In Memory

[Trevor2118]

[DougB]

Thank you for that picture Trevor.

[El Presidente]

A prayer for all that lost their lives on the day, their family and friends, and all the have fallen in the ten years since.

[MoneyPit]

Thanks for the photo Trevor. I wanted to post something similar but just didn't have the words. I'm spending the day with family smoking cigars and watching football thankful that they could share the day with me. Peace be with all those families that lost loved ones all those years ago.

[ZAZ]

Trevor -- thanks for sharing.

[Dbone]

May we never forget this day

[PigFish]

God bless America!

Thank you brothers. God bless the men and women who stand the wall, for me, for you, for us all. -Piggy

[OZCUBAN]

Thanks for posting Trev

Lest we forget,thoughts and prayers go out to all those affected ,and on a side note what a beautiful memorial site

OZ

[riazp]

Wonderful Picture, thank you so very much for sharing. Prayers for all those souls, and the families that lost someone in that senseless act of terrorism

[mbrody]

Thanks Trevor. I will never forget that day...

[Wicky]

I clenched my teeth... and my fist more than once today.

GOD BLESS US ALL.

[rdb6]

As a native New Yorker I witnessed this act ot cowardice. September 11, 2001 was the darkest most horrific day in my lifetime. Almost 3000 people died that day with 3 of them good friends. The men and women who protect our countries, cities and towns deserve not only our gratitude but our love as well. My son is a NYPD officer and I have a nephew who is a FDNY firefighter. Neither one of them were on the job when 9/11 happenned, thank goodness.

[mykeuva]

What follows is my story of 9-11-2001 in downtown Manhattan, where I

was, what I felt, and what I remember. I try and post this every year (on a different site), to

remind myself, and others who are interested, about one person's

perspective that was there. I had written this down shortly after that day

so as to remember as much as possible, so I apologize for its

disjointedness. I can't believe it's been 10 years.....

I remember getting to work that day around 8:30. I worked diagonally

across the street from the World Trade Center, on the 19th floor of the

Woolworth Building. I remember that morning, running a little bit late for

work, but hurrying as fast as I could, b/c I had an early morning

meeting. My ride to the train station called me up and asked if it was ok

for her to stop by a little later, b/c she was also running late. She

wanted us to take the 2nd train into Manhattan, which was 15 - 20

minutes after the 1st train.

I told her that was impossible, b/c I had a big meeting I had to get to

that day....so she hurried up a little, as did I...I made it into work at 8:30

am, if I had taken the later train, I would've been under the WTC at the

time of the first plane.......I finally made it into work, and took the

elevator up 19 floors. I had walked into the reception area in the middle

of my floor of my company. I was talking w/ a coworker that had

walked in 2 seconds after I did.

All of a sudden, we both heard this loud BOOM, and our building

shook. We both looked at each other, wondering what the hell that

was. I had thought some kind of truck had crashed into our building,

maybe exploding, that's how violent the building shook. Our company

occupied the entire floor of our building, and I didn't bother going over to

the window that faced right into the WTC. I was closer to the window

on the opposite end of the building, and so I went over, and tried to look

down onto Broadway, to see if I could see anything that happened to

our building at street level. About 5 minutes later, my cell phone rang,

and it was my brother who worked in the Empire State Building. He

didn't know the extent of what happened, he said that I should check

the train schedules, b/c a small plane had hit the WTC, so it might

affect traffic on my way home tonight.

When I heard that, I walked over to the side of the floor that faced right

onto the WTC, and I looked up.......all of a sudden, my heart sank. No

way was this some small plane that hit into the building. My first

thought was that it looked like a bomb. Reports were that a small

plane hit the building, but at the time, I couldn’t conceive it could

possibly be a passenger jet. All 4 sides of the building were damaged,

so I thought it was an explosion from the inside....I couldn't imagine a

small plane could do that. I had thought it was a bomb.

One of my first thoughts was about my uncle (he worked on the 91st

floor of the South Tower, 7 floors above jet impact.) I didn't know what

tower he worked in at the time, but I knew he worked in one of the two

main buildings. I thought, and hoped, that he wasn't in the tower hit. I

called my cousin at work right away (at this time, the news still hadn't

really hit the rest of the city, or the country, so I was able to get

through.) I didn't know what to say at first, thinking that I may be telling

him news about how his father was killed. I told him he should leave

work right away and go to his mom's (my aunt's) house, and he should

wait there for news from my uncle, I told him what I saw. Turns out, b/c I

called him so early, he was able to get the last ferry out of Manhattan

that morning, and be w/ my aunt the entire day.

Then, I interrupted the meeting that I was supposed to be in, and broke

the news to everyone that if they knew people in the WTC, they should

probably try and contact them, b/c something awful just happened.

We all had walked over to the window again, and just stared and stared

at what was going on, right across the street.

If you talk to anyone that was there that day, they'll all tell you the

same thing. It was just a beautiful, picture perfect day, weather

wise......I remember sitting there, thinking that it was like watching a

movie, this awful scene pitted against this simply gorgeous backdrop.

It really was a crystal clear, crisp, warm, early september morning in

Manhattan. The sky was just so blue, I still remember it to this day,

how blue and clear the sky was. Usually a day like this is just a great

day in Manhattan.....I can't get that out of my head, remembering how

great a day it was, how blue the sky was, on the way to work.....

I remember staring at the WTC, and all of a sudden, a fellow worker had

exclaimed "oh my god, that's a person." We started to see people

jumping. But it was early yet, we all thought she must've mistaken

some debris for a person. And all of a sudden, one after the other, we

saw people, hanging onto the buildings, then leaping to their deaths.

They were so goddamn close. I remember seeing a man, in his suit, tie

flapping in the wind......another man, in khakis.....just one after the

other.......I remember a coworker who had originally thought we were

watching pieces of debris come to realize the truth. She started

screaming "oh my god, they're people!"

Everything from then on seemed as if it were in slow motion......I turned

to look at my boss, and she just broke down in tears. I wanted to put

my hand on her shoulder, she was only a couple feet away, but I

couldn't move, I couldn't grasp at what I was watching. I wish I had

turned away that day....I wish I had asked everyone to not watch.....

Then I remember a coworker exclaim "oh my god, another plane!", and

he ducked down, as if to take cover. And we looked up, and watched a

plane coming straight at our building, nose pointed right at us. Again,

slow motion, I felt like I was swimming in molasses. The plane banked

at the end, and crashed into the south tower. The fireball just kept

getting larger and larger. I closed my eyes, having never seen anything

like it, I didn't know how big that fireball was going to get. I naively

thought I was going to die, as I hadn’t ever seen anything like it. I

thought that the fireball would keep coming, and envelop the floor. I

opened my eyes a second later, and everyone ran for the elevators (the

Woolworth Building is one of the tallest buildings, after the trade

center.) I remember thinking if my uncle wasn't in the 1st tower hit, I

hope he got out of the 2nd tower, b/c he'd be dead if he didn't get out at

that point....

We finally made it downstairs, and a group of us starting walking

directly north on Broadway. Never have I seen anything like it. The

streets of Manhattan, all these tough New Yorkers, filled w/

terror....asking each other, where do we go? Central Park? No, public

place. Midtown? No, empire state building, target. Downtown? No,

WTC on fire, planes coming in. All we could all do, is walk

North....where, we didn't know, I think we still were in shock.

My cell phone wasn't working, although I kept right on trying.

I finally was able to grab a pay phone, and after repeated tries, was able

to reach my brother. At that point, all the rumors were flying, and what

my brother told me terrified me even more, terrified everyone I worked

with. He told me that the news was reporting besides the trade center

towers, that the pentagon was hit, that the white house was on fire, that

there was a car bomb on Wall Street....we thought the world was

coming to an end......I gave him some coworkers names, and the

numbers to their families, b/c he was on a landline, and maybe he

could keep trying and reach their families so they'd know that their

family was ok.

We kept walking north. All of a sudden, we turn around, and looked at

the south end of Manhattan, and the entire area was filled w/ smoke

(the 1st tower collapse.) We didn't know what happened, we thought a

bomb went off, or that something major happened to the south end of

the island, other than the WTC, b/c it never entered into our thoughts

that the towers could actually fall.

We kept walking north on broadway, and finally walked into a Wiz

(electronics store.) They had their doors open and were letting

everyone come in and watch the news on all the tvs. We saw all the

smoke, and when it cleared, only saw one tower. I was devastated.....all

those people, all that progess......gone.....I remember hoping, praying,

asking if there was a god, to please, please keep that 2nd tower

standing. I remember thinking, at least leave us one tower, to remember

how amazing these things really were....leave us a reminder.......Then

all my hopes crashed w/ the collapse of the 2nd tower......Just felt

totally helpless, and hopeless.

We didn't know what to do. We figured we'd walk over to give blood at a

hospital....Every hospital we went to, there were lines of people for

blocks, waiting to give blood. We decided to wait a while, and so we

went to get something to eat at a diner. I remember I wanted a tuna

melt and french fries....then thinking, wait a minute, screw the french,

screw everybody. If it didn't have something to do w/ America, I didn't

want to deal w/ it, at that moment. I asked to waitress for a "tuna melt

and fries."

Then, when finished, we walked all over manhattan, looking for a place

to give blood....when we finally got some chilling news from the hospital

staff. They had surplus blood. There just weren't survivors coming out

of the site. If people got out, they got out. If they didn't, they didn't.

Not too many in-between cases.

We finally managed to get to someone's apartment, where we could sit,

watch the news, and gather ourselves.

I managed to get lucky and get on the 1st PATH train to leave

Manhattan that night (around 8:30 PM.) Some coworkers drove me

home once we got off the train. I made it back home around 10PM that

night. I didn't sleep for 2 days straight. I just wanted to watch the

news. Didn't want to sleep, didn't want to miss anything, didn't want to

feel alone.....watching the news help me feel connected to others.

I have a pretty good memory. If I want to, I can close my eyes and

picture anything that has happened in my life. The difference between

my regular memories and my memories of 9/11 is that I don’t need to

close my eyes to remember the morning of 9/11. If I start to think

about it, whatever I’m looking at just seems to melt away, and I’m back

there on that day.

By the way, my uncle (who's from Europe) made it out ok. He just

went to a bar, ordered a sandwich and a beer, and watched tv all day.

He managed (somehow, I still haven't figured out how) to get home by 6

pm. He lost 13 coworkers.

[First Lady]

Thank you for posting that , I still remember coming home from a wine dinner and my husband telling to sit down and watch the news as a plane had hit the WTC... we both didn't got to bed that night and stayed up to watch the live telecast.

I have been watching alot of Docos this past week and my heart breaks everytime I watch the scene of the planes hitting

I hope that all those lost are in peace

Had a candle lit all day in memory of those lost

[android]

God speed to all of our fallen.

[adic88]

I was watching TV here in Malaysia when it happened. When i saw the plane fly into the first tower, i thought this was some sort of movie. I checked a few times to make sure the channel was CNN and even then i still couldn't believe it.

I didn't sleep that night, and my thoughts were troubled for weeks afterwards due to what i had seen. It was a terrible.

Prayers go out to all who lost their lives that day.

[CanuckSARTech]

Amazing story, mykeuva, thanks for sharing.

My favourite documentary on that sad day is "9-11". It's the one that came out two years or so afterwards. Filmed by a pair of French brothers doing a documentary on rookie FDNY firefighters. They're one of the only ones who managed to get a relatively straight-from-below shot of the first plane actually impacting (the fire crew was just up the street investigating a gas leak). But overall, that documentary is very tastefully shot and presented, considering the horror that happened that day, and is a fitting memorial/tribute to those lost.

Hope I never have to deal with something like that in my working career. I remember it being just an absolutely awe-inspiring day in the level of shock and horror that we all witnessed that day.