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One of the two District of Columbia Air National Guard fighter pilots sent on a potential suicide mission the morning of 9/11 will share that experience at the 148th General Conference & Exhibition in Indianapolis, Aug. 28-31.
Then-1st. Lt. Heather “Lucky” Penney and then-Lt. Col. Marc “Sass” Sasseville took off in their F-16s from Andrews Air Force Base outside of Washington, D.C., to intercept United Airlines flight 93, which was hijacked and believed to be heading to the U.S. Capitol.
Two hijacked planes had already crashed into the World Trade Center’s twin towers in New York City that day, while a third struck the Pentagon.
There wasn’t enough time to outfit Penney and Sasseville’s aircraft with live ammunition, so their only option was to ram the plane.
They decided to aim for different parts of the commercial airliner. Sasseville would strike the cockpit; Penney would hit the tail.
Ultimately, they never had to execute their plan. The passengers of Flight 93 attacked their hijackers and forced the plane down in Shanksville, Pennsylvania.
Penney will be joined in a conference panel discussion Aug. 30 with another now-retired officer who also has a unique perspective on that day nearly 25 years ago.
As events unfolded, then-Marine Corps Maj. Robert Darling spent 24 consecutive hours in the White House Bunker Complex.
Officially, he was the White House Airlift Operations Officer. On 9/11, he was the liaison between Vice President Dick Cheney and the Pentagon to help coordinate real-time defense decisions.
With President George W. Bush on scheduled travel that day, Cheney was the senior-most official physically present at the White House. Darling was next to the Vice President for much of the day.
Penney and Darling are high-demand speakers on the events of 9/11. The NGAUS conference is one of 23 speaking engagements Darling has scheduled between now and Veterans’ Day, he said.
The 9/11 panel is one of three set for the Second Business/Professional Development Session on Sunday, Aug. 30.
Dan Fata, a former deputy assistant secretary of defense and now a senior advisor to NGAUS, will lead a discussion, “Future of Asymmetric Warfare and the National Guard.”
“The panel will explore the evolution of asymmetric warfare and how state and nonstate actors utilize unconventional tactics to exploit the vulnerabilities of technology superior forces,” Fata said.
Lessons learned from the conflicts in Ukraine and Iran will be central to the discussion, he added.
He moderated a panel discussion at last year’s conference on the growth of unmanned aerial systems on the battlefield.
The third panel will look at post-traumatic growth from the invisible wounds of war.
Panelists will include Steven Grayhm, who spent more than a decade talking to veterans before writing the screenplay for Sheepdog, an award-winning 2026 film that explores the road to post-traumatic growth.
Retired Col. Chris Stricklin, a former Air Force Thunderbirds pilot, will also be on the panel.
During a 2023 air show, he was forced to eject just 140 feet before his F-16 crashed. It was one of the most documented ejections in aviation history. The aircraft was destroyed. Stricklin walked away.
He said he has spent every day asking the question: What do you owe the second chance you were never promised?
“We added panel discussions last year to bring more voices to our business sessions,” said retired Army Maj. Gen. Francis M. McGinn, the NGAUS president. “They were well-received.
“We will continue to host senior Pentagon officials,” he added. “We need to hear from them, but panel discussions enable us to focus on some issues and events that are especially important to the National Guard community.”
The business agenda this year also features Gen. Steven S. Nordhaus, the chief of the National Guard Bureau, Gen. Christopher C. LaNeve, the acting chief of staff of the Army, and Space Force Gen. Michael A. Guetlein, the director of Golden Dome.
Guetlein will address the Guard role in a layered defense of the homeland designed to shield the nation from ballistic, hypersonic, advanced cruise missiles and other next-generation aerial attacks.
—By John Goheen
