Local Texas Task Force 1 members tell their 9/11 stories
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As any major disaster develops, the task at hand shifts from rescue to recovery and one Texas-based task force is always ready.
Texas Task Force 1 is the state’s elite search and rescue and has been called to action for major disasters, both locally and across the nation.
The Texas-based task force was dispatched to Ground Zero after the attacks on Sept. 11, 2001.
Austin Fire Department’s Battalion Chief Warren Weidler and Division Chief Dawn Clopton's jurisdiction is larger than most.
While their primary role is to serve Austin, as members of Texas Task Force 1, they must stay prepared to be dispatched anywhere.
"I always try to thank the citizens of Austin, Texas because we go away to help other people, and they allow it." Battalion Chief Weidler said.
Responding to the immediate aftermath of the Sept. 11 terrorist attack was Texas Task Force 1’s first federal response.
“You couldn't see across it. It took almost an hour to walk completely around the site area," Division Chief Clopton said.
From cutting steel to passing buckets down a line, they said the work at Ground Zero seemed endless.
"There was steel out there that was still so hot you couldn't touch it. It was hot through the steel-toed boots. You could still feel the heat coming through the steel because there were still fires burning down under there," Clopton said. "If you ever imagined hell, that's probably the smells, the sounds, the heat, the smoke.”
After laboring for almost two weeks, it was only on the trip back when the team had time to reflect.
"I think a lot of people came home, and you hugged your wife a little tighter, you talked to your parents a little more, you hugged your kids a little tighter," Chief Warren said.
The reflections continue for both firefighters a decade later.
“I come from a military family,” Chief Clopton said. “I still have a brother and a nephew in the military. One's in Afghanistan and one's in Iraq right now, so I understand the long-term ramifications of what happened that day."
Most recently, Texas Task Force 1 has been called in for recovery efforts for the Bastrop County Complex Fire which burned 34,000 acres and destroyed more than 500 homes.