CHILLIWACK, BRITISH COLUMBIA —— "Could you please tell us where we are?"

That was the question posed by a California couple Wednesday morning outside the Rhombus Hotel in downtown Chilliwack.

Their United Airlines flight was diverted from LA to Vancouver after the terrorist attacks virtually shut down travel across the continent. After hours of delays and waiting around, they finally arrived in Chilliwack by bus late Tuesday night without knowing where in the world they had landed.

Winona* and Vernon Howe** were trying to get home after holidaying in Malaysia for a few weeks. The college professors spoke to a Progress reporter about their hopes and fears in the wake of the unprecedented strike on American soil.

"We’re feeling better today than we were yesterday. Everyone from the people at the airline, at the airport, to the hotel staff here has been so wonderful to us, and that has helped us a lot," says Ms. Howe.

When they touched down in Vancouver at about 10:30 a.m. and saw pine trees and a river, they immediately knew they weren’t in Los Angeles. Flight attendants took out their breakfast trays and then put them away. Then the planes started taxiing away from the airport terminal, which frightened them with visions of a bomb scare of some sort. All this time, they had no idea that their country had been attacked by terrorists.

They found out later that their plane was the fourth diverted plane to land in Vancouver and there were more than 25 planes waiting behind them.

"The pilot gave out the information about what had happened very slowly," says Mr. Howe. "I realized later he knew more than he let on. The tension they were dealing with must have been enormous. Every plane in the air was a potential hijack target."

The pilot announced that they were in Vancouver and that all air space in the U.S. had been closed but they weren’t told why.

"We thought the government had been overthrown," says Ms. Howe.

"Or that someone had done something stupid," her husband adds. "You just don’t know what to think."

Then as they were listening to the earphones they discovered that planes had been hijacked. There was a stunned silence on the plane.

"The airport looked like a "ghost town" they say. Security was tight. Dogs were sniffing luggage.

"You didn’t see a soul in the airport until we hit the security area," says Mr. Howe. "It was a totally surreal scene."

Later when the airline was trying to accommodate the diverged passengers, they were given the option of a cot in Vancouver or in Seattle or a bed in a hotel in Chilliwack. They chose the latter option.

"It’s funny. We were feeling sorry for ourselves for having been delayed by a typhoon in Tokyo but in retrospect, all that is awfully trivial compared to the whole picture," says Mr. Howe.

He says his one hope is that the tragedy won’t lead to more violence or used as an excuse for increased racial stereotyping.

The couple were on a bus heading for Seattle by Wednesday evening with full appreciation at how professionally they’d been treated by sympathetic Canadians in Vancouver, Richmond, and Chilliwack.

"It really makes you review what’s important, like family. Health and safety" He says.. "Western Canadians can take a lot of pride in what they’ve done. Good neighbours are precious."

*Winona Howe, PhD, professor and chair of the English Department, La Sierra University, Riverside, CA

**Vernon Howe, PhD, professor and chair of Mathematics and Computing Department, La Sierra University, Riverside, CA

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by Jennifer Feinberg
Reprinted with permission of The Chilliwack Progress, Rick Collins, editor.