IRS Employees Rescued Each Other After Plane Crash

IRS workers demonstrated bravery in helping each other escape from a burning building after a deranged pilot crashed his plane into their facility in Austin, Texas, last month.

Earlier this week, National Treasury Employees Union president Colleen Kelley told a Congressional committee about one employee who carried a disabled co-worker on his back out of the burning building.

“Upon impact, the burning fuel from the plane quickly filled the air with black smoke making it impossible for many in the building to see anything,” she said, according to the Washington Post. “Yet, employees near exits delayed their own escape so others could follow their voices and find their way out. Employees who were outside the building went back in to help evacuate disabled employees who worked in the mail room. An IRS employee with a disability told her co-worker to leave her on the fourth floor because she could not walk down the stairs. He insisted she climb on his back, saying he had carried soldiers that way when he was in the service. He carried her on his back down the four flights to safety.”

The scene is reminiscent of the way workers helped each other on 9/11 and in the wake of other disasters. You can read more about it here.