Retired NYPD officer reflects

Sound asleep on his day off from work as a police officer in Brooklyn, N.Y., Steve Hamrick got a call from his wife that he never expected.

“She said that an airplane hit the (World) Trade Center,” Hamrick recalled. “She told me to turn on the TV right before the second airplane hit the tower. I just remember turning the TV on, and it was chaos.”

Hamrick, a West Coast native, moved to New York five or six years before Sept. 11, 2001. In 2006, Hamrick retired and moved to Odessa with his family.

Ten years after the attacks on the World Trade Center, Hamrick can still remember the atmosphere of New York City that tragic day and the weeks following.

Soon after Hamrick learned of the attacks, he picked up his four children from school. Hamrick lived in Long Island, 40 miles away from the Brooklyn precinct, and was one of the few people driving toward New York City.

“You see those horror movies or sci-fi movies where the freeways were all empty, that’s what it was like,” Hamrick said. “All the onramps were blocked by state troopers. I had to show ID to get on the highway, and it was empty. It was just me.”

Not wanting to worry his children, Hamrick kept the details of the attacks vague.

“I just told them there was an accident down there, that there

are people in the world that just didn’t like our ways of life and what we stood for,” Hamrick said. “I tried to make them feel safe. They didn’t go to school for a week. I kept them home, because we didn’t know what was going on.”

After Hamrick brought his kids home, he, along with 36,000 other police officers, was called back to duty. He began work at 11 a.m. Sept. 11 and did not return home until 3 or 4 a.m. the next day.

Because Hamrick was stationed at the 77th Precinct in Brooklyn, he was not called to cover ground zero immediately. Rather, Hamrick was blocking traffic away from Manhattan and only letting emergency vehicles through.

Many people argued with the officers, not knowing the immensity of the attacks or the reason why they were being inconvenienced, Hamrick said.

“I’d have to point out to the cloud of smoke and say we have people down there. They didn’t understand at all,” Hamrick said. “It was chaos down there.”

Hamrick usually worked the midnight shift, but had to work 12-hour day shifts and overtime for a month to help protect Catholic, Jewish and Islamic houses of worship, as well as working security at ground zero and bridges and tunnels.

Hamrick also served as security for Emergency Medical Services squads. He said the squads deserved just as much recognition as firefighters and police officers.

Unlike firefighters, Hamrick said police officers were never assigned to dig through the wreckage, but many officers volunteered on days off to help.

Hamrick said what stuck out most in his mind was the willingness of so many people coming from around the country to help New Yorkers.

“All these people came to help. It made you feel good when they you were down there (at ground zero),” Hamrick said. “It moved you that these people came to help you.”

Others were not so sympathetic.

“I remember we were getting some pizza for lunch and this one guy said, ‘I’m glad the attack happened and those towers fell down,’ ” Hamrick said. “I could believe what he said. My partner had to step in between us and told him to take a hike. He didn’t explain it. I know the firefighters would not have like it.”

At the police station, officers were coping in their own ways.

Hamrick did not lose any family or friends in the attacks, but some of his colleagues did. And though loss was common at the time, it was not usually discussed at work.

“We push all that stuff back and continue on,” he said. “You just learn to deal with it, and you just compartmentalize.”

Sharon Bowles, a licensed clinical social worker with the Student Counseling Center at the University of Texas at Dallas, said compartmentalizing is a typical, and often healthy, response for officers like Hamrick who are working high-stress jobs.

“That (compartmentalizing) is often the coping mechanism people will use in order to survive and not burn out, particularly with people who work in emotionally painful jobs; otherwise, you would be overwhelmed with the feelings,” Bowles said. “In order to do their job, the culture is to remain stoic.”

Hamrick experienced the first major change in a post-Sept. 11 world when he took a vacation in November 2001. Until he went through airport security, Hamrick did not know that aerosols weren’t allowed in carry-on baggage anymore.

But Hamrick said he didn’t mind then and he still doesn’t mind the inconveniences of airport security.

“Yes, it’s inconvenient, but you see the nuts out there, and you see what they’ve tried to do already,” Hamrick said. “You just have to deal with it. There’s no reason to complain. I’m sure the TSA (Transport Security Administration) people put up with more than they have to deal with.”

And 10 years since the Sept. 11 attacks, Hamrick said he still hasn’t fully learned to cope with what happened that day. Hamrick said he rarely watches footage from Sept. 11 and, if he does, he can only watch for a few seconds.

“I’m sure it must be hard for everybody who went through that day,” Bowles said. “For some people, depending on where they were and their own personal makeup, some people may lock that (Sept. 11 memories) or some people ‘forget’ details, because it’s just too traumatic – more than a person could really deal.”

But Hamrick said it’s important to move on from the tragedies that occurred on Sept. 11.

“It’s in the past now; we’re just trying to live day to day,” he said. “You’re more concerned with your family and local community. I can’t speak for the whole country, but I think the people are recovering fine.”

@OAlifestyle