(2001 Thread) Plane just crashed into the world trade center

[jessienkitty]

i kind of remember where i was. i was in the 5th grade in my first class of the day when another teacher came in my classroom to tell my teacher what had happened and all i remember thinking was "what is the big deal? its just a building." (keep in mind i was 10 and had no idea what the world trade center was) then we went into our next class and just watched the TV for the rest of the day. we were all just glued.

we were only 10 years old. it was weird from a childs prespective because we had no idea just how much the world would change after that.

 

[beckiboo]

So many of these posts are just so touching, and have brought me to tears.

I heard it on the radio, and with the first plane hitting the tower, like many others, I thought it was an accident. Then the second plane hit. I live in NW Illinois...no where near the tragedies. But I wanted to gather my family and go home! I didn't, I stayed for a Bible study I had joined...that was the first class.

The same day, my Mom was diagnosed with brain cancer. She died on Memorial Day 2002. I remember driving to Michigan for her funeral alone, because dh was to bring the kids the next day. They were having a ceremony on the radio that the mess from the twin towers was cleaned up.

I remember watching the news on our bedroom TV so the kids didn't see to much of the coverage. We joked that we watched the news in secret like other people watch pornography!

 

[Moz]

I, like JESSIEnKITTY, was only in grade five when it happened. My mom woke my brother and I up earlier than usual and said there was a big plane crash in NY (this was right after the first crash into the WTC and everyone was still confused). So we watched TV for a while and saw the second tower hit live. My blood literally ran cold when it happened. Then it was time to go to school, and a friend and I informed everyone on what was going on. That was all we talked about at school, and we had a moment of silence. It was such a weird day to have thousands of people die; it was the perfect September morning.
Although I was ten years old at the time, I decided to save the newspapers from the 11th and a few days after because I thought they would be really important. I still have them, in fact I can see them right now. I want to make sure kids of the future will know what happened that day.

 

[fwan]

I remember when that happened too, I had just turned 15.

My mother ran into my room at 6 am telling me that america is at war, and that the twin towers have collapsed the twin towers were hit at 2 am (melb australian time)
I told her she should stop watching stupid movies, but she dragged me out of bed, I took my school uniform with me and my breakfast into the living room and started watching the news, my eyes were glued onto the TV! I couldnt figure out if it was just a drama or reality!
By the time I got to school it was all quiet, it was the topic for a couple of days in English and History class.
I remember that we couldnt wait to get home to watch the news a little more to see what had happened.
All of our favourite programs were cancelled and the news stayed on for a long long time!
Although I wasnt in America and am not American, I remember that day very clearly!

 

[lookingglass]

It was a beautiful day, perhaps the last nice day of the year. I had gone to my first class of the day, and my professor was upset that no one had showed up (the class started at 8:50). I walked to my second class, and my professor let us out early. I couldn't figure out what was happening. I saw a bunch of cops and police dogs on campus, I figured it was yet another drug bust. A friend of mine and I decided to get a piece of pizza and enjoy the rest of the day. Someone walked by crying, and told us what happened. I ran home, and there were 4 messages on my answering machine, two were from my husband's old military unit, asking him not to leave the area. The other two were my sister freaking out because my Dad was flying that day. We found my father, later on that afternoon in a bar in New Orleans, and couldn't get a hotel room.

 

[etain]

It was my birthday, I lived in Maryland at the time, between Baltimore and DC, I worked at a pediatric office in Baltimore, I had just gotten into work and was talking to the mother of a sick patient on the phone when she heard on the radio what had happened. I wasn't quite sure what she was talking about, she said said she'd call back. We hung up, the phone rang, it was my significant other, he said, "happy birthday, turn on the radio". So we did, like many other people, we listened to the radio all day, almost none of our patients showed up for their appointments. We had a few muslim families and I remember being very worried about their safety in the wake of everything that was happening, the accusations that were flying around, and the anger and rage that people were feeling.

The doctor sent me home early because I commuted by bus and he knew it was going to be a long trip. What we didn't know was that downtown Baltimore had been completely shut down and the MTA had closed, leaving their driver's out on the road with no instructions about where to drop people off or pick people up (all of the mass transit hubs were downtown). So our driver veered off the regular route, stopped at some dead end street and said, "last stop, everyone off". I had no clue where we were, and the streets were deserted. I wandered around for a while, trying to recognize landmarks and hoping another bus would come along (I didn't own a cell phone back then). At one point, the only other person I saw on the street was a police officer in full riot geer wielding an automatic rifle, and looking really edgy, I quickly turned around and walked the opposite direction, I was afraid to ask him for help. Most of the bus drivers wouldn't stop to pick anyone up, I guess they wanted to get home too, eventually I waved one down and I managed to get close enough to home and a pay phone to call someone to come pick me up. It was a late night, after a terrifying day. We watched the news almost all night, I don't think we slept. I remember for days afterwards mass transit was still screwed up because they kept the downtown area closed off. Parent's didn't bring their kids in for appointments because they were afraid to leave the house. People were scared of almost everything, especially in that area. I heard that Baltimore had a number of structures that were considered likely targets including an extension office of the world trade center (though I never verified that so I don't know if it's true or not). And being pinned right between NYC and DC people were afraid of nuclear and biological attacks. It all contributed to the fear and hysteria following September 11th.

I think that for a long time Americans felt safe from the troubles that plagued the rest of the world, and September 11th forced us to come to terms with the fact that that's not true, that we are also vulnerable. It's such a 180 for us and I think that's part of why, five years later, we're still struggling with it.

I still get a wide range of reactions when I have to show my ID to people or tell them my birth date. At the best, I just get a funny look, or, "oh man, that sucks", other people look sad and say stuff, like, "oh you poor thing", other people give me nasty look and tell me that it should be a national day of morning and that nothing should be celebrated on that day. I can't really say that I agree with that last one. Obviously the attacks on New York and Washington should not be forgotten, but I think that we need to go on living. And I think that some of the more extreme attention that is given to this date feeds right into what terrorist organizations and people who hate Americans, want to see, that we are paralyzed with fear, and that we value American lives far above the tens of thousand of people who have died from war and terrorism all over the world in the past few years. It's going on every where, and people are dying in even greater numbers in the middle east and africa, but we're still so focused on ourselves. I am in favor of memorials and tastefull rememberances for those who died, but I am sickened by the media, politicians and other factions of our society who evoke the memories of September 11th for their own gain when we should be focusing on the future and making the world a better, safer place, not a scarier place.

Ok, I'll get off my soapbox now. I really wasn't expecting to write something quite that long or opinionated, I guess I just had it all bottled up inside. I hope I didn't offend anyone, that certainly was not my intention.

 

[lionessrampant]

I was a junior in high school and in music theory, my 2nd period class, sitting on my then-boyfriend's lap (that class was run like a frat house), and getting ready to go to a funeral for one of my classmates (that's right: one of my classmates, whom I was friends with and had known since we were 5, had passed away days earlier). I remember it, because I was wearing one of those long black duster sweaters that were popular 5 years ago and allllll black and it was still really warm out. It was actually perfect weather, come to think.

So anyway, back to music theory. We're sitting there getting ready to start class and this really doofy irritating kid ran into the room and screamed "There's planes crashing into buildings in New York!" And our teacher was like, Ok, Trent, whatever, go back to whatever class you're supposed to be in" and yet he wouldn't leave until we looked on the computer. And sure enough, the attacks were happening.

In the hour between that and when I left for my friend's funeral, it had been pretty much determined that it was a terrorist attack and I was hearing so much ominous whispering about how the Sears Tower was next. And of course, all of downtown was in fact evacuated that day. I was so overwhelmed by the end of the funeral that I just drove straight home without even calling the school and I went to bed.

 

[enkeli-kitten]

I was 11 and on class camp, and one of the kids heard what happened from his parents. He told us all that terrorists had bombed the Empire State Building! The adults wouldn't tell us anything, so it wasn't till we got back a week later that we actually figured out what had happened. Actually, I didn't get the proper details until we learned about the attacks in Social Studies class about 2 years later. I guess it's different when you're in another country, but I remember there were memorial services and everything.

 

[sibohan2005]

I was sitting at home waiting to hear about a job I had just interviewed for. I turned on the tv and saw the first video's coming in of the first plane hitting the tower. I didn't leave my seat for almost 18 hours. I had friends working in the vecinity and couldn't sleep until I heard somthing. To this day watching footage of the attack makes the hairs stand up on the back of my neck.

 

[olivesmarch4th]

I won't forget that day for a lot of reasons. I was a freshman at the University of Michigan and pretty naive about the way the world worked. I was in my Intensive II Spanish Grammar class when someone came into the room and started speaking with our professor in hushed tones.

Prof turned around and said, "Hay un emergencia" (There is an emergency) and cancelled class. I won't forget the way she said it... almost like she didn't believe it.

We assumed it was a family emergency and were pretty worried about her. Then I shuffled upstairs to my dorm room hallways, where my New Yorker roommate came flying down the hall screaming, "Someone just bombed the World Trade Center!"

This is where I show my ignorance by admitting that at the time, I did not know the World Trade Center was in the United States. I figured it out pretty quickly though. I walked in to see our television set just moments before the second plane hit... then we heard about the Pentagon. Somewhere in there, the towers fell. It was the most helpless feeling ever to watch them fall, because I knew there were people in there, and I wanted to reach through the television set and hold them up, just a little bit longer, just so everybody could get to safety.

There was a point where everything was happening so fast and seemed to be spiralling out of control, where I didn't know when it was going to stop... maybe it would go on for days... for that moment, there was total abject helplessness. I called my Mom. We were largely estranged at the time, but I didn't know what else to do. I just wanted her to know that I loved her.

I was spared most of the direct grief. We have a very high population of New Yorkers at our school and the entire campus was pretty much at a stand-still for a long time. I had friends who were purely devestated so I didn't waste too much time feeling sorry for myself. I listened to one young woman talk to her brother, who attended school in a building right next to the Trade Center. He said he was on one of the upper floors and looked out the window and into the faces of people right before they dove off the window ledges and plummeted to their death.

This was before all of the political rhetoric. This was before hating Muslims was the cool thing to do, before liberal meant "terrorist" and conservative meant "fascist." This was before American flags became slapped on every cheap plastic item you could think to sell. This was just a moment in history where a nation felt vulnerable and afraid... this was a time where I thought of the Revolutionary War, and the Civil War, and all wars throughout history and realized what it meant to fear for your community's safety... when I got just a little personal experience as to the idea of what war means. As the coming weeks filled with endless propoganda (and it keeps coming), I just get more and more indignant that the honest grieving of a large number of people has been so cheapened and glorified. It makes me sad that so many people live in fear in this country when we have less to fear than most people in the world and are incredibly blessed by the circumstances of our existence.

And I feel great sorrow that this incident occurred, but grateful that I was able to gain something of lasting value from the experience. It was that day that I started caring about global issues and that I recognized the impact of global policy on our sheltered little lives. It was that day I experienced a fraction of what people go through all over the world... whenever I hear about terrorism in other countries, I remember that day and feel immensely grateful that this event actually stands out as a tragedy that shatters our every day lives, rather than a fact of life that we must daily endure. It makes me care more about other people and their situations throughout the world, and demonstrates solid evidence that the political decisions we make regarding foreign countries inevitably have consequences not only for those nations, but for our own safety as well.

This thread has helped me get out of that political trap that seemed to instantly divide our country... and get back to the core of the experience, which is honest fear and tragic loss. I deeply appreciate that.

 

[olivesmarch4th]

Also, this is a good song that sums it up for me... but you have to HEAR the song to really get at the heart-wrenchng ambience. The song is on Live's "V" album and was written as a response to September 11th.

LIVE
"Overcome"

even now the world is bleedin'
but feelin' just fine
all numb in our castles
where we're always free to choose
never free enough to find
i wish somethin' would break
cuz we're runnin' out of time

and i am overcome
i am overcome
holy water in my lungs
i am overcome

these women in the streets
are pullin' out their hair
my master's in the yard
givin' light to the unaware
this plastic little place
is just a step amongst the stairs

and i am overcome
i am overcome baby
holy water in my lungs
i am overcome

so drive me out
out to that old burnt field
turn the ignition off
and spin around
your help is here
but i'm parked in this open space
blockin' the gates of love

i am overcome
i am overcome
holy water in my lungs
i am overcome

beautiful drowning this beautiful drowning this holy water
this holy water is in my lungs

and i am overcome i am overcome i am overcome i am overcome