I won't forget; No Life is Trivial
It’s been called our Generation’s day of Infamy. It was also dubbed
102 minutes that changed the world. That description seems so small
compared to the impact of the events that day and what it’s consequences
have done to the planet since. It’s more than fair to say there wasn’t a
soul in this country that wasn’t changed by those events seen on the
television that Tuesday morning of September 11th. The
effects are still felt today. After eleven years, I’ve never written
about the events until now. I’ve been afraid to. What could I possibly
add that hasn’t been said or felt? I am a writer. And would be remiss
if I continued to ignore how that day changed me, and what I feel in
regard to that day. Still, I’ve been afraid that my words would not be
eloquent enough to express my own personal belief of the importance of
2997 lives that should never be forgotten. 90 different countries lost
citizens, including the United States. The effects of September 11, 2001
touched the World. I am just one person, of millions who watched those
events unfold. It may be arrogant, or even presumptuous on my part to
be writing this. Yet, I am an American, who has the right of Freedom of
expression, not just because it was written on a parchment two hundred
years ago, but because Men and Women have paid for that right in
protecting this country and those rights and ideals with their own
blood. That fact is never lost on me. I’ve tried to pretend those
memories from that Tuesday morning didn’t scare me, or didn’t
emotionally have an effect on me. America supposedly moved past those
events, but was changed forever. As I have learned more about those
events, as I have heard about the individual stories of people saved, or
those who lost their lives that day. What I learned was whether they
were Agnostic, Atheist, Christian, Jew, Muslim, Hindi, Buddhist, Taoist,
their faith, or political views are not as important as their
existence, impact, and meaning to the lives of others. Events happened
that day that changed the entire world, myself included. Put simply- I
will not forget 9-11.
That Tuesday morning in Virginia was a beautiful sunny morning. The temperature was about sixty four degrees. At a little before Seven a.m. I was in Chester Virginia, at a Production Plant called Power Packaging eagerly awaiting going home. I had just completed my twelve hour shift from the night before operating Line Five;a production line subcontracted for Hewlett Packard to package their ink jet cartridges. I punched out a couple minutes after seven, and proceeded to walkout the security doors. The night had been hard. My production line had given me problems almost the whole night. My Ex- wife Ann, waited for me in the parking lot of the plant in our blue Plymouth Voyager, for the twelve minute drive back to the house. I remember thinking as I walked out of the building, “All I want is to get something to eat, and go to bed”, since I would be dealing with the same problems that later that night on line five. I figured I’d be able to face those challenges a little better fully rested.
7:03-7:28-During the drive back to the house I discussed my frustrating night with the Ex while we drove back to the house. The kids were wide awake in the back seat of the Van. The two older kids were fully ready for school. At a little before seven thirty we were finally back at the house. I poured myself a bowl of cereal, while the youngest kid finished getting ready for the bus to pick them up for school. My bowl of Golden Grahams was gone in less than six minutes. I put the bowl in the sink,told my kids to have a good day, told Ann goodnight, and walked into my bedroom and laid down. I remember falling asleep almost as soon as my head hit the pillow. While I slept my first and only hour that day, American Airlines Flight11, American Airlines Flight 77 (which had taken off from Fairfax County in Virginia), United Airlines Flight 175, and United Airlines 93 were already in the air.
8:55-My Ex woke me up, telling me “You need to see this.” I remember answering still half asleep.
“I need to see what?”
That was when Ann answered “A Plane just crashed into the World Trade Center.”
I remember sitting up and climbing out of the bed, opening the door of the bedroom and walking into the living room to sit down on the couch in front of the television. In my head I was picturing something completely different from what the reality actually was. When the Ex had said ‘Plane’, I pictured a private plane like a Piper, or a Cessna crashing into the building. I drew a mental image that I would see the tail of the private plane sticking out of the windows of the building. I remember thinking “what dumb ass pilot could miss seeing the World Trade Center, especially on a day like today”. I pictured the tower intact save whatever windows the plane had crashed through as well as the bent steel from the familiar grating pattern on the outside of the building, so when I sat down to see the live report, my jaw dropped to see a jagged hole center of the North Tower with an enormous fire. I was unaware that Fire Fighters from Engine 7 Ladder Company 1 under the command of Battalion Chief Joseph Pfeifer would arrive two minutes after the plane had struck the tower. And would be the very first to arrive. The events of that particular ladder company would be filmed by two brothers that day, Jules and Gedeon Naudet, they were who filmed the tower strike of Flight 11 into the North Tower seen from the street. While those events played out in New York my television was tuned in to "Good Morning America", WRIC Channel 8, in Virginia. I had no idea that I was looking at the devastation caused by Flight 11 hitting the building instantly killing 86 human beings still alive in the plane, as well as a countless number inside the building between the 93rd and 98th floors at the time of impact. I also was not aware that the death toll was slowly rising as people began to desperately climb out the windows holding on to the steel framing of the building from areas that were just too hot, or too filled with smoke to endure. Or that some had been blown out at the time of impact. I wouldn’t know that by the end 1,344 lives would be extinguished in the North Tower. Immediately as I sat down, my mother-in-law walked into the house from next door.
“Are you seeing this?” she asked as Ann and I nodded.
9:03- At that particular time we were only seeing one camera angle, which showed the North Tower with it’s gash, and smoke pluming out the gash. The South Tower was almost directly behind it, so from that vantage point you could only see the edges of the South Tower. I remember something caught my eye as I was listening to Diane Sawyer and Charles Gibson talk, coming in fast from the right of the screen about mid-way. I saw a silhouette in the shape of a plane banking hard to the left, disappearing behind the tower in the foreground, followed by a giant fireball exploding outward to the left side of the screen. My eyes see, but my mind can’t fully comprehend what has happened at that moment. United 175 had just crashed into the South Tower killing the 51 souls still alive on board, and again an untold amount of people between the 78th and 84th floors in the South Tower as well as people killed at the base below, from concrete, and steel, and people as well as jet plane parts as the death toll continued to climb. The South tower unknown to any one at the time would lose 630 people.
“Holy Shit! Another one just hit!” I practically yelled to Ann who was talking to my Mother-in-Law in the kitchen during the strike against the tower. I know there was an element of fear in my voice, as well as a weird sense of anxiousness. Initially from the camera angle I thought the same tower had been struck again, it wasn’t until the two rushed back into the living room and they played back the footage of the second strike, a little less than thirty seconds later that I realized it was the other Tower. I sat there not believing what I was seeing, and in shock. Two planes within twenty minutes of each other, there was no way it was coincidence.
All of us in the living room had known about the bombing that had occurred in 1993. In fact that particular bombing had been mentioned by Charles Gibson, about three minutes into coverage of Flight 11’s strike into the North Tower. In 1993 I was in my early twenties. I didn’t know the history behind the bombing attempt, or the stories behind what happened in Mogadishu, another historic incident that occurred that particular year and the reasons why. I wouldn’t truly learn and understand those events until three years later during my Second Semester of World Religious Traditions at Regis University. I wouldn’t understand an expanded view completely until after writing a term paper about the meaning of Jihad, using the Megadeth song “Holy Wars- the punishment due” as a basis for the term paper. Over the next couple of days you would hear that word in the news a lot. I being naïve, had assumed events like this would stay across the Atlantic, in parts of Europe, and the Middle East. I never imagined it would be brought so blatantly and destructively on American soil.
Silently, and shocked to our very core, we continued watching as the events that day unfolded.When I look back at those events that day I realize how naïve of a viewer I was watching those moments on television. I learned that day, American citizens are not always seen as the men and women in the white hats, seen as the good guys.I had caught glimpses of it after the first gulf war on the internet, in certain chat rooms, or web pages. I learned that our hopes and ideals, and our freedoms sometimes pose a threat to others. I learned our media, plays partially into that perception, as does our politics. People are People the world over. They are susceptible to believing whatever is portrayed to them by Politics and Media. And sadly, almost no one wants to take responsibility of actions that cause harm to others unless it’s a show of Power. This is the truth everywhere. Humans do not always know how to be human to each other. Nor the importance, of being human to each other. What was happening that Tuesday morning fully reinforced that. But it’s these misguided perceptions that keep wars from becoming obsolete. Whether on our on soil or across the world. In over two thousand years people still haven’t learned that lesson.
I couldn’t fully grasp everything that was happening in those moments at that time. It was hard to grasp and fully understand the danger to the people on the street below the towers, as well as the people above the strike zone in the towers. It wasn’t conceivable to me the danger that the ERT teams, The Port Authority, The NYPD, and The NYFD faced in the moments. I couldn’t even fathom the intense heat of the fires burning, or the acrid smoke slowly suffocating those trapped. I was ignorant of the danger happening on the upper floors of both towers, as some were told to stay where they were at during emergency phone calls. I didn’t know that some of those who had made it out of the south tower were following the training given to them by Rick Rescorla, a Retired Army Colonel 1st Cavalry Division and Veteran who was then the Security Chief for Morgan Stanley. He had been present during the bombing in 93. And he prepared for the eventuality that it would happen again.He was who had told everyone to leave the South Tower the moments after the North Tower was hit. He is partially responsible for why the total deaths in the South Tower were less than half of the number of the North Tower. He would also perish trying to help as many people as he could get out when the south tower fell.
It was impossible for me to conceive the heartbreaking choices people in the upper floors were having to face- whether to die by burning to death, smoke inhalation or die by falling. I didn’t know that Fire Fighter Daniel Suhr from Engine Company 216 was the first firefighter casualty that Tuesday, when he was struck and killed by someone falling from the tower while he was rushing to help. I was ignorant of the structural integrity of the Towers being compromised from the stripping of the fireproofing, damage to the columns, and the temperatures generated by the fires, not just from the jet fuel, but also what happened to be in the offices. I was ignorant of the events of the separate Highjacks. The events that Betty Ong, and Amy Sweeney reported to those on the ground the last fifteen to twenty minutes of their lives. What had happened to the pilots, flight crew and passengers minutes before those planes crashed.I like others had no idea there were still two planes in the air. That Flight 77 was on its way to Arlington Virginia, not more than a couple hours away from where I lived at the time. Or that a highjack would be occurring on Flight 93 a few minutes later.
In my ignorance I held hope that it wouldn’t take long to extinguish the fires hoping that the sprinkler systems in the buildings would be able to at the very least help the fire department out. Looking back at it, it sounds hopelessly optimistic and completely unrealistic. As I continued watching, I wondered whether they could fight the fires using helicopters with those giant water buckets used to fight forest fires in certain areas. As I saw the news helicopters circling I silently wondered how come none had thought about landing on the upper tarmac,and attempting to rescue those in the upper floors. I had no idea that the doors to the roof were locked. I was not aware a landing attempt had been tried by a Police helicopter ten minutes before, but the heat from the fire interfered with the helicopter’s descent. It would be explained about twenty minutes later, during the broadcast. When Good Morning America/ ABC News cut to the various NYFD companies still arriving, I felt a little better, knowing these brave men would help. It was just a matter of time. I believed this. And I hoped that with the sheer number of Firefighters now converging on the Trade Center, the fires could be contained quickly. How incredibly naïve, as I was to learn when I was older. NYFD knew there was no realistic way of containing the fires. Their first priority was to rescue as many of those people that could be saved. Again, I was ignorant of knowing how long it would take to ascend each tower on foot, especially with sixty to a hundred pounds of equipment, having to go by stairwell, while those that could escape were coming down, with the elevators malfunctioning in both buildings.
What I remember that day especially during those last ninety minutes was the newscasts focused on the towers themselves. We could only see from the outside, all of us unaware of the fear of those still trapped inside both towers, as well as the chaos happening on the streets below. News coverage stayed mostly to the structures,about halfway up of both the North and South Towers was the viewer’s line of sight. It could only hint at the dangers within the towers, as the fires continued to burn, as the black smoke steadily rose through both buildings escaping out through various broken windows behind the grating, pluming upward.And although the perspectives changed from the East side, to the West side, the North and the South, from close up to medium shot what was happening on the street below, was rare. Footage on the street was mostly contained from what had happened before the second strike. In a way we were taken away from the human element of those events. The shots of evacuations were three to five second images of those lucky enough to have exited the buildings. None of us viewing the television, or even watching from the giant screen in Time Square would see the destruction, or devastation below the fiftieth floor of the towers. Only those in the street would know. I wouldn’t know about the collapse of WTC seven, or The Marriot destruction until the following day.
One of the saddest memories that will never leave me was the images of people falling. In the years since that particular topic has become controversial, a part of the history of these events that are considered in bad taste to mention. But it brings in mind a question. The whole day was full of horror, why object to one aspect of it? It actually happened. When we can learn to accept it and learn from it so it never has to happen again to anyone else will be the day we truly honor those who perished in that way. I was glad to be spared from the aftermath of those images on the day, but during the initial broadcast I remember clearly seeing more than three people falling from both the towers disappearing out of line of sight, as the camera would either cut away, or a building in the foreground would thankfully obscure the view of those tragic moments. I also distinctly remember one News correspondent filming from the NYFD command center, in the South Tower Lobby about twenty minutes before the tower collapse and distinctly remember a shot of the central courtyard. I remember hearing the sounds of the rustling of paper in the air, the crackling of fire, faint sounds of sirens, the creaking of steel and unidentifiable numerous cracks echoing loudly amid a muzak version of Billy Joel’s “She’s always a Woman”. On that day I had no idea what the cracks echoing across the courtyard were, assuming the cracks to be parts of the building still falling from the impact. I remember that they were jarring and loud. It wouldn’t be until a few years later I would learn those cracks echoing were lives ending, as the death toll continued to rise. Certain estimates have the count of over one hundred innocent lives. In the years to come those images and sounds would be re-lived in various documentaries. It was captured in a photograph entitled “The Falling Man.” In two of the documentaries the sounds of impacts would be haunting, and uncomfortable. But that was the grim non-sugar-coated reality of that morning,and the other major imminent danger the FDNY, Port Authority, and NYPD faced while trying to rescue lives during the events of that day. The part of the reality we the viewers watching the events unfolding were spared from. It doesn’t negate this happened. It wasn’t just the sounds of infernos burning, emergency response sirens, or the march of Fire companies arriving to the site. I remember hearing gasps of horror, screams of fear, and disbelief on the faces of every one. This was the reality.
9:29- President George W. Bush makes his first public address at an Elementary school in Florida, confirming the events at the World Trade Center to be a terrorist attack. My heart sank. And one of my first thought was why? Even today I still fail to understand the logical reasoning behind killing for a belief based upon Faith. Even learning about past history. Even after my time in college. My apparently primitive mind just does not get it. Let alone understanding Mass murder of innocent people,either on their way to California, or those reporting to work in those two buildings. Sadly, it is easier for me to understand Military action based on Political agenda, than it is for me to understand War based on Religious Faith.To me killing is killing, it’s a commandment not to break, and should only have to occur during times of war. And as I silently thought about this again the death toll continued to rise.
9:39- There is a report of an explosion at the Pentagon, but I wouldn’t see the images, or hear a confirmed report of the crash of American Airlines Flight 77 killing 59 including men,women, and children, as well as well as an additional 126 Pentagon employees until 9:53. I will admit that this was the first time I began to feel sick to my stomach feeling a true sense of dread. I lived during the height of the cold war, when the threat of Nuclear war was an everyday fear, and still wasn’t as startled and unnerved as I was that day. At that time we lived pretty close to Ft. Lee Army Base. I worried for friends who were at the Base, and also at the Base in Quantico. I would later see the destruction at the Pentagon first hand later that year, paying my respects to those lost there on a trip with my family to Maryland.
9:41-Associated Press Photographer Richard Drew takes the now well-known photograph entitled “The Falling Man” a visual image of a man falling head first from the North Tower. This image will appear once in the New York Times, on page seven the following day and will prove to be so controversial, angering readers who find the image disturbing,it never appears in the New York Times again. I saw the image on the front page of USA Today. Even now I take the photo for what it is- a testament to what was happening in the wake of the attacks. I had seen the falls on live on television this only captured one particular haunting moment.
9:50- It is confirmed that both crashed planes at the Trade Center were hijacked. Again I was in disbelief. Most planes that have been hijacked during that decade and the decade before were usually handled by some type of negotiation. Passengers were held hostage, while the demands of the hijackers were handled, to try to prevent loss of life. In these circumstances usually it’s a negotiation to release a political prisoner, or a demand for money. Up to that time it wasn’t to systematically and indiscriminately kill as many people as possible for seemingly no reason.This would forever change how I viewed a hijacking.
9:58- While we watched and listened to Peter Jennings saying “…that all air traffic had been suspended…” we were to learn later Bill Sliney of the FAA had ordered all Planes in the Air to land.The total number of planes was 4500. As I listened to Peter Jennings speak, the Camera held on an image of the South Tower, in Close Up. I will never forget the sight I saw next as long as I live. I could see the glow of molten steel dripping from just below the gash the impact zone and sparks to the steel below when the molten steel hit another section. I watched as the outer edge of the tower which had been peeled back from the wing of Flight 175 almost as if it were aluminum and saw it suddenly buckle, lean slightly to the left, as I continued to see sparks and steel melt. As Ann asked if I had seen it buckle I remembered nodding. Then I remember saying “Oh My God!”
The reason for the exclamation was because of what was occurring. We saw the structure suddenly bend and teeter a piece dissolve then the structure drop sharply and begin to disintegrate producing a semi solid cloud of White and Gray smoke that mushroomed up and then out and appeared to descend downward from the top of the roof as the structure began to disappear floor by floor for almost ten seconds under the cloud heading for the street below in a rumble so loud it could be heard in the studio of the news broadcast. We were unaware that at that moment inside the South Tower, Vice President of Aon Corporation Kevin Cosgrove and 2 colleagues would lose their lives while trying to get help, and were at that very moment talking to a 9-11 dispatcher on the 105th Floor as the tower collapsed, or that Financial Manager of IQ Financial Systems Melissa Doi, and five others would lose their lives talking to 9-11 on the 83rd floor. We didn’t know Battalion Chief Orio Palmer from Battalion 7, and New York Fire Marshall Ronald Bucca; the very first two Firefighters to reach the impact zone would lose their lives, somewhere between the 78th and 80th floor in that moment. We had no idea that debris from the collapse had crashed through to the lobby of the North Tower killing Father Mychal Judge, Chaplin of the NYFD and others while he was praying over the fallen. We had no idea that 2 of the Fire Fighters, with the help of two bystanders carried Father Mychal’s body amidst the chaos, of the dust settling and people still falling , to St. Peter’s Church where Father Mychal was officially designated “Victim 0001” the first official casualty to be recorded. Other firefighters including Battalion Chief Joseph Pfeifer had survived the collapse were trying to find a way out of the rubble, to try to establish another command center. The scene was incomprehensible as Peter Jennings proved that day seeing the tower was collapsing at that moment, saying aloud to a correspondent “What…what do we have? What are we looking at?”
The answer to that question was the unthinkable that had just occurred. That was when we suddenly realized the devastating reality, and a sickening realization that both towers were going to go. Mass amounts of people had just died. Again the amount of lives lost climbed, to our horror and shock, it wasn’t just those souls still trapped in the South tower, it was the brave men and women trying to rescue them. We are also shown people running as fast as they could to get out of the range of the debris cloud which seemed to be chasing and eventually over taking them like a sick giant wave, followed by an eerie calm. We had no idea the Marriot Hotel a neighboring building is heavily damaged in the collapse, and will be destroyed by the north tower in less than fifteen minutes.
10:10- We receive news that a fourth plane has crashed in Stonycreek, Pennsylvania at 10:03 later to be identified Flight 93. 33 innocent people killed, trying to stop the plane from hitting Washington D.C. During this time details are sketchy, and the scene shown shows a large crater with investigators arriving to the site. At the same time part of the west wall outer ring of the Pentagon collapses, while people attempt to rescue those still trapped. Attention returned to the remaining tower, the fire still raging, people still trapped on the upper floors, with a new element. The complete devastation left in the wake of the South Tower collapse, and a subconscious clock now going through the heads of every single person still viewing the events ticking down seconds. The knowledge of an almost hopeless,inevitability and eventuality. The ground is covered with a thick layer of gray dust. Those lucky enough to get away are walking from the site covered in this thick layer of dust, ash, pulverized concrete and gypsum. The cloud left behind continued to settle, resembling nuclear winter. In later years that dust will claim the lives of three others. I remember everyone in my house being anxious, and uncomfortable. We have the sickening feeling of knowing that the other tower is going to go, and we helplessly watch waiting,and silently praying it won’t happen. In the end we were hoping against hope, as more information is given in regards to the Pentagon, as well as in Pennsylvania. The seconds continued to tick away.
10:26- We continued watching the news unfolding, as the camera stayed unwavering and unblinking at the North Tower. The first tower hit, although at the time I didn’t know this. I remember that at the time, I had assumed that when the South Tower fell it had been the first one struck. It never dawned on me the distinction between the twins. How the South had no aerial tower on it’s roof, while the North one did. Those who had never been to New York, or had never known exactly which buildings housed which companies probably wouldn’t know the distinction. Between accurate news reports, there were also inaccurate accounts, such as a report of a car bomb to have gone off outside the State Department. Or a fire at the World’s Mall, that had been reported earlier. So many things were happening during that first forty five minutes, had a car bomb actually exploded, I can say in all honesty I don’t believe it could have shocked us any more than watching planes hit buildings, people descending from buildings or the South Tower collapsing. I listened to Peter Jennings talk to John Miller, about the Rescue Command Center having to be moved due to the collapse of the South Tower, and the eminent collapse of the North. The other thing that I will clearly remember is what was being said by these two gentlemen beginning with John Miller.
“…Something that is striking about this today, is that this is indicative of… with a car bomb at the state department, plane crash into the Pentagon, two planes designated to crash into each tower of the world trade center, bringing one down…it… it denotes the planning and the level of sophistication, and uh extreme logistical ability, that…that probably makes this singularly, the largest most well-coordinated attack in U.S. History...”
Peter Jennings agreed adding “Certainly in modern times...”
At the exact moment while Jennings was saying that sentence two things happened. The aerial antenna tower listed and then noticeably sank, as the black smoke from the inferno raging in the tower in front of the gash suddenly appeared to flatten straight across that floor of the building, and we were helplessly watching the collapse of the North tower, disappear floor by floor like the South Tower accompanied by a roar before it vanished into the same type of billowing smoke and ash. Both Buildings were now gone in the wake of an enormous gray and white cloud that covered a significant portion of the Manhattan Island Skyline. During the North Tower collapse, only 23 people who were in or below the tower survived.
10:30-Everything I had hoped after seeing the second tower struck was over, in a way that I couldn’t imagine. I had just watched over a thousand people die in real time, helpless to do anything, but just watch it happen. It angered me, it made me feel a weird sense of guilt. It shook my belief in the future. It caused an odd sense of grief. It stripped me of any sense of what I believed about the world before. It crushed my hope, and destroyed my faith in humanity. It made me feel this desire to get revenge on those who had done this. It caused me to fear about the future for my children. It suddenly occurred to me to wonder what the kids knew about the events. Had the schools here done what my elementary school had done when President Reagan was shot? That day a television had been pushed into every classroom and we had to watch the shooting occur, seemingly over and over. I hoped that wasn’t the case. I would find out later it was up to us to tell the children what happened, and try to explain the reasons why. It was a seemingly impossible job to do when we had no idea where to even begin, and didn’t know all the facts. That would be a worry for when they came back home that day.
The Aftermath-That night we told the children what had happened explaining the best way we could. I called in from work that night. It was just more important to be with my family. The television which had been on most of the day stayed off once the kids were back from school. Ann and I took the kids to a Wal-Mart in Colonial Heights, and purchased a couple of American Flag magnets to display on the car, as well as getting to something to eat. On the drive back we heard Lee Greenwood’s “God Bless the U.S.A.” being played on the radio. The song had been originally released in 1984, I hadn’t heard it since I was a kid, but now that song would be included in the full rotation of various radio stations in Virginia. A song by Metallica off of the Black album suddenly had relevance. And I would listen to it often during the following weeks. The song was “Don’t Tread On Me”.
That night as I was smoking a cigarette on the front porch I noticed something that now is completely unimaginable, something that I have only ever experienced in Colorado during a winter storm, during the day. Complete silence. A peaceful silence. No traffic going down the block, no one outside, no dogs barking in the distance. No commercial planes in the air. Everything had stopped. There was nothing, but silence, save the sound of the paper of my cigarette burning every time I took a draw from it. Since my time in Colorado I had never experienced a moment of time that quiet. Although I was mad at God for losing my Mom from Cancer at the beginning of that year I prayed for the safety of people living in the United States that night. That night I went to each of the kids bedrooms, and watched each of them for a little while, kissing them while they slept, before laying down finally and going to bed.
In the coming weeks something occurred in this country that I have yet to see happen again. And I will add this saddens me to some degree. In the days and weeks following, America United Together. They stood by one another. Seeing those firefighters marching to the site to try to pick up the pieces of what became the broken heart of our country inspired us to be better people in those few short fleeting weeks. Petty Bickering stopped, lobbying stopped, Politics stopped, and everyone dedicated to helping one another. There was a tremendous sense of Pride, Unity, and Purpose for a common goal. Showing the rest of the world we weren’t finished. I wish now that time hadn’t ended, and even though you have seen glimpses of that solidarity however brief since. Most recently the events of the Boston Marathon were we lost another three people meaninglessly, and 141 injured.
In the true wake of 9/11 we slowly received the figures. For 99 days small fires still burned at Ground Zero. 246 innocent people between the four separate flights were killed for no other reason than to make a political statement. 2,606 people lost their lives that day in New York, whether in the towers, or on the ground. 125 were lost at the Pentagon, 55 of those were Military personnel. 373 innocent Foreign Nationals representing 90 different countries, and diverse faiths. 292 innocent people at street level. An estimated 200 lives lost at the Sky Lobby, 200 inside the express elevators, an estimate of 200 that perished falling. 343 Fire Fighters attempting to help the injured and the trapped. 23 New York City Police officers trying to maintain order so the rescue workers could do their jobs, 37 Port Authority officers, 15 EMT responders, 3 Court officers, and Sirius a bomb sniffing dog. The youngest victim was only Two and a half years old. 6,294 injured. And more than 300,000,000 people in America effected by the events and the aftermath. No, I won’t ever forget those days events. Or those people lost. How could I in good conscience ? No life is trivial.
That Tuesday morning in Virginia was a beautiful sunny morning. The temperature was about sixty four degrees. At a little before Seven a.m. I was in Chester Virginia, at a Production Plant called Power Packaging eagerly awaiting going home. I had just completed my twelve hour shift from the night before operating Line Five;a production line subcontracted for Hewlett Packard to package their ink jet cartridges. I punched out a couple minutes after seven, and proceeded to walkout the security doors. The night had been hard. My production line had given me problems almost the whole night. My Ex- wife Ann, waited for me in the parking lot of the plant in our blue Plymouth Voyager, for the twelve minute drive back to the house. I remember thinking as I walked out of the building, “All I want is to get something to eat, and go to bed”, since I would be dealing with the same problems that later that night on line five. I figured I’d be able to face those challenges a little better fully rested.
7:03-7:28-During the drive back to the house I discussed my frustrating night with the Ex while we drove back to the house. The kids were wide awake in the back seat of the Van. The two older kids were fully ready for school. At a little before seven thirty we were finally back at the house. I poured myself a bowl of cereal, while the youngest kid finished getting ready for the bus to pick them up for school. My bowl of Golden Grahams was gone in less than six minutes. I put the bowl in the sink,told my kids to have a good day, told Ann goodnight, and walked into my bedroom and laid down. I remember falling asleep almost as soon as my head hit the pillow. While I slept my first and only hour that day, American Airlines Flight11, American Airlines Flight 77 (which had taken off from Fairfax County in Virginia), United Airlines Flight 175, and United Airlines 93 were already in the air.
8:55-My Ex woke me up, telling me “You need to see this.” I remember answering still half asleep.
“I need to see what?”
That was when Ann answered “A Plane just crashed into the World Trade Center.”
I remember sitting up and climbing out of the bed, opening the door of the bedroom and walking into the living room to sit down on the couch in front of the television. In my head I was picturing something completely different from what the reality actually was. When the Ex had said ‘Plane’, I pictured a private plane like a Piper, or a Cessna crashing into the building. I drew a mental image that I would see the tail of the private plane sticking out of the windows of the building. I remember thinking “what dumb ass pilot could miss seeing the World Trade Center, especially on a day like today”. I pictured the tower intact save whatever windows the plane had crashed through as well as the bent steel from the familiar grating pattern on the outside of the building, so when I sat down to see the live report, my jaw dropped to see a jagged hole center of the North Tower with an enormous fire. I was unaware that Fire Fighters from Engine 7 Ladder Company 1 under the command of Battalion Chief Joseph Pfeifer would arrive two minutes after the plane had struck the tower. And would be the very first to arrive. The events of that particular ladder company would be filmed by two brothers that day, Jules and Gedeon Naudet, they were who filmed the tower strike of Flight 11 into the North Tower seen from the street. While those events played out in New York my television was tuned in to "Good Morning America", WRIC Channel 8, in Virginia. I had no idea that I was looking at the devastation caused by Flight 11 hitting the building instantly killing 86 human beings still alive in the plane, as well as a countless number inside the building between the 93rd and 98th floors at the time of impact. I also was not aware that the death toll was slowly rising as people began to desperately climb out the windows holding on to the steel framing of the building from areas that were just too hot, or too filled with smoke to endure. Or that some had been blown out at the time of impact. I wouldn’t know that by the end 1,344 lives would be extinguished in the North Tower. Immediately as I sat down, my mother-in-law walked into the house from next door.
“Are you seeing this?” she asked as Ann and I nodded.
9:03- At that particular time we were only seeing one camera angle, which showed the North Tower with it’s gash, and smoke pluming out the gash. The South Tower was almost directly behind it, so from that vantage point you could only see the edges of the South Tower. I remember something caught my eye as I was listening to Diane Sawyer and Charles Gibson talk, coming in fast from the right of the screen about mid-way. I saw a silhouette in the shape of a plane banking hard to the left, disappearing behind the tower in the foreground, followed by a giant fireball exploding outward to the left side of the screen. My eyes see, but my mind can’t fully comprehend what has happened at that moment. United 175 had just crashed into the South Tower killing the 51 souls still alive on board, and again an untold amount of people between the 78th and 84th floors in the South Tower as well as people killed at the base below, from concrete, and steel, and people as well as jet plane parts as the death toll continued to climb. The South tower unknown to any one at the time would lose 630 people.
“Holy Shit! Another one just hit!” I practically yelled to Ann who was talking to my Mother-in-Law in the kitchen during the strike against the tower. I know there was an element of fear in my voice, as well as a weird sense of anxiousness. Initially from the camera angle I thought the same tower had been struck again, it wasn’t until the two rushed back into the living room and they played back the footage of the second strike, a little less than thirty seconds later that I realized it was the other Tower. I sat there not believing what I was seeing, and in shock. Two planes within twenty minutes of each other, there was no way it was coincidence.
All of us in the living room had known about the bombing that had occurred in 1993. In fact that particular bombing had been mentioned by Charles Gibson, about three minutes into coverage of Flight 11’s strike into the North Tower. In 1993 I was in my early twenties. I didn’t know the history behind the bombing attempt, or the stories behind what happened in Mogadishu, another historic incident that occurred that particular year and the reasons why. I wouldn’t truly learn and understand those events until three years later during my Second Semester of World Religious Traditions at Regis University. I wouldn’t understand an expanded view completely until after writing a term paper about the meaning of Jihad, using the Megadeth song “Holy Wars- the punishment due” as a basis for the term paper. Over the next couple of days you would hear that word in the news a lot. I being naïve, had assumed events like this would stay across the Atlantic, in parts of Europe, and the Middle East. I never imagined it would be brought so blatantly and destructively on American soil.
Silently, and shocked to our very core, we continued watching as the events that day unfolded.When I look back at those events that day I realize how naïve of a viewer I was watching those moments on television. I learned that day, American citizens are not always seen as the men and women in the white hats, seen as the good guys.I had caught glimpses of it after the first gulf war on the internet, in certain chat rooms, or web pages. I learned that our hopes and ideals, and our freedoms sometimes pose a threat to others. I learned our media, plays partially into that perception, as does our politics. People are People the world over. They are susceptible to believing whatever is portrayed to them by Politics and Media. And sadly, almost no one wants to take responsibility of actions that cause harm to others unless it’s a show of Power. This is the truth everywhere. Humans do not always know how to be human to each other. Nor the importance, of being human to each other. What was happening that Tuesday morning fully reinforced that. But it’s these misguided perceptions that keep wars from becoming obsolete. Whether on our on soil or across the world. In over two thousand years people still haven’t learned that lesson.
I couldn’t fully grasp everything that was happening in those moments at that time. It was hard to grasp and fully understand the danger to the people on the street below the towers, as well as the people above the strike zone in the towers. It wasn’t conceivable to me the danger that the ERT teams, The Port Authority, The NYPD, and The NYFD faced in the moments. I couldn’t even fathom the intense heat of the fires burning, or the acrid smoke slowly suffocating those trapped. I was ignorant of the danger happening on the upper floors of both towers, as some were told to stay where they were at during emergency phone calls. I didn’t know that some of those who had made it out of the south tower were following the training given to them by Rick Rescorla, a Retired Army Colonel 1st Cavalry Division and Veteran who was then the Security Chief for Morgan Stanley. He had been present during the bombing in 93. And he prepared for the eventuality that it would happen again.He was who had told everyone to leave the South Tower the moments after the North Tower was hit. He is partially responsible for why the total deaths in the South Tower were less than half of the number of the North Tower. He would also perish trying to help as many people as he could get out when the south tower fell.
It was impossible for me to conceive the heartbreaking choices people in the upper floors were having to face- whether to die by burning to death, smoke inhalation or die by falling. I didn’t know that Fire Fighter Daniel Suhr from Engine Company 216 was the first firefighter casualty that Tuesday, when he was struck and killed by someone falling from the tower while he was rushing to help. I was ignorant of the structural integrity of the Towers being compromised from the stripping of the fireproofing, damage to the columns, and the temperatures generated by the fires, not just from the jet fuel, but also what happened to be in the offices. I was ignorant of the events of the separate Highjacks. The events that Betty Ong, and Amy Sweeney reported to those on the ground the last fifteen to twenty minutes of their lives. What had happened to the pilots, flight crew and passengers minutes before those planes crashed.I like others had no idea there were still two planes in the air. That Flight 77 was on its way to Arlington Virginia, not more than a couple hours away from where I lived at the time. Or that a highjack would be occurring on Flight 93 a few minutes later.
In my ignorance I held hope that it wouldn’t take long to extinguish the fires hoping that the sprinkler systems in the buildings would be able to at the very least help the fire department out. Looking back at it, it sounds hopelessly optimistic and completely unrealistic. As I continued watching, I wondered whether they could fight the fires using helicopters with those giant water buckets used to fight forest fires in certain areas. As I saw the news helicopters circling I silently wondered how come none had thought about landing on the upper tarmac,and attempting to rescue those in the upper floors. I had no idea that the doors to the roof were locked. I was not aware a landing attempt had been tried by a Police helicopter ten minutes before, but the heat from the fire interfered with the helicopter’s descent. It would be explained about twenty minutes later, during the broadcast. When Good Morning America/ ABC News cut to the various NYFD companies still arriving, I felt a little better, knowing these brave men would help. It was just a matter of time. I believed this. And I hoped that with the sheer number of Firefighters now converging on the Trade Center, the fires could be contained quickly. How incredibly naïve, as I was to learn when I was older. NYFD knew there was no realistic way of containing the fires. Their first priority was to rescue as many of those people that could be saved. Again, I was ignorant of knowing how long it would take to ascend each tower on foot, especially with sixty to a hundred pounds of equipment, having to go by stairwell, while those that could escape were coming down, with the elevators malfunctioning in both buildings.
What I remember that day especially during those last ninety minutes was the newscasts focused on the towers themselves. We could only see from the outside, all of us unaware of the fear of those still trapped inside both towers, as well as the chaos happening on the streets below. News coverage stayed mostly to the structures,about halfway up of both the North and South Towers was the viewer’s line of sight. It could only hint at the dangers within the towers, as the fires continued to burn, as the black smoke steadily rose through both buildings escaping out through various broken windows behind the grating, pluming upward.And although the perspectives changed from the East side, to the West side, the North and the South, from close up to medium shot what was happening on the street below, was rare. Footage on the street was mostly contained from what had happened before the second strike. In a way we were taken away from the human element of those events. The shots of evacuations were three to five second images of those lucky enough to have exited the buildings. None of us viewing the television, or even watching from the giant screen in Time Square would see the destruction, or devastation below the fiftieth floor of the towers. Only those in the street would know. I wouldn’t know about the collapse of WTC seven, or The Marriot destruction until the following day.
One of the saddest memories that will never leave me was the images of people falling. In the years since that particular topic has become controversial, a part of the history of these events that are considered in bad taste to mention. But it brings in mind a question. The whole day was full of horror, why object to one aspect of it? It actually happened. When we can learn to accept it and learn from it so it never has to happen again to anyone else will be the day we truly honor those who perished in that way. I was glad to be spared from the aftermath of those images on the day, but during the initial broadcast I remember clearly seeing more than three people falling from both the towers disappearing out of line of sight, as the camera would either cut away, or a building in the foreground would thankfully obscure the view of those tragic moments. I also distinctly remember one News correspondent filming from the NYFD command center, in the South Tower Lobby about twenty minutes before the tower collapse and distinctly remember a shot of the central courtyard. I remember hearing the sounds of the rustling of paper in the air, the crackling of fire, faint sounds of sirens, the creaking of steel and unidentifiable numerous cracks echoing loudly amid a muzak version of Billy Joel’s “She’s always a Woman”. On that day I had no idea what the cracks echoing across the courtyard were, assuming the cracks to be parts of the building still falling from the impact. I remember that they were jarring and loud. It wouldn’t be until a few years later I would learn those cracks echoing were lives ending, as the death toll continued to rise. Certain estimates have the count of over one hundred innocent lives. In the years to come those images and sounds would be re-lived in various documentaries. It was captured in a photograph entitled “The Falling Man.” In two of the documentaries the sounds of impacts would be haunting, and uncomfortable. But that was the grim non-sugar-coated reality of that morning,and the other major imminent danger the FDNY, Port Authority, and NYPD faced while trying to rescue lives during the events of that day. The part of the reality we the viewers watching the events unfolding were spared from. It doesn’t negate this happened. It wasn’t just the sounds of infernos burning, emergency response sirens, or the march of Fire companies arriving to the site. I remember hearing gasps of horror, screams of fear, and disbelief on the faces of every one. This was the reality.
9:29- President George W. Bush makes his first public address at an Elementary school in Florida, confirming the events at the World Trade Center to be a terrorist attack. My heart sank. And one of my first thought was why? Even today I still fail to understand the logical reasoning behind killing for a belief based upon Faith. Even learning about past history. Even after my time in college. My apparently primitive mind just does not get it. Let alone understanding Mass murder of innocent people,either on their way to California, or those reporting to work in those two buildings. Sadly, it is easier for me to understand Military action based on Political agenda, than it is for me to understand War based on Religious Faith.To me killing is killing, it’s a commandment not to break, and should only have to occur during times of war. And as I silently thought about this again the death toll continued to rise.
9:39- There is a report of an explosion at the Pentagon, but I wouldn’t see the images, or hear a confirmed report of the crash of American Airlines Flight 77 killing 59 including men,women, and children, as well as well as an additional 126 Pentagon employees until 9:53. I will admit that this was the first time I began to feel sick to my stomach feeling a true sense of dread. I lived during the height of the cold war, when the threat of Nuclear war was an everyday fear, and still wasn’t as startled and unnerved as I was that day. At that time we lived pretty close to Ft. Lee Army Base. I worried for friends who were at the Base, and also at the Base in Quantico. I would later see the destruction at the Pentagon first hand later that year, paying my respects to those lost there on a trip with my family to Maryland.
9:41-Associated Press Photographer Richard Drew takes the now well-known photograph entitled “The Falling Man” a visual image of a man falling head first from the North Tower. This image will appear once in the New York Times, on page seven the following day and will prove to be so controversial, angering readers who find the image disturbing,it never appears in the New York Times again. I saw the image on the front page of USA Today. Even now I take the photo for what it is- a testament to what was happening in the wake of the attacks. I had seen the falls on live on television this only captured one particular haunting moment.
9:50- It is confirmed that both crashed planes at the Trade Center were hijacked. Again I was in disbelief. Most planes that have been hijacked during that decade and the decade before were usually handled by some type of negotiation. Passengers were held hostage, while the demands of the hijackers were handled, to try to prevent loss of life. In these circumstances usually it’s a negotiation to release a political prisoner, or a demand for money. Up to that time it wasn’t to systematically and indiscriminately kill as many people as possible for seemingly no reason.This would forever change how I viewed a hijacking.
9:58- While we watched and listened to Peter Jennings saying “…that all air traffic had been suspended…” we were to learn later Bill Sliney of the FAA had ordered all Planes in the Air to land.The total number of planes was 4500. As I listened to Peter Jennings speak, the Camera held on an image of the South Tower, in Close Up. I will never forget the sight I saw next as long as I live. I could see the glow of molten steel dripping from just below the gash the impact zone and sparks to the steel below when the molten steel hit another section. I watched as the outer edge of the tower which had been peeled back from the wing of Flight 175 almost as if it were aluminum and saw it suddenly buckle, lean slightly to the left, as I continued to see sparks and steel melt. As Ann asked if I had seen it buckle I remembered nodding. Then I remember saying “Oh My God!”
The reason for the exclamation was because of what was occurring. We saw the structure suddenly bend and teeter a piece dissolve then the structure drop sharply and begin to disintegrate producing a semi solid cloud of White and Gray smoke that mushroomed up and then out and appeared to descend downward from the top of the roof as the structure began to disappear floor by floor for almost ten seconds under the cloud heading for the street below in a rumble so loud it could be heard in the studio of the news broadcast. We were unaware that at that moment inside the South Tower, Vice President of Aon Corporation Kevin Cosgrove and 2 colleagues would lose their lives while trying to get help, and were at that very moment talking to a 9-11 dispatcher on the 105th Floor as the tower collapsed, or that Financial Manager of IQ Financial Systems Melissa Doi, and five others would lose their lives talking to 9-11 on the 83rd floor. We didn’t know Battalion Chief Orio Palmer from Battalion 7, and New York Fire Marshall Ronald Bucca; the very first two Firefighters to reach the impact zone would lose their lives, somewhere between the 78th and 80th floor in that moment. We had no idea that debris from the collapse had crashed through to the lobby of the North Tower killing Father Mychal Judge, Chaplin of the NYFD and others while he was praying over the fallen. We had no idea that 2 of the Fire Fighters, with the help of two bystanders carried Father Mychal’s body amidst the chaos, of the dust settling and people still falling , to St. Peter’s Church where Father Mychal was officially designated “Victim 0001” the first official casualty to be recorded. Other firefighters including Battalion Chief Joseph Pfeifer had survived the collapse were trying to find a way out of the rubble, to try to establish another command center. The scene was incomprehensible as Peter Jennings proved that day seeing the tower was collapsing at that moment, saying aloud to a correspondent “What…what do we have? What are we looking at?”
The answer to that question was the unthinkable that had just occurred. That was when we suddenly realized the devastating reality, and a sickening realization that both towers were going to go. Mass amounts of people had just died. Again the amount of lives lost climbed, to our horror and shock, it wasn’t just those souls still trapped in the South tower, it was the brave men and women trying to rescue them. We are also shown people running as fast as they could to get out of the range of the debris cloud which seemed to be chasing and eventually over taking them like a sick giant wave, followed by an eerie calm. We had no idea the Marriot Hotel a neighboring building is heavily damaged in the collapse, and will be destroyed by the north tower in less than fifteen minutes.
10:10- We receive news that a fourth plane has crashed in Stonycreek, Pennsylvania at 10:03 later to be identified Flight 93. 33 innocent people killed, trying to stop the plane from hitting Washington D.C. During this time details are sketchy, and the scene shown shows a large crater with investigators arriving to the site. At the same time part of the west wall outer ring of the Pentagon collapses, while people attempt to rescue those still trapped. Attention returned to the remaining tower, the fire still raging, people still trapped on the upper floors, with a new element. The complete devastation left in the wake of the South Tower collapse, and a subconscious clock now going through the heads of every single person still viewing the events ticking down seconds. The knowledge of an almost hopeless,inevitability and eventuality. The ground is covered with a thick layer of gray dust. Those lucky enough to get away are walking from the site covered in this thick layer of dust, ash, pulverized concrete and gypsum. The cloud left behind continued to settle, resembling nuclear winter. In later years that dust will claim the lives of three others. I remember everyone in my house being anxious, and uncomfortable. We have the sickening feeling of knowing that the other tower is going to go, and we helplessly watch waiting,and silently praying it won’t happen. In the end we were hoping against hope, as more information is given in regards to the Pentagon, as well as in Pennsylvania. The seconds continued to tick away.
10:26- We continued watching the news unfolding, as the camera stayed unwavering and unblinking at the North Tower. The first tower hit, although at the time I didn’t know this. I remember that at the time, I had assumed that when the South Tower fell it had been the first one struck. It never dawned on me the distinction between the twins. How the South had no aerial tower on it’s roof, while the North one did. Those who had never been to New York, or had never known exactly which buildings housed which companies probably wouldn’t know the distinction. Between accurate news reports, there were also inaccurate accounts, such as a report of a car bomb to have gone off outside the State Department. Or a fire at the World’s Mall, that had been reported earlier. So many things were happening during that first forty five minutes, had a car bomb actually exploded, I can say in all honesty I don’t believe it could have shocked us any more than watching planes hit buildings, people descending from buildings or the South Tower collapsing. I listened to Peter Jennings talk to John Miller, about the Rescue Command Center having to be moved due to the collapse of the South Tower, and the eminent collapse of the North. The other thing that I will clearly remember is what was being said by these two gentlemen beginning with John Miller.
“…Something that is striking about this today, is that this is indicative of… with a car bomb at the state department, plane crash into the Pentagon, two planes designated to crash into each tower of the world trade center, bringing one down…it… it denotes the planning and the level of sophistication, and uh extreme logistical ability, that…that probably makes this singularly, the largest most well-coordinated attack in U.S. History...”
Peter Jennings agreed adding “Certainly in modern times...”
At the exact moment while Jennings was saying that sentence two things happened. The aerial antenna tower listed and then noticeably sank, as the black smoke from the inferno raging in the tower in front of the gash suddenly appeared to flatten straight across that floor of the building, and we were helplessly watching the collapse of the North tower, disappear floor by floor like the South Tower accompanied by a roar before it vanished into the same type of billowing smoke and ash. Both Buildings were now gone in the wake of an enormous gray and white cloud that covered a significant portion of the Manhattan Island Skyline. During the North Tower collapse, only 23 people who were in or below the tower survived.
10:30-Everything I had hoped after seeing the second tower struck was over, in a way that I couldn’t imagine. I had just watched over a thousand people die in real time, helpless to do anything, but just watch it happen. It angered me, it made me feel a weird sense of guilt. It shook my belief in the future. It caused an odd sense of grief. It stripped me of any sense of what I believed about the world before. It crushed my hope, and destroyed my faith in humanity. It made me feel this desire to get revenge on those who had done this. It caused me to fear about the future for my children. It suddenly occurred to me to wonder what the kids knew about the events. Had the schools here done what my elementary school had done when President Reagan was shot? That day a television had been pushed into every classroom and we had to watch the shooting occur, seemingly over and over. I hoped that wasn’t the case. I would find out later it was up to us to tell the children what happened, and try to explain the reasons why. It was a seemingly impossible job to do when we had no idea where to even begin, and didn’t know all the facts. That would be a worry for when they came back home that day.
The Aftermath-That night we told the children what had happened explaining the best way we could. I called in from work that night. It was just more important to be with my family. The television which had been on most of the day stayed off once the kids were back from school. Ann and I took the kids to a Wal-Mart in Colonial Heights, and purchased a couple of American Flag magnets to display on the car, as well as getting to something to eat. On the drive back we heard Lee Greenwood’s “God Bless the U.S.A.” being played on the radio. The song had been originally released in 1984, I hadn’t heard it since I was a kid, but now that song would be included in the full rotation of various radio stations in Virginia. A song by Metallica off of the Black album suddenly had relevance. And I would listen to it often during the following weeks. The song was “Don’t Tread On Me”.
That night as I was smoking a cigarette on the front porch I noticed something that now is completely unimaginable, something that I have only ever experienced in Colorado during a winter storm, during the day. Complete silence. A peaceful silence. No traffic going down the block, no one outside, no dogs barking in the distance. No commercial planes in the air. Everything had stopped. There was nothing, but silence, save the sound of the paper of my cigarette burning every time I took a draw from it. Since my time in Colorado I had never experienced a moment of time that quiet. Although I was mad at God for losing my Mom from Cancer at the beginning of that year I prayed for the safety of people living in the United States that night. That night I went to each of the kids bedrooms, and watched each of them for a little while, kissing them while they slept, before laying down finally and going to bed.
In the coming weeks something occurred in this country that I have yet to see happen again. And I will add this saddens me to some degree. In the days and weeks following, America United Together. They stood by one another. Seeing those firefighters marching to the site to try to pick up the pieces of what became the broken heart of our country inspired us to be better people in those few short fleeting weeks. Petty Bickering stopped, lobbying stopped, Politics stopped, and everyone dedicated to helping one another. There was a tremendous sense of Pride, Unity, and Purpose for a common goal. Showing the rest of the world we weren’t finished. I wish now that time hadn’t ended, and even though you have seen glimpses of that solidarity however brief since. Most recently the events of the Boston Marathon were we lost another three people meaninglessly, and 141 injured.
In the true wake of 9/11 we slowly received the figures. For 99 days small fires still burned at Ground Zero. 246 innocent people between the four separate flights were killed for no other reason than to make a political statement. 2,606 people lost their lives that day in New York, whether in the towers, or on the ground. 125 were lost at the Pentagon, 55 of those were Military personnel. 373 innocent Foreign Nationals representing 90 different countries, and diverse faiths. 292 innocent people at street level. An estimated 200 lives lost at the Sky Lobby, 200 inside the express elevators, an estimate of 200 that perished falling. 343 Fire Fighters attempting to help the injured and the trapped. 23 New York City Police officers trying to maintain order so the rescue workers could do their jobs, 37 Port Authority officers, 15 EMT responders, 3 Court officers, and Sirius a bomb sniffing dog. The youngest victim was only Two and a half years old. 6,294 injured. And more than 300,000,000 people in America effected by the events and the aftermath. No, I won’t ever forget those days events. Or those people lost. How could I in good conscience ? No life is trivial.
posted by Joel at 7:43 AM
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