By Sarah Robbins
The months after Sept. 11, 2001, are a blur for Leslie Wiser Jr.
Wiser, now chief of staff at the Columbia Police Department, was an FBI special agent assigned to the counterterrorism division when the attacks occurred.
"We were camped out at headquarters for days," Wiser said. "We worked long hours for months after that."
He was in his 11th-floor office at FBI headquarters in Washington when his boss asked if Wiser had heard about the plane that hit the World Trade Center tower. He hadn't. He turned on the TV and watched the second plane fly into the other tower.
Director Robert Miller, who had only been on the job since Sept. 4, Wiser and others decided to open the Strategic Information and Operations Center, an FBI system that collects, processes and distributes information in an emergency.
Wiser said there was suspicion early on that al-Qaida was behind the attacks. The assault's complexity was a hallmark of the way it operated. There was also concern there would be attacks with small arms, like handguns, because al-Qaida had used those tactics before, he said.
A list of suspects was created from the passenger manifests of the flights.
"There was an unquenchable thirst for information that we had to provide, and it had to be accurate," Wiser said.
The third plane flew into the Pentagon. A fourth plane crashed into a Pennsylvania field as passengers stormed the terrorists who had hijacked it.
The counterterrorism division began coordinating with the federal government, the Federal Aviation Administration and the National Transportation Safety Board to make sure no additional attacks occurred.
Before September 11, Wiser was focused on infrastructure protection and had developed relationships with utilities, pipelines and other companies that after September 11 feared they would be attacked next.
Wiser said it was December before some sense of normality returned to the FBI.
"There was a great deal of thoughtful analysis about what had occurred," says Wiser. "But we were also very busy separating out the real facts from the rumored facts."
In February 2002, Wiser was dispatched to Los Angeles by the director for a special project he won't talk about.
He came to Columbia in June 2004 as special agent in charge of South Carolina's main FBI office, but in 2005 he was transferred to head the New Jersey office. He retired in 2007 and made his way back to Columbia because, Wiser said, his family wanted to call it home.
The attacks transformed the FBI, Wiser said, and created a greater focus on intelligence work and coordination with other agencies.
The CIA and the FBI share information more freely now that earlier legal restrictions have been lifted. But, he said, "It's not over.
"We have to remain vigilant here in the U.S. because there are people committed to attacking the U.S. here and abroad."
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