Posted on 09/10/2007 6:41:30 PM PDT by Milwaukee_Guy
Might be a good time to revisit how we all heard about the the attack on 9/11 and how we reacted to the darkest day in American history.
What emotions were strongest for you on that day?
How did you find out? Did you stay at work? Did you go Home? Who did you call?
I had just come back from running and, just as always, I had CNN on while I got ready for the shower. They reported "Plane crash at the World Trade...". The hole in the building looked small from the ground, as though it might have been made by some bonehead dentist lost in a Cessna. As soon as the second plane hit, I knew it must be an attack, but the CNN infobots kept treating it as an "incredible air traffic control error at JFK..."
Same here. Doing exactly what I'm doing right now in cubicle land. Now that I think about it, a lot of important things have happened when I've been on "the forum."
I got a phone call before the second plane hit,,,
Woke-up in the fog of war,,,
I have. Every day since then. For the fat lot of good it does me.
That’s what I meant. :^) (Good for you)
I hear ya, it is weird because one of my students this year, is the daughter of one of those pilots who were guarding the skies of NYC after the attacks.
I was working for the ‘Bret Schundler for Governor’ campaign in NJ. I remember looking up at the brilliantly blue sky as I was walking into the building. I saw a passenger plane and thought of what a beautiful day it was to be going somewhere. (Not one of the destined planes)
Shortly afterward, it came over the TV (which was always on). What a totally unbelievable scene to watch! I had forgotten my lunch and my husband was dropping it by. As he came into headquarters, he asked me if I knew what was going on at Eagle Rock — which overlooks Mantattan — because the place was packed with cars and police.
One of the volunteers called his home as his BIL worked in the South Tower. BIL was fine and had called home, after the South Tower was hit, to say he was leaving the building. He never made it out.
I see the NYC skyline just about every day and I still can’t believe it happened.
Like most, I was at work. My boss’s co-manager leaned around the cubicle wall and said that a plane had gone into the World Trade Center. Being a historian, I immediately thought of the plane that flew into the Empire State Building. Then we heard that a second plane hit and my boss said “this is that Taliban bullshit!”
There was some chaos in the office. We were on the tenth floor of the Exchange Place tower in Boston. The windows right behind my desk faced across to Logan Airport, where the two planes had taken off, not long before. We watched as plane after plane landed...none took off again for four days.
We got out of there about twenty past ten. I remember seeing an email from my brother. I didn’t bother to reply. I shut down the computer and left.
Saw the second plane hit at home...blew my mind...decided to go in to work anyway to get feedback, a college, and once there saw a crowd of people in shock gathered around a TV monitor, looked up at the 3rd floor..a balcony type structure and saw students laughing...looked closer and saw among them several Yemeni (Muslim) students including one of mine.
I have been a Patriot Act crusader ever since.
Our elder son was serving in the USMC at Camp Pendleton, and I was checking postings on the "Sgt. Grit" forum - I always liked to keep up with what the Marines were doing - when Grit himself wrote, "If you've got a flag, go fly it NOW."
Ever since 9/11/01, Old Glory, the USMC flag (for my son), and the USN flag (my prior service) have hung proudly on my balcony.
Each and every day.
I’d been watching Imus that morning but wasn’t in the mood so I muted the TV & turned on the radio. Not long after that the morning guys said that there was some weird news out of New York. They said “it looks like a plane has crashed into the World Trade Center. Looks like it might be a Cessna....”
I turned around & saw the smoke billowing out of the tower. Knew exactly what was happening when the second plane hit. By the time there was a report of the plane in Pennsylvania I was ready to go get the kids out of school.
I can’t remember what I had for breakfast yesterday but I remember that day in vivid detail.
It was my oldest son’s first day of kindergarten.
I was getting ready to take my youngest son in to the hospital for a hearing test and listening to WABC radio’s Curtis(Sliwa) and (Ron)Kuby show. The first report I heard was that a “small Piper Cub-type plane” had crashed into the WTC and that there was a fire. I remember wondering, given how spectacularly clear the day was, how in the world THAT had happened. I decided that the pilot had to have had a massive heart attack or something.
I called downstairs to my husband and told him to turn on the TV. When I got down there myself and saw the hole left in the building I said, “That was no Piper Cub. That hole’s 6 stories tall!” I watched for a few more minutes and then got into my car and prepared to battle the traffic on the Long Island Expressway. I was still listening to Curtis and Kuby. Curtis was speculating whether or not this might be a terrorist attack, and Kuby was saying not to jump the gun, that it was probably an accident. When I got onto the highway, an eyewitness caller who was describing the scene live let out the most blood-curdling scream I’d ever heard. Even through the mono reception from an AM station, the whole car seemed to reverberate with the sound. Then the man said, “Another plane! Another plane just hit the other tower!” There was shocked silence as the two hosts absorbed this information and finally Kuby said something like (I paraphrase), “It’s not looking good for this being an accident.”
As I approached the NYC border (I was not travelling all the way in to the City), I could see the column of smoke rising over the horizon. I got to the hospital. By the time I’d secured a parking spot, the Pentagon had been hit. One minute before I exited the car, the first tower fell. By the time I’d gotten signed in at the hospital, they had both fallen.
The ride home that day was surreal. The traffic was bumper-to-bumper, but there was none of the usual “hurry-up-and-get-home” feeling. Not a single horn honked. No one cut off anybody else. And only police cars and fire trucks were going westbound.
I hadn’t seen a single TV image of any of this until I got home several hours later.
Regards,
It was chilling to say the least and I’ve never been more emotional in my life. It was rage.
Augusto Pinochet’s coup d’etat that brought down Chile’s red regime led by Salvador Allende
Now that was a happy 9-11...
I was in a meeting at Plano Chamber of Commerce. Someone had come in and said something about the Twin Towers and The Pentagon. I really didn’t grasp what she meant.
It wasn’t until I was driving to my office when I heard on the radio that both WTC towers had collapsed. My eyes welled with tears and “NO, God, NO”s over and over.
At the office everyone was gathered in the lobby, watching the TV monitor. I then remembered that Ross Perot officed two floors above me. Thinking that whoever was doing this might be wanting revenge on him for extricating several EDS employees during the Iran Hostage Crisis, I thought it best to grab my laptop and head home to watch the coverage.
I went to church later, alone in the sanctuary, prayed and cried like a baby.
As for all of us, it was very surreal. Like JFK, it was one of those “never forget” moments.
Wifey was ticketed to fly from Los Angeles to Minneapolis a month later, but the reunion got cancelled due to all of this. NWA wouldn't issue a refund, so the ticket envelope still, to this day, sits in my "inbox" waiting for prepaid revenge.
i was in San Diego and i sleep usually with the radio on. as i awoke to the news. at first thought that i was listening to a some sort of repmake of Well’s “The War of the Worlds”. i turned on the TV only to see replays of the attacks, i still didn’t fathom what was going on.
as i followed the events of the day. i realized that our coutry had been changed forever. i concluded that we were going to be at war for a very long time by an enemy that had been invited to our midst.
my first supposition was that this was a Soviet/Russian sponsored event and i happened to spend the evening at Roger Hedgecoks’ restaurant. he didn’t appear to have have an insight at that time.
i recall meeting some liberal broads at the restaurant that were convinced that we were all doomed, that it was time to give up and die.
the next day, there was a fireworks display that i only heard in the distance (which i thought was in poor form); it kept me up late wondering what was going on.
needless to say, i drove back to New England, instead of flying.
my Prayers are with You All
It was a clear, cool, beautiful fall day. I was at the bank listening to the radio after the first plane hit, and then the second plane hit as I drove home. I phoned my spouse at work and as I was talking on the cordless in the backyard, I heard what I believe, given the time, was the sound of the plane slamming into the Pentagon several miles away. All that day, smoke from the burning crossed the southern sky in front of my house.
—tkoed
Thanks for letting us get this out. Kudos Milwaukee_Guy. ;^)
I went to the office and into a meeting. Someone came in and told us the Pentagon had been hit. No one said a word.
I checked in with the family. My husband was watching it at his office and said they were evacuating his building. The kids' school was on lock down. We're no where near where any of the attacks were happening, but no one knew that for sure at the time.
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