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Volume 10, Issue 36
‘This was personal’
Lorain man reported on Flight 93 crash in his own community OWEN MACMILLAN THE COMMUNITY GUIDE
It was a cold morning on Sept. 11, 2001 and Kirk Swauger was working with a friend to replace the front windows of his home near Somerset, Pennsylvania. Within an hour Swauger, who now lives in Lorain, would find himself at the site of the crash of United Airlines Flight 93 and in the midst of the deadliest terrorist attack in U.S. history. Swauger, then a reporter with the Johnstown Tribune-Democrat, was on vacation and had removed both windows when he received a call from his motherin-law; a plane had crashed into the World Trade Center. “We turn on the T.V. watching this, I make some joke about how the editor’s going to be sending me to New York City,” Swauger told a Chronicle reporter in his office at The AbbeWood retirement community in Elyria, where he now works as sales director. Within a half hour his editor had called, but she had sent him
somewhere much closer to home. There were reports of a plane down outside Shanksville, only about 15 minutes from the home Swauger shared with his wife and two young children. His wife took their children to their church and Swauger took off in his car towards Shanksville, unsure of what he would find when he got there or even exactly where he was going. “One of the things on the drive up there was the concern I had for my family,” Swauger said. “Because at that point I was driving into the unknown.(My family) were at a house with no windows 15 minutes away. I’m thinking, okay, well what if there were terrorists that survived? The community, everyone else is vulnerable. There was so much uncertainty at that time.”
The crash site
On the drive down, Swauger was on the phone getting information from 911 dispatchers he had built up relationships with in his 20 years at the TribuneDemocrat.
He said he had an idea that it may have been connected to what he had seen on T.V. happening in New York City, but there was no way to be sure. “We didn’t know what was down, what was happening,” Swauger said. “It could have been a false alarm for all we knew. But once again I’m talking to the 911 guys and they’re filling me in, “hey this was something bigger,” but they didn’t know either.” With the help of those dispatchers, Swauger was able to locate the crash site and, after being turned away at the main road by police, pulled into an old recycling plant overlooking a field. “I’m able to look down at the scene directly, probably about 50 yards,” he said. “And all I could see at this point was a 15 to 20 yard smoldering crater. There was literally no evidence of a plane, and out of the smoke occasionally a piece of mail would waft up into the air.” That smoldering crater was all that remained of United Airlines FLIGHT 93 PAGE A5
BRUCE BISHOP | The Community Guide
Kirk Swauger was a reporter who worked on Sept. 11, 2001 when United Airlines Flight 93 crashed in his coverage area.
Neighborhood Alliance breaks ground on new shelter expansion CARISSA WOYTACH THE COMMUNITY GUIDE
THOMAS FETCENKO | The Community Guide
The UAW Local 2000 hosted a solidarity rally at their union hall on Abbe Road on Sept. 9.
UAW Local 2000 marches ahead of possible strike DAVE O’BRIEN THE COMMUNITY GUIDE
SHEFFIELD — Brian Dorsey stood on the side of Abbe Road in the village Saturday, holding up a sign and chanting in unison with dozens
of other autoworkers. The Brownhelm Township resident and veteran Ford worker of nearly 30 years was outside the United Auto Workers Local 2000 hall, surrounded by fellow autoworkers, their children, spouses and supporters at the corner of Abbe Road and
French Creek Road. “I’m here to support my brothers and sisters of the UAW Local 2000,” Dorsey told a reporter. The solidarity rally happened just days ahead of a possible strike by the UAW against the big three Detroit UAW PAGE A3
LORAIN — Thirty years after Haven Center first opened its doors, Lorain County’s only family homeless shelter is getting an upgrade. Neighborhood Alliance staff, alongside city, county and nonprofit officials, threw the first shovelfuls of dirt on a new expansion to the center. The expansion will include about 20 additional beds and changes to the center’s layout to better accommodate couples and families with children in a new J-shaped addition. The addition also will create a courtyard for families with children to play outside without going in and out of security. Neighborhood Alliance Executive Director Alicia Foss said the expansion will allow the Haven Center to house 80 people, which means the nonprofit can avoid putting families or single residents in hotels.
Over the past few years the center has seen the number of families — and the size of families seeking shelter — rise, she said. With the current layout staff often had to clear out the women’s dorm room to house larger families together. The current layout also provided families with little privacy and required them to walk through the men’s and women’s areas to use the bathrooms. The bathrooms in the center serves about 30 people, Foss said, comparing it to staying in a college dorm as an adult. Foss said when she first came in as CEO in 2015 there was a drawing of what Haven Center’s “dream” would be, and it wasn’t nearly as large as the expansion the group kicked off Sept. 7. That original plan included space for programming and classrooms, she said, but now they’ve traded that need for growing calls for shelter. The pandemic was a SHELTER PAGE A3
INSIDE THIS WEEK County
Jane Norton honored ● A4
Oberlin
Sports
Freshman find ‘common ground ● A5
Comets win against Bruins ● A6
OBITUARIES A2 • CLASSIFIEDS A4 • CROSSWORD A7 • SUDOKU A7 • KID SCOOP A8