A look behind the scenes of Boston University on Sept. 11

On Sept. 11, 2001, at 1:03 p.m., all Boston University students, faculty and staff received a letter from then-President Jon Westling, urging them the campus was safe and the business of the University would go on as usual.

Five hours earlier, public relations spokesmen Kevin Carleton and Colin Riley were both on their way to the office for a typical Tuesday, sure to be filled with media requests and questions from reporters. However, the questions and media requests were about issues Carleton and Riley could have never imagined.

Carleton said he recalled arriving at work around 8:30 a.m. and having a brief conversation with WBUR reporter Ted O’Brien, who had been rescued the week before after disappearing in the New Hampshire mountains. Their reunion was cut short, however.

“It was a great relief to finally see him,” Carleton said. “But then someone called and told me to turn onto one of the networks.”

When Carleton turned on the television, he saw the North Tower of the World Trade Center and a gaping hole where American Airlines Flight 11 had flown into it.

Carleton said he and other members of the public relations department were watching the newscast when the second plane, United Airlines Flight 175, slammed into the South Tower at 9:03 a.m.

“We recognized it was a deliberate act,” Carleton said. “It became apparent that it couldn’t have been an accident. What I didn’t know is that there was a classmate of mine on one of the two planes.”

Riley said he was “horrified” and “disturbed” by the images he saw on the screen.

“I called my friend because his brother worked in one of the buildings,” Riley said. “One of his friends got out from above the place where the plane hit the first tower.”

While Carleton and Riley observed the newscasts, Susan Paris, Vice President of University Relations, was preparing to attend her weekly meeting with other high-level BU administrators when she observed the plane hitting the buildings as millions of others did. She was soon on her way to 147 Bay State Rd. to attend the meeting.

The weekly meeting was of a more important nature, due to the morning’s events, and many upper-level administrators were present, including Westling, Provost Dennis Berkey, Executive Vice President Joseph Mercurio, Senior Vice President Richard Towle, Vice President of Enrollment Anne Shea, Dean of Students W. Norman Johnson, Associate Provost Peter Wood, Vice President of Planning, Budgeting and Info Marvin Cook, Vice President of Information Technology John Porter and Paris. Paris said she recalled the meeting starting around 10 a.m.

“When I got to [the administration meeting], they rolled a television in there, and we watched,” Paris said.

During this time, while Paris, Westling and their colleagues sat helplessly watching, both the North and South Tower of the World Trade Center collapsed.

Paris said she remembered Westling constantly having a phone to his ear, and she said she was “pretty sure” he was speaking with the governor’s office, the mayor and at least one other university president.

“Phone calls were going in and out from Westling at a rapid rate,” Paris said.

Westling put the phone back on the hook and sat down at his seat at the table. Taking out a pad, Paris said, Westling wrote a letter on it and sent it to be typed. When the letter returned, Westling asked members of the senior staff to read the letter, according to Paris.

“I told him, ‘I admire your position,'” Paris said, commenting on her response to Westling’s letter. “I read it and said it was admirable. He restored a sense of stability.”

Associate Dean of Students Herbert Ross was not at the Tuesday morning meeting, but said he believed Westling made the correct decision.

“The decision for the University to stay open was the right choice,” Ross said.

Westling’s letter, which was finished prior to approximately 11:30 a.m. when the meeting broke, was written in what many considered to be the former president’s finest hour.

Paris said the entire senior staff was “supportive” of Westling’s decision for business to continue as usual.

“We are closely monitoring the situation as it develops, and we are in contact with the appropriate local, state and federal officials,” Westling wrote in the letter. “At the moment, there is no reason to believe that there is any threat to any Boston University students, faculty, or staff, or to any Boston University facilities.

“I am confident I speak for all of Boston University in expressing our sympathy to the victims of the attack and to their families, and our determination to continue the essential work of education,” he wrote.

Athletic Director Gary Strickler, who is not on the senior staff, said he respected Westling’s decision to maintain business as usual and did not cancel any Terrier sporting events.

While the teams played some games on Sept. 11 and 12, Strickler said many opponents chose to postpone games, although BU would have played.

Within an hour and a half, the letter Westling penned during the meeting was sent out to every Boston University email address in the system through a “broadcast email.”

“It took an hour between him signing the letter and getting it out to a broadcast email that took an hour to send out,” Paris said. “We felt it was too long.”

Elsewhere on campus, Carleton was walking to a meeting with the Dean of Students and other administrators. But the scene Carleton witnessed when walking eastbound down Commonwealth Avenue is one he will never forget, he said.

“The second time, walking [eastbound], I was looking at the empty skies,” Carleton said. “I saw the Prudential [Building], and I remember thinking that could be a target too.”

Carleton, Paris and Associate Dean of Students Herbert Ross were three members attending a meeting of the special ad hoc crisis committee, chaired by Johnson.

The committee members, who met around 11 a.m., had dealt with crisis issues on campus, but had never discussed an issue with the severity of the terrorist attacks on New York and Washington, D.C, according to Ross and Carleton.

“We generally meet when there’s been a student death or something else that would impact the campus,” Ross said. “We came together and everyone has the role that they play.”

While normal crisis committee meetings have from 12 to 20 attendees, Ross said he believed the meeting on Sept. 11 had “22 or 23” administrators present. Due to the nature of the incident, public relations representatives, BU lawyers, BU police, University chaplains, the Dean of Students office, the Office of Housing and the telecommunications department were all represented.

Ross said while more people at the meeting meant more manpower, there was a tendency to keep the meetings to those who were familiar with crisis situations.

“There’s a point where you can’t get it too large,” Ross said. “You want to work with the people who have been through this before.”

Ross said the worst part of the day was the uncertainty of future attacks, saying BU “didn’t know what was going to come next.”

Ross said the crisis committee wouldn’t have met had the situation worsened, due to the possibility that an executive order would have been placed over the state. Under the executive order, BU would be waiting for the federal government to call the shots.

“If they place executive order in the Commonwealth, it’s like martial law,” Ross said. “Decisions would be taken away from us.”

Ross said at no point did the ad hoc crisis committee view the school as a target, although Warren Towers is the second-largest non-military residence in the country, according to Colin Riley.

Carleton said BU wasn’t one of the prime targets in Boston, in his mind.

“In New York, they attacked the World Trade Center because it was a symbol,” Carleton said. “If it was in Boston, there are other buildings that would make more appropriate symbols.”

After a phone tree was established, if further situations should arise, Ross said the meeting broke after a few hours.

Though Ross was exhausted, he said he was content with the University’s handling of arguably its toughest moment.

“I was very pleased about what we were able to do on campus,” Ross said. “However, we were very concerned about what would happen next.”

When asked if BU implemented any measures to maintain the safety of the University from terrorist threats or the possibility of a bomb this Sept. 11, Carleton declined to discuss such matters.

“We do not discuss what is done for security,” Carleton said, saying if it were printed, it would be easier for someone attacking the school to circumvent emergency security measures.

While the University day had ended, its events lived on into the homes of those involved. Carleton said one of his main priorities was getting home so he could talk to his wife, and more importantly, his children.

“I wanted to get home and talk to the kids,” Carleton said. “My son was 14, and he’s at a very impressionable age.”

Carleton, Riley, Paris and Johnson all said they pulled late hours working at the office, but were soon home for the night.

On the morning of Sept. 12, Paris said a meeting took place where the University Relations staff maintained its first goal was to take care of the students.

“We said we have 15,000 undergraduates at this school, and we wanted to figure out what we were going to do take care of them,” Paris said.

Ideas were tossed around, and some of them stuck. Paris said a few of them became permanent fixtures for the BU community throughout the first semester.

The “We Remember” wall and website were both created. According to Paris, the wall, which was originally 20 ft. long, soon grew to 40 ft., and eventually 60 ft. The first 40 ft. have been placed back on a wall in Marsh Plaza with a panel for current thoughts, Paris said.

The website remembered all BU alumni and families of alumni who were lost in the terrorist attacks.

Among the first to be remembered on the website was Lisa Frost, a 2001 graduate and commencement speaker for the School of Hospitality, and Mark Bavis, a former player on the Boston University hockey team and twin brother of assistant hockey coach Mike Bavis.

Over the next few days, administrators in the Dean of Students Office and the University Relations Office said they tried to make things easier for students who had already lost so much.

Phone banks were set up in the GSU for students to make phone calls home for free, and the University chaplains were available for counseling at any time.

In ad hoc crisis committee sessions that took place over the next few days, Ross said the meetings mainly consisted of “debriefing” the staff that had given so much of their time on Sept. 11.

“We became more concerned about retaliation against brown-skinned students, Muslim students or Hispanic students,” Ross said.

The Dean of Students Office sent a letter to the president of the BU Islamic Society, offering help and asking if they had any concerns, according to Riley.

While some BU students did suffer discrimination as a result of prejudice following the attacks, Ross said he was proud that none of the aggressors were BU students.

“The campus came together because of a fear of the unknown,” Ross said.

And while many BU students will remember Westling for his mid-summer resignation, many may forget his letter, addressed to BU students at 1:03 p.m. on Sept. 11, 2001, pledging that “the important business of teaching and learning should not be held hostage to terrorism.”