MILWAUKEE (CBS 58) -- On the 25^th anniversary of the September 11^th attacks, the United States is looking back to honor and commemorate the people who were lost, the families that were impacted forever, and the heroics that helped save lives and heal the country.

Nearly three-thousand people died in the attacks on the World Trade Center, the Pentagon, and in Shanksville, Pennsylvania.

Nearly everyone of age at that time remembers those moments, and many are sharing their experiences on the anniversary.

We spoke with a Milwaukee pilot flying for the hometown Midwest Express Airlines that day. His routine flight turned into a mission to get his passengers to safety.

Captain Chuck Savall was flying into Newark that clear Tuesday morning when he looked out his cockpit and saw the second plane hit the World Trade Center.

Midwest Express Captain Chuck Savall flew from Milwaukee to Newark on September 11, 2001. His plane was diverted and eventually made an emergency landing in Pittsburgh. Chuck Savall

As chaos unfolded on the ground over the next many hours—in New York, Washington, and Shanksville—chaos also spread throughout the nation's airspace.

Savall told us, "I looked out the window and looked down and there was this huge plume of smoke.”

The day started like most others. Everyone remembers the color of the sky that day. Deep blue, with no clouds.

For Savall, it was a good sign.

"You’re like, ‘Good,'" he said. "'There’s nothing to worry about as far as weather delays, that kind of thing.’”

Savall was piloting a DC-9 September 11 with about 50 passengers on board and a crew of four.

Capt. Chuck Savall and his crew in Pittsburgh, where they made an emergency landing September 11, 2001 Chuck Savall

It was another routine flight for the 15-year veteran who had flown the Milwaukee-to-Newark route hundreds of times.

As he got down to 13,000 feet, they were about 30 miles from Newark and in their final descent.

“Suddenly we got put in a holding pattern," he said.

A holding pattern was unusual in good weather, and air traffic control wouldn't tell them why.

“And that was the first hint that something wasn’t normal.”

Savall got to work, thinking they could land at LaGuardia instead, or JFK. But they soon found out that would not be allowed.

He said there was always chatter on the radio frequencies, where pilots can hear other pilots.

One asked, "Anybody know what that smoke is in lower Manhattan?"

Another said, "The top of the World Trade Center building, a major fire."

"And I thought, well, I can see the World Trade Center,'" Savall told us.

"And then as I'm looking out the window, a giant explosion occurs in the second tower. So I literally looked out the window just as the second airplane hit."

From that distance, Savall could not tell it was an airplane.

"But I saw a giant fireball. And that's when we immediately knew that something huge was going on."

Initially, Savall and his crew were not told the planes were hijacked.

The found out when his first officer dialed in an AM radio station.

"Then we heard on the radio station that it was actually airplanes. We also eventually heard about the Pentagon."

Eventually their dispatchers confirmed the hijackings.

"And then we treated everything differently," he said. "Locked the door, told the flight attendants to keep an eye out, that kind of thing."

Once they got sorted out, Savall's attention turned to their passengers.

Chuck Savall

"I was as honest as I could be. I came on and I said, 'We can't believe this, but we believe the country is under attack. There have been several explosions in New York and Washington.'"

They were told to get as far from the east coast as possible and had enough fuel to get to Cleveland.

But on the way, they were headed directly into the flight path of the hijacked United Flight 93 and the fighter jets that were chasing it.

Savall was told to make an emergency landing.

"This guy came on and said, 'Midwest, can you see Pittsburgh?' 'Yep.' 'Dive! Dive now! Get down as soon as you can.'" He added, "We were diving for our lives."

And they were on their own. No one was in Pittsburgh; the airport had been evacuated.

Savall broadcast to anyone who may be listening. “We just said, ‘Hey, everybody in the Pittsburgh area, this is MidEx and we’re landing.'"

There was no jetway, and Savall told his passengers there likely would not be anyone inside the airport.

They dropped the stairs and “We deplaned our passengers onto the ramp. The first officer and I went and personally got all their luggage.”

They found an open door and went into the empty airport alone.

Midwest cobbled together hotel rooms for the crew for two days as they waited to get the ok to fly back to Milwaukee.

On September 13, when the airspace was reopened, Savall was one of the first five planes allowed back in the air.

He said it was not difficult to get back in the cockpit for his next flight.

Savall continued flying for Midwest Express until retiring in 2009.

Looking back on September 11, 2001, he said every pilot and flight attendant was exemplary that day.

And he singled out the air traffic controllers who got thousands of planes safely on the ground.

“They were acting for our safety, for everyone’s safety. But the controllers, once the second plane hit, every airplane in the sky became an enemy of the United States.”

Chuck Savall, his crew, and the passengers in their care eventually got home safely, as "The Best Care In The Air" meant something more on 9-11.

“I never felt fear that day," he said. "I just knew that we had to just be pilots and get the plane on the ground.”

Chuck Savall said pilots had trained for hijackers for decades. Prior to 9-11 they were taught to comply and do whatever the hijackers wanted because crews always survived.

But after 9-11 they were taught to save the airplane at all costs; to sacrifice themselves, their crew, and their passengers in order to prevent the plane from being used as a weapon.