Jersey Federal Credit Union, safely evacuated its headquarters on the 39th floor of the North Tower, and moved operations to New Jersey, where it is headquartered today.

The narrative changed at 9:03 a.m. when five hijackers crashed United Airlines Flight 175 into the World Trade Center's South Tower between floors 77 and 85, killing themselves and all 56 passengers and nine crew members.

"That's when the fear set in," Parker said.

The two dozen people in the Navy Federal branch were huddled around the TV set "shocked" and "speechless," Parker said. "It was as if someone had turned the volume off in our space."

Soon buildings near the World Trade Center were evacuated, including the Federal Building. The FBI moved its operations to a parking garage at 26th Street and the West Side Highway.

Caruso sent the other two branch employees home. He then walked the three miles north with a bag of cash and security guards from the building, and set up a temporary branch in the parking garage.

The scope changed again at 9:37 a.m. when five hijackers crashed American Airlines Flight 77 into the western side of the Pentagon, killing themselves, 58 passengers and six crew members.

Schenck, now PenFed's president/CEO, was a 1988 graduate of West Point and worked at the Pentagon before joining PenFed in February 2001 as an SVP and chief administrative officer responsible for security.

James Schenck

When he saw on TV that a third plane had struck the Pentagon, he left PenFed's headquarters. Outside he could see a "big black plume" of smoke rising from the Pentagon.

He ran seven miles in roughly an hour in his black loafers to the Pentagon. Fortunately, the branch was on the side opposite the crash and all 18 employees were safe.

Many other people had arrived to help. "I saw the best of America that day," he said.

Traffic in Washington, D.C., is never smooth, but on Sept. 11 many highways were blocked. It took Parker four hours to pick up her six-month-old daughter and return home. She is now a regional manager in branch operations at Navy Federal.

Schenck recalled that it wasn't until 6:30 p.m. that the branch employees were able to leave and check in at a nearby hotel. The next day they returned to the Pentagon and reopened the branch.

Travel in New York City was restricted for weeks. Patricia Duke, Justice FCU's assistant vice president for marketing and development, said that for six weeks FBI agents would drive Caruso to Justice's branch to pick up cash and then to the parking garage. At the end of the day, they would drive him home.

Caruso, who joined the credit union in 1997, is still the manager at the Federal Building. "He's the face of the FBI branch," Duke said.

Greg Caruso

The death toll was 2,977 at the three sites with more than 25,000 injured. The dead included FBI Special Agent Leonard W. Hatton, who was inside one of the towers helping with rescue efforts when it collapsed.

Justice FCU President/CEO Mark Robnett said many FBI agents serving at the crash site belonged to the credit union. "Our members were called to serve," he said.

The deaths included 184 at the Pentagon.

Parker said she knew a couple former classmates from her high school in Clinton, Md., who were killed while working at the Pentagon. Several credit union members died aboard the plane that hit it.

Schenck knew seven Pentagon employees who died.

Retired Army General John W. Nicholson Jr., who is president of the PenFed Foundation, recalled for a PenFed commemoration last year that he was moving into a new house on 9/11. His desk in the Pentagon was 100 feet from where the nose of the plane hit the building.

"Everyone between my desk and the plane perished," Nicholson said. "You don't forget something like this. It stays with you forever. What I do every day, I do now in honor of those people we lost."