This was published 2 years ago
‘If we insult you, we like you’: Two unsung 9/11 heroes on the art of mateship
On September 11, 2001, 38 planes landed in Gander, Newfoundland, stranding 6800 passengers for five days. Helping them out were teacher Brian Mosher, 62, and his best friend, town constable Oswald Fudge, 67.
Brian Mosher (left) and Oswald Fudge: “I guess we were just in the right place at the wrong time.”Credit: Wayne Taylor
Brian: Oz is the most proactive police officer I’ve ever met. If I’m not mistaken, he gave me a ticket when I first moved to town 40 years ago! But I forgave him. I was a high-school media teacher and Oz was probably my most featured guest, using my classroom to meet kids and head off minor problems before they became infractions. I did community TV work, too, and Oz would use the cable airwaves for messages about crosswalk safety and school-zone speed limits. We did a five-part segment on snowmobile safety.
On September 11, 2001, it was the first full week of the school year, and while I was fixing our closed-circuit TV, I saw that the North Tower had been hit; while I was changing the channel to get away from it, I saw the hit on the South Tower. Then the planes arrived – 38 of them, with just shy of 6800 people, in a town of 9300, and we were converting gyms and community halls into places to eat and sleep.
It was impossible to coordinate. That electronic thing in your pocket that tells you everything? That wasn’t around in 2001. Oz drove around collecting information and queries on scraps of paper, and three times a day he’d show up at the studio before a broadcast with a stack of announcements: “The Elks Club needs some children’s rain jackets.” “The Lions Club says bingo is cancelled this Saturday.” “Gander Academy is running out of toilet paper.”
Quarter after five, Oz shows up again with a greasy grin and a note in his scrawly red handwriting: “For the love of god, please stop bringing toilet paper to Gander Academy.” Without knowing it we had sparked a mass donation and filled an entire classroom, piled up to the ceiling, with donated rolls.
“If an organisation is having trouble keeping the lights on, or a family is in need, Oz always finds a way.”
Literally everybody in town knows Oz. He used to do animal control, so even the dogs know him. If an organisation is having trouble keeping the lights on, or a team can’t raise the money for new jerseys, or a family is in need, Oz always finds a way. While the plane people were in Gander, he pulled off an impromptu birthday party for 300 terminal-wish kids. He wanted the biggest cake known to man, and it was eight feet by four feet. It was too big to fit through the doors.
Oz is a small-town boy, born and raised in Gander, and because of the musical about what happened here after 9/11, Come from Away [opening in Melbourne on August 27], we’ve been all over the world. People want their picture with us, and it’s bizarre because I was the high-school media teacher and Oz was the medium-chubby cop from a police force of two. He’s still gobsmacked over where this has taken us, and I am, too. I guess we were just in the right place at the wrong time.
People call us Bert and Ernie, but I think we’re Statler and Waldorf, the two old guys in the balcony in The Muppets. We talk to each other daily. We run into one another, or I call, or he texts with horrible punctuation. It’s a beautiful friendship. He pulls into the driveway and my wife says, “Your friend is here, go play.”
Oz: Holy jeez, Brian likes to talk. When he gets going, sometimes you stand there and wonder, “Is he ever gonna run out of words?” I would go into his classroom and talk to his students and say, “You must be bored silly listening to that, but at least you get a nap.” This is just how we gel together – I take cheap shots at Brian and he does the same to me. It’s a very unusual relationship.
During that whole week of 9/11, my job was to go around checking on everyone everywhere, and I’d be driving around and see Brian filming on the sidewalk, and I must have seen him 30 to 40 times every day. I wondered, “When does he get time to rest?” And I really wasn’t sure how long he was gonna last. You could see his batteries running down. He stayed awake almost the entire five days. But I guess he was doing something he loves, which is talking!
“This is just how we gel together – I take cheap shots at Brian and he does the same to me. It’s a very unusual relationship.”
The whole Come from Away thing is still surreal. Remember, none of us thought we’d done anything special. We were just helping people out. That was just the latest news story from the airport. We have one of the biggest airports in the world because Gander used to be on the popular transatlantic flight path, so something interesting was always landing there. We used to get those Antonovs – the biggest aircraft in the world – landing at Gander, and that was a news story, too. Or when the Concordes were on the go. A bit like The Shipping News.
Brian used to have a motorcycle, but he was driving back from the nearby town of Gambo and saw someone get hit. He sold it shortly after. One of the things I learnt as a police officer is that when you go out to an accident scene and you’ve gotta pick up the pieces of a body on the highway – especially of someone you knew – it’s difficult, and you’ve gotta talk about it or you go crazy. When Brian goes through a tough time, I send him text messages – “Hey, Arsehole, what are you up to?” – and once he opens up, he does better.
You go into his garage now and Brian has about 50,000 lights up, glowing and blinking, decorating the place. He’s got one of the biggest TVs in town there, too, and then there’s his sports car “Georgette” – a black MX-5. I swear to god he goes out every night and kisses the headlights. If someone crashed into it, they’d have to get through five inches of wax to hit the body.
If he didn’t have his wife Cathy, I don’t know where he’d be. She’s the brains behind the operation. She lets him out on a leash and when he gets out so far she yanks him back in.
People say we’re Bert and Ernie, but I call us Abbott and Costello. He calls me Officer Ding Dong and tells me I should go out and write another ticket, and I make fun of the fact that he can’t shut up. We get talking with other people around and they often ask, “Do you two like each other?” But if we insult you, we like you.
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