Betty Ong

Betty Ong: [I'm] Number 3 in the back. The cockpit's not answering. Somebody's stabbed in business class and—I think there's mace—that we can't breathe. I don't know, I think we're getting hijacked.

Betty Ong: We're—just left Boston, we're up in the air.

Betty Ong: And the cockpit is not answering their phone, and there's somebody stabbed in business class, and there's—we can't breathe in business class. Some-body's got mace or something.

Winston Sadler: Can you describe the person that you said—someone is what in business class?

Betty Ong: And our number 5—our first class passengers are—galley flight attendant and our purser has been stabbed. And we can't get into the cockpit, the door won't open. Hello?

Winston Sadler: Yeah, I'm taking it down. All the information. We're also, you know, of course, recording this. At this point—

Nydia Gonzalez: Flight 12? Okay. I'm getting—

Male Voice: Well, if they were shrewd they would keep the door closed and—

Betty Ong: I think the guys are up there. They might have gone there—jammed the way up there, or something. Nobody can call the cockpit. We can't even get inside. Is anybody still there?

Betty Ong: Yeah, I'm number 3. I'm number 3 on this flight, and we're the first—

Betty Ong: No. Somebody's calling medical and we can't get a doc—

Nydia Gonzalez: Hey, this is Nydia at American Airlines calling. I am monitoring a call in which Flight 11—the flight attendant is advising our reps that the pilot, everyone's been stabbed.

Male Voice: (Inaudible)—Raleigh Reservations. Okay, now when you—

Nydia Gonzalez: Okay, hold on. Hey Betty, do you know any information as far as the gents—the men that are in the cockpit with the pilots, were they from first class? They were sitting in 2A and B.

Male Voice: He turned his transponder off, so we don't have a definitive altitude for him. We're just going by—they seem to think that they have him on a primary radar. They seem to think that he is descending.

Nydia Gonzalez: She doesn't have any idea who the other passenger might be in first. Apparently they might have sprayed something so it's—they're having a hard time breathing or getting in that area.

Nydia Gonzalez: Okay, so we'll like—we'll stay open. We—I think we might have lost her.

An extensive clip from Ong's call to headquarters was used for the beginning of the 2012 film Zero Dark Thirty. The clip was used without attribution, and without the consent of Ong's family and the airline. They requested that Sony Pictures Entertainment, the film's U.S. distributor, make a charitable donation in her name, credit her onscreen, state the Ong family doesn't endorse torture (which the film depicts being used in the manhunt for Osama bin Laden) on its website and in home entertainment versions of the film, and acknowledge these things during the 85th Academy Awards ceremony.

In 2011, the recreation center in San Francisco's Chinatown where she had played as a child was renamed in her honor, as the Betty Ann Ong Chinese Recreation Center.

Betty Ong's name is included in the 9/11 Memorial, which was dedicated on September 11, 2011.

In 2002, the first recipients of the annual Madeline Amy Sweeney Award for Civilian Bravery were Sweeney and Ong.

At the time of her death, Ong lived in Andover, Massachusetts. On September 11, 2001, Ong assigned herself to Flight 11, so she could return to Los Angeles and go on vacation to Hawaii with her sister. During the hijacking, she used a telephone card to call in to American Airlines' operations/Raleigh reservations center, from the plane's rear galley; identified herself and alerted the supervisor that the aircraft had been hijacked. Along with fellow flight attendant Madeline Amy Sweeney, she relayed a report of the seat numbers of three hijackers. During her Airfone call, she reported that none of the crew could contact the cockpit nor open its door, a passenger (Daniel M. Lewin) and two flight attendants (Karen Martin and Bobbi Arestegui) had been stabbed, and that she thought someone had sprayed Mace in the business class cabin.

On September 21, 2001, some 200 members of the Chinese American community in San Francisco gathered in a small park to pay tribute to Ong. Mayor of San Francisco Willie Brown, who was present, gave a proclamation honoring the people who died in the tragedy and called September 21 "Betty Ong Day".

Betty Ann Ong (traditional Chinese: 鄧月薇 ; simplified Chinese: 邓月薇 ; pinyin: Dèng Yuèwēi ; February 5, 1956 – September 11, 2001) was an American flight attendant aboard American Airlines Flight 11, the first airplane to become hijacked during the September 11 attacks. Shortly after the hijacking, Ong notified the American Airlines ground crew of the hijacking, staying on the telephone for 25 minutes and relaying vital information that eventually led to the closing of airspace by the FAA for the first time in United States history.

Betty Ann Ong was born on February 5, 1956 in San Francisco, and she was of Cantonese descent.