Steven O'Brien is a lieutenant colonel in the Minnesota Air National Guard's 133rd Airlift Wing. O'Brien has become known because of a notable coincidence on 9/11, when he and his crew flew close, in space and time, to the crashes of two of the four airliners hijacked that day, American Airlines Flight 77 and United Airlines Flight 93. The former hit the Pentagon, while the latter later crashed in a field in western Pennsylvania.

9.36 a.m. September 11, Military Cargo Plane Asked to Identify Flight 77: Washington's Reagan National Airport air traffic control instructs a military C-130 cargo plane that has just departed Andrews Air Force Base to intercept Flight 77 and identify it. (Wald and Sack 10/16/2001; Ellison 10/17/2001) Remarkably, this C-130 is the same C-130 that will be 17 miles from Flight 93 when it later crashes into the Pennsylvania countryside (see 10:08 a.m. September 11, 2001). (Pittsburgh Channel us Reserve 9/15/2001; Sternberg 9/11/2002).