Former NYPD officer recounts 9/11 terror attacks
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The Veterans of Foreign Wars in Brownsville came together Sunday to honor the lives lost and remember the first responders of the Sept. 11, 2001 attack in New York.
Mark Davis, a U.S. Marine and Army Reserve veteran and a former New York Police Department officer, was traveling to New Jersey for a doctor's appointment the morning of 9/11 when he was called in to help with the rescue mission.
"We figured it was just a regular rescue mission until you see the devastation and it literally looked like a movie," Davis said. "So, it was look for civilians and if you see any police personnel, notify us and we can get them out and get them help, as well."
Davis says the chaos of that day is still etched in his mind.
"It was chaotic," Davis said. "There was no way to prepare for it, but what the public didn't understand was that we searched for remains and signs of remains for about two years after the buildings went down. I worked seven days straight. I think I did 45 days in a row, one day off, searching. "
Twenty-one years later, Davis remembers the day as if it were yesterday.
"I can smell the burn and I can think of hearing the moving the metal out of Manhattan, you had to put it on trucks and take it to a landfill out in Long Island," Davis said. "That emitted an odor that you can't forget it; The smell of a burnt body is nothing you're ever going to forget."
Years after 9/11, Davis moved to the Valley and continues to serve his country, now as a U.S. Customs and Border Protection agent.
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