Between September 23 and September 24, 2001: NORAD Commander Visits NEADS and Stresses Importance of Transcribing Recordings from 9/11

General Ralph Eberhart, the commander of NORAD, visits NORAD’s Northeast Air Defense Sector (NEADS) in Rome, New York, and emphasizes to an officer there the importance of promptly transcribing the recordings of the NEADS operations floor from September 11. Technical Sergeant James Tollack, the resident expert in digital voice recording systems at McGuire Air Force Base, New Jersey, arrived at NEADS on September 20, in order to transcribe the facility’s tape recordings from September 11 (see (September 20-October 4, 2001)). Three or four days later, Eberhart comes to NEADS and sees Tollack personally. Eberhart stresses to Tollack the importance of getting the information from the tapes as quickly and as accurately as possible. He says the information is needed for a Congressional report or hearing. [9/11 Commission, 3/22/2004; 9/11 Commission, 7/29/2004] Presumably Eberhart is referring to his appearance before the Senate Armed Services Committee on October 25, in which he will put forward the military’s account of what happened on September 11. [US Congress. Senate, 10/25/2001; Farmer, 2009, pp. 248] When the 9/11 Commission interviews Tollack during its investigation of the terrorist attacks and asks him what order of priority his task of transcribing the tapes had been given, he will indicate that he knew it was a high-priority assignment when he was visited by Eberhart. [Farmer, 2009, pp. 274]