WASHINGTON - Two Reuters reporters traveled with George W. Bush on September 11, 2001 on what began as a feel-good trip to Florida to promote education.

Here are some of their memories of that day, and those that followed, as they watched Bush's evolution from the leader of a country enjoying peace and prosperity to a wartime president.

Arshad Mohammed:

"Mr. President, are you aware of the reports of a plane crash in New York?"

I called out that question to Bush in the Florida classroom where, unbeknownst to me, he had just learned the second World Trade Center tower had been hit by an airplane.

Those minutes in the Emma E. Booker Elementary school, where Bush silently came to grips with the attack on the United States illustrate the blessings and the frustrations of being in the media pool that travels everywhere with the president.

On the one hand, we witness history in real time -- watching White House chief of staff Andrew Card whisper into Bush's ear as he sat with second graders, and enjoying direct access to the president to lob questions at will.

On the other, as in every White House, the information flow is tightly controlled and our questions often go unanswered.

Standing in the classroom, we knew the first tower had been hit, but not the second and we had no idea what Bush had been told by Card, nor any clear sense of what might happen next.

Bush brushed off my question and emerged a short while later in the school library to say: "Today we've had a national tragedy. Two airplanes have crashed into the World Trade Center in an apparent terrorist attack on our country."

Caught off guard by the hijacked plane attacks, Bush gave an initially halting response, and spent the day flying across the country on Air Force One fleeing some unseen enemy instead of returning immediately to Washington, moves that raised doubts about his leadership in the tumult of the crisis.

Only days later, when he visited the smoking remains of the downed World Trade Center towers would the new president seem to regain his footing with a dramatic, impromptu speech atop a crumpled firetruck and a vow to punish the attackers.

Air Force one heads for points unknown

Bush sped away from the school in a long motorcade.

According to the 9/11 Commission Report, the president learned of the attack on the Pentagon on his way to the airport and he grudgingly accepted the Secret Service's advice that he not return to Washington as he wished.

Before we boarded the plane, a team of security agents and sniffer dogs checked the media pool at the foot of the stairs -- an unusual step as we'd already been screened once -- and one that suggested the Secret Service was taking no chances.

Near the back stairs, a White House official, in a rare display of emotion, bellowed out to ask if everyone was on board.

Virtually everyone else -- from the security personnel who protect the plane to the news photographers who track the president -- had their game faces on.

Within minutes of takeoff, it was clear we were not flying home along the Florida seaboard on the route we had taken the day before, with beaches and blue water beneath us.

Instead, we flew over land, made at least one sharp turn, and climbed steeply to an altitude far beyond normal.

In the back cabin, the press pool was on edge but unaware of the frantic attempts to remain in touch with the White House from the front of the plane.

Like most passengers, we were riveted by live images of the attacks broadcast on a TV screen at the front of our cabin, at one point watching in disbelief and horror as one of the twin towers collapsed.