After 9:37 a.m. September 11, 2001: Some Witnesses Surprised by Lack of Plane Debris at the Pentagon

This piece of metal, apparently showing the red, white, and blue stripes worn by American Airlines, is said to be a piece of wreckage from Flight 77. [Source: Associated Press]Some emergency responders and other witnesses are surprised at the lack of major plane debris at the Flight 77 crash site at the Pentagon:
Brian Ladd of the Fort Myer Fire Department arrives at the scene a few minutes after the attack. Yet, “Expecting to see pieces of the wings or fuselage,” he instead sees “millions of tiny pieces” of debris spread “everywhere.” [Goldberg et al., 2007, pp. 68]
Captain John Durrer of the Metropolitan Washington Airports Authority Fire Department also arrives within minutes of the crash. He later recalls thinking: “Well where’s the airplane, you know, where’s the parts to it? You would think there’d be something.” Reportedly, “The near total disintegration of the plane had left only a multitude of bits scattered outside the building.” [Goldberg et al., 2007, pp. 70]
Steve DeChiaro, the president of a New Jersey technology firm, had just arrived at the Pentagon when it was hit and ran toward the crash site. He later recalls: “But when I looked at the site, my brain could not resolve the fact that it was a plane because it only seemed like a small hole in the building. No tail. No wings. No nothing.” [Scripps Howard News Service, 8/1/2002]
Early in the afternoon, CNN Pentagon correspondent Jamie McIntyre reports: “[T]he only pieces left that you can see are small enough that you can pick up in your hand. There are no large tail sections, wing sections, fuselage, nothing like that anywhere around, which would indicate that the entire plane crashed into the side of the Pentagon and then caused the side to collapse.” [CNN, 9/11/2001]
Sheryl Alleger, a Navy officer at the Pentagon, goes past the crash site in an ambulance in the afternoon. She recalls: “[Y]ou couldn’t see any bits of the airplane, that was the thing that got me.… I expected to see the tail sticking out.… But—nothing. It was like the building swallowed the plane.” [Hilton, 2002, pp. 143]
Other witnesses say they come across some pieces of plane debris:
Rich Fitzharris, an electrical engineer working at the Pentagon, later remembers seeing “small pieces of debris, the largest of which might have been part of an engine shroud.” [Mlakar et al., 1/2003, pp. 13 ]
Allyn Kilsheimer, a structural engineer who arrives at the Pentagon at about 5:00 p.m., later recalls: “I picked up parts of the plane with the airline markings on them. I held in my hand the tail section of the plane.” [Popular Mechanics, 3/2005; Goldberg et al., 2007, pp. 100]
Later on during the day, the FBI arranges a search of the lawn in front of the crash site. According to the Defense Department’s book about the Pentagon attack: “Although much of the plane disintegrated within the Pentagon, the searchers found many scraps and a few personal items widely scattered on the grass and heliport. Plane remnants varied from half-dollar size to a few feet long.” [Goldberg et al., 2007, pp. 159] Also, one photo shows what appears to be plane debris on the lawn in front of the Pentagon, with the red, white, and blue stripes of American Airlines. [Knight Ridder, 4/28/2002]