September 11th 2009
September 11th
First of all I want to say that no one who I personally know was injured during the September 11th attacks.
This story has to go all way back to summer of 1977. I was 11 years old and I saw George Willig climb the outside of the World Trade Center North Tower on the news. My father worked in the area at the time and saw him climbing in person, when he reached the roof he was arrested and fined a penny per floor. He later got to appear on ABC’s Wide World of Sports.
Later on in 1977 my family and I went to the Observatory of the South Tower. It was fantastic to be in the enclosed deck where you could see straight down and then later on we went out onto the roof where we could look outside in the air. The outside deck was tucked in well from the edge so you could not look down but you could look out towards the other parts of the city and straight up. You could just about touch the sky. It was a memorable moment. I would never forget it.
In December of 1977, the remake of King Kong had its fateful climax at the World Trade Center. It was really fun to see that on film since I had just been there a few months earlier so I recognized everything.
In 1982, Tom Hanks filmed a movie on the outdoor Observation Deck of the South Tower. I first saw this film in November 2001. I believe it was called Mazes and Monsters.
July 7th 1986, I was 20 years old, and I had been working full time for 3 weeks. I had never worked a day in my life. On this hot 97-degree day I was assigned to work at DC37 on Vescey and West Street. In the shadows of the World Trade Center Complex. As I excited the subway with my co-workers, they pointed out 7 World Trade Center. The building was under construction but it was almost finished. It was a site to see the final piece to the complex, which had opened 15 years earlier. I audited this client for 3 weeks. Making errors each day. Doing a poor job. As I would go out for lunch to rest my brain and get away from my supervisor reprimanding me, I would see people lined up to enter the South Tower Observatory. I was wistful, thinking about all my summer vacations and how I no longer had the freedom to do such things. But, on Friday night, July 25th, after finally finishing my assignment, I celebrated by going back to the observatory. In my business suit, an adult, spending the 1st of many Friday nights in lower Manhattan. Going out and having fun. It was a great night, and the Observatory was exactly as I had remembered it from a decade earlier.
During my years of working, I would get off the train at Cortland Street on Friday nights and walk from the World Trade Center to the South Street Seaport to have some after work fun. There was always good energy getting off the train in that area after work
Friday, February 26, 1993. I was at work at this horrible job on 20th and Broadway. We had a nice view of the Twin Towers, from our 7th floor office. Before cell phones, e-mail and Internet, people were hearing that a Truck Bomb had gone off in the underground garage of the Twin Towers. 6 people were killed including a pregnant woman. It was terrorism. As we went home that night, we thought, well this was not a major crisis. We had terrorist attacks in NYC before. Those of us who did not have cable TV only got the CBS station. They maintained a backup antenna on the Empire State building. All the other stations could not reach those without Cable TV since their antenna was the large pointy thing on the top of the North Tower. It was a strange weekend with lots of news coverage, and a light snowfall coming down. We saw people being helped at the base of the Towers, with black soot over their faces.
The FBI caught those who were directly responsible. We all thought how foolish these terrorists were: they tried to get the deposit back on the rental truck used in the attacks.
We also were so impressed with the Towers not being seriously damaged, although they were closed for 6 weeks. How lucky we were that only 6 people were killed. As if that made it not too serious. Within the last two years I have seen reports that if the explosion had taken place in another part of the garage the terrorists would have succeeded in causing at least one Tower to collapse. They were very close to a critical support beam.
In the summer of 1995, the World Chess Championship took place here in New York City at the Observation deck of the World Trade Center. I went to see three of the games.
The two players, Gary Kasparov and Vishy Anand, played in a sound proof booth in the observatory and we all got to watch the game a few feet away. Several grandmaster chess players provided expert analysis. It so much fun to watch in person. It was also the last time I was ever in the Observatory.
In 1996 I was fired from my job and I took a year off. There were many days that I would start right at the World Trade Center complex. Sitting on a bench, near the large gold sphere, looking at the fountain. Being in the concourse. During the summer of 1997 I was there every Tuesday from noon to 2PM for a weekly standup comedy show. Other days they had music in the plaza, at the base of the Twin Towers in that beautiful plaza.
By this time the Port Authority had placed a nice memorial fountain with the names of the people murdered in the 1993 attacks
Also, during the summer of 1997, a terrorist plot to blow up subways in New York City was foiled by the hard work of our New York Police Department. However, subway service was severely disrupted that day. I had chosen to sit in a park in Brooklyn and I was not affected by it. We all thought that we had scored another victory in the criminal practice of catching crooked would be terrorists.
August 2000, the last time I was ever in the plaza of the World Trade Center. The plaza was located at the base of the Twin Towers. It was a marble plaza with a huge fountain. Lots of places to sit. Lots of places to eat. A farmers market was every day. The huge gold sphere, a symbol of peace was also there. It was a great place to hang out, meet friends, and listen to music in the summer. My dentist called me that morning and cancelled my appointment for a checkup. I had to wait a few weeks, I went in mid September. That meant my next checkup was in March 2001 and then in September 2001.
October 31, 2000, the USA network covers the annual Village Halloween parade.
The opening shot, the Twin Towers, seen in the background of 6th Avenue as the costumed marchers walk down the parade route. I have all Halloween parades on videotape from 2000 through 2007. It’s difficult to watch this parade since a year later it all changed.
In August 2001, I was 3 years into my current job. Things were fine. I set up my dental appointment, looking at the calendar and noticed that Tuesday Sept 11th was primary voting day in NYC. So, there it was, I would go vote at 8AM and then go to my dentist at 9 30AM. All set.
Monday September 10th 2001. I am not happy. Monday’s were always my busiest workday and I got 16 invoices in the mail. That meant 16 checks to print on the computer. All in the late afternoon of a rainy day before I could go home. I hate leaving work late, so I was rushing. I was also annoyed that I had to go to our warehouse on Wednesday September 12th, 2001 to straighten out a mess left by two ex-co workers. This meant that after my dental appointment, I had to go to work. I could not take a vacation day. Sept 11th meant another hectic workday with me getting in at 11AM and leaving at 4PM.
I went home that night, I watched my favorite movie Coyote Ugly on Video. There are several shots of Piper Perabo playing her music on a rooftop of her Lower East Side Apartment building.
Tuesday morning, September 11th, I get up. I watch the news on TV. I leave promptly at 8AM to go vote and then to walk to my dentist office. I vote and its 8 15AM and I start walking to the dentist. I have no cell phone, no radio, and no way to communicate.
I am walking up a street near a train station, in Brooklyn. I see a woman running up and down the sidewalk, hysterical. This must have been at 9AM. But this is New York City; I just ignore it and keep moving. I get to a park bench on Ocean Parkway. Sitting there at 915AM. I see a man running into his car, putting a siren on top and speeding off.
He could have been an off duty police officer. I also see several fire trucks speeding up the Parkway. I still ignore it, all I could think about was hoping that this dental checkup would be a perfect one. Back in the spring I had to have lots of painful dental work done.
I was also more and more angry that I could not take the whole day off because it was such a beautiful day.
9 30AM, I walk to the my dentist office which is in the ground floor of a private house.
Two people come out from the 2nd floor, look at me and say “I don’t know if he is going to be here, the Tower is in the Street”
Again I ignore the person. And my Dentist does arrive about 9 45AM. He tells me that two planes have hit the World Trade Center and one has hit the Pentagon. I immediately am worried about my sister who I know must exit the Path Train Station at the World Trade Center at 845AM each workday. I have two quarters in my pocket. I never ever carry change, but I was planning to purchase a newspaper after my appointment. Luckily now I had two quarters to use the payphone to call home to find out what is going on. But, I think I wanted to calm down so I went ahead with the Dental Checkup. I came through with a perfect checkup and I did not need to go back to the dentist until March 2002.
When I left the office I knew that I was not supposed to get on the train to go to work. I rushed to a gas station where I knew that could find a pay phone. First I called my office.
No one was there. Our office is a few miles away from the World Trade Center and everyone had left together about 10AM. They all had to walk home. Some of them walked all day and did not get home for hours.
Then I called my mother, it was 10 30AM. I told her that I was fine and she told me that my sister had called and she was fine too. I was so relieved. I told her that I had to go to the dentist and that I would be home at 12 30PM. This would give me time to walk back home and stop at the bank to make a deposit. She told me “the other tower fell down”
I again ignored her. I said see you soon and I started walking home.
I could see the streets were now buzzing. Radios were on, people were talking about what happened. People were scared and angry. I kept walking and about 11 30AM I was in southwest Brooklyn when I could see brown flakes filling the area. They burned my eyes and made me cough. I kept thinking this is not good. Something is very wrong in Lower Manhattan. I got to my bank and made a $65 check deposit. I then walked past my old grammar school, where I graduated back in 1977. Parents were outside waiting to pick up their children. People were yelling and panicking.
I walked in the door at 12:15PM. I had no lunch since my sandwich was in the fridge at the office. I got a hug from mom and she had talked with my sister who was just fine.
I knew that just like in 1993, only CBS would be working, since all the other stations had their transmitter at the top of the North Tower. Then I put on the Television.
CBS had a graphic “World Trade Center Destroyed”
We spoke to my sister on the phone, she had to get on a Ferry to get back home to New Jersey. She did confirm that she was right where I had feared she was: one the street a few seconds after the plane hit the North Tower. She quickly ran to her office 6 blocks away. Stayed inside her ground floor office during the morning. Venturing out a few minutes before the 1st collapse, then coming back inside and staying put until about noon when everyone left. Walked east to get the Ferry and escape. Years later we found out that she was hit by some falling debris, but not injured.
I got to see the videos, the same videos we all saw that day. I finally ate a normal dinner at 6PM. I spent a good part of the afternoon outside listening to Jessica Ettinger of Bloomberg News Radio. Many of her friends were killed at the Trade Center since she worked closely with business p[people in the financial district. She kept saying that 8 planes were not accounted for but it turned out to be simply the 4 that we knew about.
At night, I called my supervisor to confirm that we would all come back to work on Thursday. Wednesday nothing would be open.
We all stayed up late and got up early the next day, Wednesday.
Thursday September 13th we all headed back to work the subway train was running with some minor service changes. However, about 7AM my particular train exited the tunnel onto the Manhattan Bridge. Everyone in the subway car knew this would give us a view of the changed New York City Skyline. The Towers were long gone and the smoke would there for quite sometime. Just as the empty hole is still there today.
We lost so much that day; so much was taken from us. Sometimes I think about all those places I used to hang out in. Gone. I saw videos of them on the news before the collapse. To this day, I still hang out along the banks of the Hudson, just West of the Trade Center. Thinking about the images of how horrible it looked that awful day.
It was an awful day; even 8 years later it was still an awful day.
First of all I want to say that no one who I personally know was injured during the September 11th attacks.
This story has to go all way back to summer of 1977. I was 11 years old and I saw George Willig climb the outside of the World Trade Center North Tower on the news. My father worked in the area at the time and saw him climbing in person, when he reached the roof he was arrested and fined a penny per floor. He later got to appear on ABC’s Wide World of Sports.
Later on in 1977 my family and I went to the Observatory of the South Tower. It was fantastic to be in the enclosed deck where you could see straight down and then later on we went out onto the roof where we could look outside in the air. The outside deck was tucked in well from the edge so you could not look down but you could look out towards the other parts of the city and straight up. You could just about touch the sky. It was a memorable moment. I would never forget it.
In December of 1977, the remake of King Kong had its fateful climax at the World Trade Center. It was really fun to see that on film since I had just been there a few months earlier so I recognized everything.
In 1982, Tom Hanks filmed a movie on the outdoor Observation Deck of the South Tower. I first saw this film in November 2001. I believe it was called Mazes and Monsters.
July 7th 1986, I was 20 years old, and I had been working full time for 3 weeks. I had never worked a day in my life. On this hot 97-degree day I was assigned to work at DC37 on Vescey and West Street. In the shadows of the World Trade Center Complex. As I excited the subway with my co-workers, they pointed out 7 World Trade Center. The building was under construction but it was almost finished. It was a site to see the final piece to the complex, which had opened 15 years earlier. I audited this client for 3 weeks. Making errors each day. Doing a poor job. As I would go out for lunch to rest my brain and get away from my supervisor reprimanding me, I would see people lined up to enter the South Tower Observatory. I was wistful, thinking about all my summer vacations and how I no longer had the freedom to do such things. But, on Friday night, July 25th, after finally finishing my assignment, I celebrated by going back to the observatory. In my business suit, an adult, spending the 1st of many Friday nights in lower Manhattan. Going out and having fun. It was a great night, and the Observatory was exactly as I had remembered it from a decade earlier.
During my years of working, I would get off the train at Cortland Street on Friday nights and walk from the World Trade Center to the South Street Seaport to have some after work fun. There was always good energy getting off the train in that area after work
Friday, February 26, 1993. I was at work at this horrible job on 20th and Broadway. We had a nice view of the Twin Towers, from our 7th floor office. Before cell phones, e-mail and Internet, people were hearing that a Truck Bomb had gone off in the underground garage of the Twin Towers. 6 people were killed including a pregnant woman. It was terrorism. As we went home that night, we thought, well this was not a major crisis. We had terrorist attacks in NYC before. Those of us who did not have cable TV only got the CBS station. They maintained a backup antenna on the Empire State building. All the other stations could not reach those without Cable TV since their antenna was the large pointy thing on the top of the North Tower. It was a strange weekend with lots of news coverage, and a light snowfall coming down. We saw people being helped at the base of the Towers, with black soot over their faces.
The FBI caught those who were directly responsible. We all thought how foolish these terrorists were: they tried to get the deposit back on the rental truck used in the attacks.
We also were so impressed with the Towers not being seriously damaged, although they were closed for 6 weeks. How lucky we were that only 6 people were killed. As if that made it not too serious. Within the last two years I have seen reports that if the explosion had taken place in another part of the garage the terrorists would have succeeded in causing at least one Tower to collapse. They were very close to a critical support beam.
In the summer of 1995, the World Chess Championship took place here in New York City at the Observation deck of the World Trade Center. I went to see three of the games.
The two players, Gary Kasparov and Vishy Anand, played in a sound proof booth in the observatory and we all got to watch the game a few feet away. Several grandmaster chess players provided expert analysis. It so much fun to watch in person. It was also the last time I was ever in the Observatory.
In 1996 I was fired from my job and I took a year off. There were many days that I would start right at the World Trade Center complex. Sitting on a bench, near the large gold sphere, looking at the fountain. Being in the concourse. During the summer of 1997 I was there every Tuesday from noon to 2PM for a weekly standup comedy show. Other days they had music in the plaza, at the base of the Twin Towers in that beautiful plaza.
By this time the Port Authority had placed a nice memorial fountain with the names of the people murdered in the 1993 attacks
Also, during the summer of 1997, a terrorist plot to blow up subways in New York City was foiled by the hard work of our New York Police Department. However, subway service was severely disrupted that day. I had chosen to sit in a park in Brooklyn and I was not affected by it. We all thought that we had scored another victory in the criminal practice of catching crooked would be terrorists.
August 2000, the last time I was ever in the plaza of the World Trade Center. The plaza was located at the base of the Twin Towers. It was a marble plaza with a huge fountain. Lots of places to sit. Lots of places to eat. A farmers market was every day. The huge gold sphere, a symbol of peace was also there. It was a great place to hang out, meet friends, and listen to music in the summer. My dentist called me that morning and cancelled my appointment for a checkup. I had to wait a few weeks, I went in mid September. That meant my next checkup was in March 2001 and then in September 2001.
October 31, 2000, the USA network covers the annual Village Halloween parade.
The opening shot, the Twin Towers, seen in the background of 6th Avenue as the costumed marchers walk down the parade route. I have all Halloween parades on videotape from 2000 through 2007. It’s difficult to watch this parade since a year later it all changed.
In August 2001, I was 3 years into my current job. Things were fine. I set up my dental appointment, looking at the calendar and noticed that Tuesday Sept 11th was primary voting day in NYC. So, there it was, I would go vote at 8AM and then go to my dentist at 9 30AM. All set.
Monday September 10th 2001. I am not happy. Monday’s were always my busiest workday and I got 16 invoices in the mail. That meant 16 checks to print on the computer. All in the late afternoon of a rainy day before I could go home. I hate leaving work late, so I was rushing. I was also annoyed that I had to go to our warehouse on Wednesday September 12th, 2001 to straighten out a mess left by two ex-co workers. This meant that after my dental appointment, I had to go to work. I could not take a vacation day. Sept 11th meant another hectic workday with me getting in at 11AM and leaving at 4PM.
I went home that night, I watched my favorite movie Coyote Ugly on Video. There are several shots of Piper Perabo playing her music on a rooftop of her Lower East Side Apartment building.
Tuesday morning, September 11th, I get up. I watch the news on TV. I leave promptly at 8AM to go vote and then to walk to my dentist office. I vote and its 8 15AM and I start walking to the dentist. I have no cell phone, no radio, and no way to communicate.
I am walking up a street near a train station, in Brooklyn. I see a woman running up and down the sidewalk, hysterical. This must have been at 9AM. But this is New York City; I just ignore it and keep moving. I get to a park bench on Ocean Parkway. Sitting there at 915AM. I see a man running into his car, putting a siren on top and speeding off.
He could have been an off duty police officer. I also see several fire trucks speeding up the Parkway. I still ignore it, all I could think about was hoping that this dental checkup would be a perfect one. Back in the spring I had to have lots of painful dental work done.
I was also more and more angry that I could not take the whole day off because it was such a beautiful day.
9 30AM, I walk to the my dentist office which is in the ground floor of a private house.
Two people come out from the 2nd floor, look at me and say “I don’t know if he is going to be here, the Tower is in the Street”
Again I ignore the person. And my Dentist does arrive about 9 45AM. He tells me that two planes have hit the World Trade Center and one has hit the Pentagon. I immediately am worried about my sister who I know must exit the Path Train Station at the World Trade Center at 845AM each workday. I have two quarters in my pocket. I never ever carry change, but I was planning to purchase a newspaper after my appointment. Luckily now I had two quarters to use the payphone to call home to find out what is going on. But, I think I wanted to calm down so I went ahead with the Dental Checkup. I came through with a perfect checkup and I did not need to go back to the dentist until March 2002.
When I left the office I knew that I was not supposed to get on the train to go to work. I rushed to a gas station where I knew that could find a pay phone. First I called my office.
No one was there. Our office is a few miles away from the World Trade Center and everyone had left together about 10AM. They all had to walk home. Some of them walked all day and did not get home for hours.
Then I called my mother, it was 10 30AM. I told her that I was fine and she told me that my sister had called and she was fine too. I was so relieved. I told her that I had to go to the dentist and that I would be home at 12 30PM. This would give me time to walk back home and stop at the bank to make a deposit. She told me “the other tower fell down”
I again ignored her. I said see you soon and I started walking home.
I could see the streets were now buzzing. Radios were on, people were talking about what happened. People were scared and angry. I kept walking and about 11 30AM I was in southwest Brooklyn when I could see brown flakes filling the area. They burned my eyes and made me cough. I kept thinking this is not good. Something is very wrong in Lower Manhattan. I got to my bank and made a $65 check deposit. I then walked past my old grammar school, where I graduated back in 1977. Parents were outside waiting to pick up their children. People were yelling and panicking.
I walked in the door at 12:15PM. I had no lunch since my sandwich was in the fridge at the office. I got a hug from mom and she had talked with my sister who was just fine.
I knew that just like in 1993, only CBS would be working, since all the other stations had their transmitter at the top of the North Tower. Then I put on the Television.
CBS had a graphic “World Trade Center Destroyed”
We spoke to my sister on the phone, she had to get on a Ferry to get back home to New Jersey. She did confirm that she was right where I had feared she was: one the street a few seconds after the plane hit the North Tower. She quickly ran to her office 6 blocks away. Stayed inside her ground floor office during the morning. Venturing out a few minutes before the 1st collapse, then coming back inside and staying put until about noon when everyone left. Walked east to get the Ferry and escape. Years later we found out that she was hit by some falling debris, but not injured.
I got to see the videos, the same videos we all saw that day. I finally ate a normal dinner at 6PM. I spent a good part of the afternoon outside listening to Jessica Ettinger of Bloomberg News Radio. Many of her friends were killed at the Trade Center since she worked closely with business p[people in the financial district. She kept saying that 8 planes were not accounted for but it turned out to be simply the 4 that we knew about.
At night, I called my supervisor to confirm that we would all come back to work on Thursday. Wednesday nothing would be open.
We all stayed up late and got up early the next day, Wednesday.
Thursday September 13th we all headed back to work the subway train was running with some minor service changes. However, about 7AM my particular train exited the tunnel onto the Manhattan Bridge. Everyone in the subway car knew this would give us a view of the changed New York City Skyline. The Towers were long gone and the smoke would there for quite sometime. Just as the empty hole is still there today.
We lost so much that day; so much was taken from us. Sometimes I think about all those places I used to hang out in. Gone. I saw videos of them on the news before the collapse. To this day, I still hang out along the banks of the Hudson, just West of the Trade Center. Thinking about the images of how horrible it looked that awful day.
It was an awful day; even 8 years later it was still an awful day.
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