The Downing representative learned of the September 11 attacks during the moose hunting in Alaska

On the occasion of the 24th anniversary of September 11, the representative Troy Downing, R-Mont., Shared his unusual experience that day, which inspired him to join the United States Air Force.

Downing was on a hunting trip to the moose with a friend in the Alaska desert, the only external communication being an aviation radio, when he and his friend noticed that no plane was no longer in distant Alaska.

“I think the nuclear holocaust. I have no idea what could make planes stop flying,” he said in an interview with Fox News Digital.

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Troy Downing representative, R-Montana, joined the United States Air Force National Guard after the September 11, 2001 attacks. (Photo of R. Krubner / Classicstock / Getty Images / Rep. Troy Downing)

“We decide if they do not come to get us on the scheduled day, which was the 16th, I said that we were able to go hiking in Anchorage and, you know, anchorage was about 350 miles away, so it would have taken some time,” he added.

On September 16, as they emballed the hunting camp, a Grumman goose plane laid on the lake, went to the shore to pick them up, and the pilot informed them by driving in his window that “they exploded the World Trade Center”.

“As, who? And I just try to deal with this. And keep in mind that we have seen none of this on television,” he said, explaining how he was quickly reconciled with the sadness and anger of what happened thousands of kilometers in New York.

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Troy Downing representative, R-Montana, during a moose hunting trip to Alaska in 2001. (Rep. Troy Downing)

He said that the tragedy found itself as a fuel for inspiration to enlist at 34, just a year from the cut, as the hundreds of thousands that did it after the attacks.

“It took a while to get out of Alaska because the airspace was closed in Canada, so I could not go home. And as soon as they opened aerial space, I returned home and the next day, I entered the office of a recruiter,” said Downing, adding that he had no previous military experience and I never planned to join before.

“Hey, I teach at New York University. I have a pilot license, you know, what can you do with me? ‘,” The Republican asked the recruiter. Downing ended up doing two tours in Afghanistan for the USAF National Guard and the Air, including in a combat research and rescue team.

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The original World Trade Center, as we can see in a file photo of July 2000. (Albert L. Ortega / Wireimage)

“And the recruiter looks at me in the eye and said:” Well, how old are you? “I said: ’34. ‘He said:” Well, 35 is the cut, will take the Asvab, “he said.

The Republican, who joined the congress earlier this year after being a listener of the Montana State, said that unity in the days following September 11 should be taken from decades later and stressed that “we continue to take care of our veterans”.

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“We were all only Americans, and you saw these flags everywhere, and you have seen this common goal of retalling, to come together, to have this true, you know, of the pride of being American. And I hate that it took such a tragedy to bring us to this place. But I hope that we can find a way to revise this place, where we are really looking at our common balance.”