Nation's capital under state of emergency
September 11, 2001 Posted: 3:20 PM EDT (1920 GMT)
WASHINGTON (CNN) -- A state of emergency was declared Tuesday afternoon in Washington, D.C., after the Pentagon was struck by an airplane and evacuations ordered throughout all federal government buildings, including the White House and Capitol.
The heart of the United States' centers of power and commerce were shaken as part of an apparent series of attacks that brought tragedy throughout the country.
In Washington, more than 50 people were injured, some severely, in the attack on the Pentagon. There was no word on fatalities. A separate explosion was reported outside the State Department, and a fire was reported on the National Mall.
The Washington explosions and evacuations in Washington came shortly after two planes flew into the World Trade Center tower buildings in New York City, where stockbrokers, office workers and others had just begun a new day of business. A fourth jetliner crashed near Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
Casualties from New York and Pennsylvania were still being assessed.
The 9:45 a.m. attack on the Pentagon appeared to take place on the Army side of the building, said retired Gen. Wesley Clark, former supreme commander of NATO.
"We've known for some time that some group has been planning" such an assault, he told CNN, adding that "obviously, we didn't do enough" to prepare for one.
The FBI suspects the events in New York and Washington are part of an organized terrorist campaign, a senior government official said.
Authorities immediately began deploying troops, including a regiment of light infantry, in Washington.
Among other developments Tuesday in Washington:
-- A car bomb exploded outside the State Department, senior law enforcement officials said
-- All federal office buildings closed and employees were told to go home
-- The FAA shut down the nationwide air traffic system
-- International embassies in the U.S. capital closed down
Bush cancels Washington plans
No firm casualty figures were immediately available in Washington and New York. Washington-area hospitals went into emergency operations as they braced for an unknown number of injured.
President Bush, in Florida when the attacks occurred, canceled plans to return to Washington and addressed the nation from Barksdale Air Force Base in Louisiana and later traveled to Offutt Air Force Base in Nebraska..
Vice President Dick Cheney was in Washington, and he and first lady Laura Bush were taken to an undisclosed secure location, officials said.
Police also hustled congressional leaders away from the Capitol to safety.
Explosion, smoke at Pentagon
Witnesses described a commercial airplane crashing into the Pentagon, the world's largest office building.
"I saw the tail of a large airliner. ... It plowed right into the Pentagon," said an Associated Press Radio reporter. "There is billowing black smoke."
Gray smoke billowed from the five-sided structure as more than 20,000 civilians and military men and women who work in the building streamed into the surrounding car parks. They fled behind blue-and-white strobe lights and wailing sirens.
Elsewhere in Washington, federal workers, some weeping, poured out of government buildings as officials ordered them to evacuate. Washington's heavily traveled streets were knotted with going-home traffic.
At the White House, employees ran out of the executive mansion as police cleared it. A "credible threat" against the White House had come in, aides said.
The evacuations were orderly at first, but turned into sprints for open gates as Secret Service workers told the employees to leave quickly.
Officers, some with automatic rifles, patrolled outside the White House.