In their own words, rescuers talk about retrieving those lost on Flight 800

Navy Master Diver James Mariano, 41

Based in Little Creek, Va., he arrived on Long Island more than a week after the crash and dived on the wreckage almost every day until early October.

"On the bottom, it's really hard to describe. Thinking about it brings back a sense of awe. In your wildest dreams, you just can't picture the devastation, the carnage that was down there. There were just mountains of debris and things strewn everywhere. . . .

"I recovered a little girl's fanny pack that was lying on the bottom. Sometimes things like that get more personal than recovering the actual victim, because you can put yourself in a numb mode for the victim but when you pick something like that up and it's got her name written on it and her stuff in it, then your mind races out of control and you think about this little girl on a trip going on her first big trip overseas to Europe and how unfair this was. You kind of have to shake your head for a moment and then get back to work."

Roger Riendeau, 41

Now a Navy chief warrant officer third class, Riendeau spent three months diving on the wreckage.

"They brought the new divers in and walked them through the morgue so they would be as little shock factor as possible when you're diving. As a Navy diver, we don't necessarily get trained for that type of recovery. It's a real wake-up to the realities of life and brings home the concept that at some point in time life comes to an end."

Steve Curtis, 50

The East Moriches dentist was on his 23-foot sport fishing boat at the dock after a fishing trip when he heard the explosion. He brought back five bodies.

"As we got closer to where the plane went down . . . there was a huge ball of fire burning and debris everywhere. It had a very distinct black smoke and the smell, you'll always remember ... I found bodies that looked like nothing had happened and others looked as if they had been through a terrible trauma. You knew it was important to recover them for their loved ones. When I left the dock, I thought of my own family and my own kid and how I would want someone to do the same thing for my family."

Jeff Chadburn, 37

The chief bosun's mate is the command chief for Coast Guard Sector Long Island Sound. Ten years ago he was operations officer on the 82-foot cutter Point Francis based in New London, Conn., which arrived at the scene six hours after the crash.

"I used to enjoy flying. I loved getting on planes and going places. Ever since then, I dread it. It was probably four years after that before I got on an airplane again. It really shook me. You think of a 747; that's a big aircraft. ... Anytime I hear of a plane crash on TV, it's almost an obsession to sit and watch. It was definitely one of the defining moments of my life, being out there and feeling helpless."

Sam DeBow, 52

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration volunteered its 90-foot survey vessel Rude to help locate wreckage on the ocean floor with its sidescan sonar. In charge was DeBow, now a rear admiral in charge of all of NOAA's vessels and aircraft.

"Now we have a higher resolution system so we have a lot higher capability of finding things. We were down in the Gulf this year using the same type of assets and techniques to help open navigation channels after Katrina and Rita."

"I think about it all the time. I'm traveling half the time. But it's one of the things we all have to learn to live with."

George Wallace, 35

The Jamesport resident was working for National Response Corp., a nationwide emergency response company based in Great River, 10 years ago. Now he is vice president for business development at Miller Environmental of Calverton, one of NRC's subcontractors.

"The state police and DEC [Department of Environmental Conservation] ... wanted a real clean chain of custody of everything from personal effects to parts of the plane being transferred to the hangar at Grumman because of the investigation NTSB was doing. There were over 160 people who were contractor employees and there were about 200 National Guard. We also had marine crews skimming oil off the top of the water after the recovery. But nevertheless, a lot of the material that came back into the hangar was soaked with jet fuel. ... Once the personal effects were sorted, we packaged it under FBI supervision and the FBI would then take those effects and get them back to the families."