Seaford Resident Recalls Grounding Air Travel On 9/11

Ben Sliney of Seaford recalls driving to work in the early morning hours of Sept. 11, 2001 with the sight of crystal clear skies and thinking that his first day on the job as national operations manager with the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) would be fairly routine.

A few hours later Sliney found himself at the center of one of the darkest day in American history when terrorists flew hijacked airplanes into the World Trade Center’s twin towers and the Pentagon. Sliney, who move to Seaford six years ago and previously lived many years in North Massapequa, was in charge of the nation’s airspace on that fateful day where nearly 3,000 innocent lives were lost. When it became apparent that America was under attack with some reports of multiple hijacked jets, Sliney made a bold decision grounding all air travel in the U.S.

As the 10th anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks passed last weekend, Sliney’s mind was brought back to that day that saw his country forever changed and every little decision that needed to be made amidst all the fear the nation faced.

“I don’t think I will ever forget every detail from that day,” said Sliney, who had worked in air traffic control for nearly 40 years when he began his first day as the FAA’s national operations manager in Herndon, Va. on the morning of Sept. 11, 2001. “I worked hard to keep my cool and deal with the situation as best as I could.”

Sliney like many Americans lost people he knew in the terrorist attacks, including some from the Massapequa area who he coached in CYO basketball at in Seaford, where he is a longtime member.

After making the unprecedented decision to halt air traffic, Sliney and his crew had to deal with floods of calls that came in with emergency requests to fly. “As soon as we shut down the air system we were inundated with requests to fly for emergencies,” said Sliney. “It was very chaotic.”

Sliney provided a glimpse of what he was confronted with on 9/11 when he played himself in the movie United 93. This 2006 film tells the story about a fourth hijacked plane on Sept. 11, 2001 that terrorists had planned to fly into the U.S capital but thanks to the heroic actions of passengers who fought back, instead crashed into the fields of Shanksville, PA. While taking part in the film, Sliney became close with many family members of the 40 victims from the crash and on Sept. 10 attended a dedication ceremony for the Flight 93 National Memorial while commemorating the 10th anniversary of that tragic day.

“It is a very unique camaraderie that has developed from people that made the movie and the victims’ families,” he said.  

Sliney, a New England native who lived in Medford, Mass and Providence, R.I. as a youngster, now works as consultant to an air traffic controller firm in Washington D.C. He is enjoying living in Seaford near his grandchildren in neighboring North Massapequa but hoping to retire in the next couple years to a home on Cape Cod.

Sliney emphasizes that credit for grounding aviation travel on Sept. 11, 2001 should go to his hard working air traffic controller crew for the way they responded during much uncertainty.

“It was one thing to give that order of halting air travel but it was another thing to executive it flawlessly,” he said. “It took incredible professionalism by the flight crew and air traffic controllers on that day.”