And it’s tough. I’ll never forget being 8 years old and having to come in from recess, not knowing what was going on. I know we all remember where we were that day, and what we were feeling. Listening to the 911 calls is absolutely heartbreaking.
The FDNY were and are heroes. In such a fractured time politically and otherwise, I hope we can all come together tomorrow and say a prayer for the families and friends and loved ones affected by this awful attack. Whatever your beliefs, theories, questions or what have you, whatever you think of certain leaders or figures, it really doesn’t matter. We’re all very blessed to live in a country where we can debate about who plays running back and point spreads in an awesome community like this.
If you had a friend or loved one give their life that day, our hearts, thoughts and prayers are with you, although that will never remove the pain of loss.
We are all Dawgs, but more importantly, at least tomorrow, we are all Americans.
God bless you, and God help and heal this country.
Sorry for the long post. This time of year always makes me think about my experience in NY that day.
I was living in NY at the time on 10th St so not too far from the WTC. I was leading a kick off a new client project in our office near the Empire State Building when my assistant informed me about the first impact and thought what we all thought at the time, that it was an accident. When she came to tell me of the second impact I knew immediately and stoped the meeting. Told the clients that it was unlikely anyone was flying home that day and that my team would start working to get everyone hotel rooms.
An hour later we were informed we had to evacuate our building due to proximity to the Empire State and we got everyone out other than my core team of five people. By this time both buildings were down and I had no idea what do do next. Well, I had a former Marine on the team and he stated firmly that we had to head downtown and see how we could help.
So, we walked south to my apartment so we could change and get to the site. Amongst the many things I’ll never forget was the masses of people walking north and away from the WTC. Every block or so we would see one or several people covered in ash with expressions you only see in a war zone. It was haunting.
We got to the rescue staging area just north of the 7 tower around noon and there were around fifty civilians like ourselves. The absence of the towers from the skyline, the burning 7 tower and the expressions of the FDNY and NYPD working to determine a response to the unimaginable are also still clear in my mind.
My coworker the former Marine spent two days on the pile and doesn’t talk about it much.
By 3pm there were about 300 of us and the FDNY announced the request that military, former military and anyone with formal medical training of any kind should stay and the rest of us should leave. So off to St. Vincents hospital to join the incredibly long line to give blood. After an hour of that they sent us home as they didn't have enough blood storage and only had a handful of victims by that time.
A team of my coworkers, including a close friend, were supposed to kick off a new project with AON at 9am in the WTC and the client pushed the meeting to 1pm the night before as she needed to catch up. She died and if the meeting had still been at 9am my team would have likely died as well. My buddy who was supposed to be there and I are speaking later today as we do every 9/11.
The next day the missing person posters started going up around St Vincent’s. If you haven’t seen any of these, Google it. Watching the family and friends putting up these homemade posters of the dead, hoping beyond hope that their people were still alive, was heart breaking. By that time, they all knew, we all knew, but they didn’t know what else to do.
The smell of the WTC site lingered for months and missing person posters around the city stayed up for months as well. Both were a very visceral reminder of how the city suffered on 9/11.
I didn’t live in NY long but I’ve always had a soft spot for the city. Watching the heroes of the FDNY and NYPD in action and the way the people of the city came together continues to give me faith in the human capacity for goodness. Never forget.