I started work at 7:00 am CDT. Went to my shop office and was busy checking out how the night shift did and what the latest production schedule required that day. I didn't turn my desk radio on because things were a little busy.
Phone rings and it's a call from my younger brother. He never calls me at work. Something has to be wrong...
Brother - "Two planes hit both of the World Trade Towers in New York."
Me - "What?"
Brother - "Both World Trade Towers are on fire. Both were struck by airplanes"
Me- "Both? Two airplanes?"
Brother - "Yep. The second tower was hit just a minute ago. I actually saw it live!"
Me- "This is straight out of a Tom Clancey or Dale Brown novel. This is like a bad movie."
Brother - "Get to a TV, you won't believe your eyes."
Me - " They actually did it this time."
My next thought was how do I calmly and factually inform the shop and my family? I put my thoughts together and started passing the word...
I was getting ready to go to a grad glass when an aunt phoned telling me to watch TV. She said that one of the WTC building was struck by an aircraft. I turned to FNC and saw the plume of smoke billowing from one tower and a number of scenarios ran through my mind. Then, I watched as the second airliner headed for the other tower. Before the second aircraft stuck its target, I muttered outloud, “It’s those jihadist M*****f******!” When the the the second airliner hit its target, I lost all composure and started screaming (mostly obscenities). One of the very few times in my life when I cursed a solid “blue streak.” Then, there was the news of the Pentagon. At the point I became rather calm and thought, “We are really in it and it is time to bring pain to some very evil people.”
Getting my morning coffee at the grocery store. Got back into my truck. Listening to the morning sports show. As they broke for the top of the hour, they reported that a small plane had hit the WTC. They never came back to sports.
My second thought was to realize the magnitude of just how big the attack was. By the time the event had sunk in as a reality my phone began to ring. Relatives we had not heard from in years suddenly wanted to know where my entire family was located. Funny how some of those relatives who almost expected to hear that our sons were headed to the streets to protect them are now so antiwar.
I was in Alaska, living there.
I worked until 0130 on 9/11 and came home and fell asleep with the TV on.
I remember dreaming about Washington being attacked.
I woke up and saw what was going on.
I called my sister and said I might be gone for a while.
War is here, and I will be going.
I called work and they said we are ready and to come in at normal time.
I then went and gassed both vehicles.
I checked my ammo situation, I felt we were good.
I then woke my wife and told her what had happened.
I was in Las Vegas for the 30th anniversary Star Trek convention the week before. I flew back to Dallas on 9/10. The next morning I did not turn on the news and listened to CDs all the way to work. I didn’t know anything was happening until I got out of my car at work and somebody asked me if I knew what was happening. They mentioned a “plane crash” and nothing else. By the time I got to my desk, both towers had collapsed and everybody was watching CNN in a conference room in utter shock.
I’ve kept my boarding pass from that flight.
I had CNN up and saw that a plane had hit the World Trade Center. This was a just a few days after that lunatic had tried hang gliding from the Statue of Liberty. I figured it was a small plane carrying the same type of nut. Then I saw that a second plane had hit. And then I saw the holes and the smoke. And I knew.
You know how things stick in your mind? One thing I will always associate with 9/11 is that on my return flight from Japan just two days prior I had a small pair of scissors in my carry on. The air line in Japan took them away from me for the duration of the flight but in LAX I was able to carry them right on the plane with no problem. And believe me those blades were a lot larger then box cutters.
I forgot to add, did anyone on FR think it was anyone but Al-qaeda?
Wondering if my cousin was working that day at his usual job in the Twin Towers … he was.
I thought it was some weird dream at first.
One of the teachers came in and told me, a plane had hit one of the twin towers. I mentioned that it had happen before when a plane hit the Empire State Building.
She told me, "No, this was not an accident."
As I turned on the television in our classroom, the second plane plowed into the second tower. We watched it up until the pentagon got hit. That is when we got orders from the principal to turn off the televisions.
I should mention our school is about 10 miles from the 177 air force reserve station. It was those pilots who were trying to intercept any other planes heading into NYC. We heard the planes over our school as they were heading out and coming back throughout the whole day.
By the end of the school day, half of the kids in school had been picked up by their parents.
It was weird, every time we heard a plane go over we stopped what we were doing until the sound was gone.
One of the teachers in the school lost her son, who was on the 87th floor of the first tower. She got a call from London that night. Her son was on the phone to one of their offices in London when the plane hit. They told her they heard a scream and the phone went dead.
Another teacher had a sister who was suppose to be in the wing of the pentagon, but because that section was just remodeled, they had not moved back into her office.
I was in a meeting in Dallas. When I came out of the meeting, I saw all the cleaning folks gathered around a TV spanish station. I saw the smoke and fire, and figured it was another terrorist attack overseas. When I was at my desk, one of my coworkers came in and asked if I’d seen the attack. “Yeah.”
“They’re tracking down the planes, locked down the plant, and calling everybody.”
“Why call everybody?”
It turns out that 4 of my coworkers were on one of the planes that crashed into the twin towers.
After hanging around and seeing the towers collapse, I walked to the Village and tried to give blood at St. Vincents. They didn’t have enough bloodsuckers, so they bussed us over to Cabrini. In the meanwhile, I got really sunburned (I’m a redhead). I also borrowed a cell phone and called my wife, who told me that her best friend, who happens to be the god mother of my older daughter, was staying in the W Hotel in Union Square and that she had room for me.
So I got to stay in a luxury hotel room, with a woman who was not my wife, on her expense account. How’s that for a war story?
When I got off, I scooped my dog up and headed to the Veterinarians office.
I was standing in the kitchen fixing breakfast with the radio on. Heard the news of the first plane hitting the building.
Turned off the stove and turned Fox news on...Just in time to see Plane #2 impact...
I didn’t sleep for 36 hrs...Couldn’t leave the TV.
Took me a while to get the other sock on.
And I remembered Tom Brokaw's dumb comment (before the buildings came crashing down) "You think they're going to have to tear the buildings down, Katie?" UH, WHAT DO YOU THINK TOM??
I was sewing in the den and watching the Today Show.(I know) When they reported that the Pentagon had been hit, with tears in my eyes, I went to the front closet and got out my flag. I knew we were at war and that things would never be the same again. My flag has been flying outside ever since.
My first thought was some off-course Cessna had screwed up, and I said rather disinterestedly, "Whoops."
But he kept staring at the screen, and I went in and turned on the news just as the second plane was hitting. Mostly we were just in shock. We sat on the edge of the bed for hours, just watching and shaking our heads.
It was the same day his aunt went into the hospital for cancer, and never came out. She died a few months later. The whole day was just surreal.
My real rage started the next day when our anthropology professors got together to hold an impromptu forum about how America deserved it. That was the beginning of the end of my interest in finishing my Ph.D.
I woke late that day. We live near Portland Oregon and had a 7 month old Baby, my husband had been out of work for nearly 6 months, the Bubble had burst in the High Tech field by then for us. So we slept in. I went upstairs and turned on the tv and saw what had happened. I immediately went back down and got my husband up, and told him that someone had blown up the world trade center,incredulous. About an hour after that, we found out he had gotten a job finally. It was an immensely difficult day, knowing what had happened and knowing that he was finally going back to work. It was a very bittersweet day.
NEVER FORGET.
I had just gotten the kids off to school and poured some coffee and sat to read the paper (yep still did that then).I had the TV on and glanced up to see the first tower burning. At first I thought it was a clip from someone promoting a movie and thought wow special effects have really gotten good. Thats when I watched in horror as the second plane hit and realized it was real. For what seemed an eternity my brain had a hard time wrapping itself around such an event. Each time I watch those images now I still feel the stinging tears and the sickening grip in my stomach. The attitudes of today seep into rage.
I gunned it a bit, thinking it'd been something like a goofy New York Yankees rookie pilot...turned on the office TV, and it went from there.
I telephonically woke up a whole lot of western time zone people that day...