9/11, This is powerful footage to watch.

3 of us at work gathered around a little telly with our jaws on the floor.

The boss had been to the US and was on top of one of the towers sightseeing the day before. He arrived back that morning and came into to work to see us all standing around the telly. When he saw what was unfolding he went into shock so we sent him home. He kept saying.. "I was on top of that yesterday!". Mental.
 


Two days back after visiting NYC and stopping in the Marriot at the foot of the towers and spending our last day on the observation deck we woke up, had breakfast, me and the wife (no) signed our US visa application and she popped to the post office to send it on its way. While she was out I switched on the TV and the day unfolded.

Her parents said we shouldn't go, mine said get one with your lifes, we went and one month later we moved to Brooklyn.

The wife's office would of been in one of the towers. Mates who moved over before us stood and watched it all a mile away over the East River in Brooklyn.

Friends I made after moving were first at the site being firemen & cops and remained to help clean up the mess. One mate worked for a company that lost close to 600 employees in the towers collapsing, one more lost his mother who was 7 months pregnant with his brother and another lost her best mate on the flight 93 that crashed in Pennsylvania.
 
I was in New York that day.

So was I. In a building about 100 yards north of the North tower. When the first plane hit we all went to the south side of our building to see what was happening. A tannoy announced we were to stay in the building. When the second plane hit we were told to stay in the building but to go to the north end. When the South tower collapsed we were told to get out. I did and up walked to Penn Station in midtown.

I have the same feeling about the footage as Yankee Mackem.
 
I was woken up at about 2 PM to be told about it.

It was the week before I started uni and had been out for a pound a pint night on the Monday
 
I have seen clips from this footage but never the whole thing. When you get the chance, watch this in its entirety. It is still hard to grasp that such a thing happened.
I remember at the time I was giving a lecture to new students in the lecture theatre and when I finished and walked of stage, a colleague told me the news that a plane has been reported to have crashed into one of the Twin Towers. At that point, little did I know of what was to come.
In the staffroom, we kept an eye on the news and what further developed, shocked us all greatly.
The whole matrix of the world shifted greatly that day.


What was the happenings of your day like, when you heard the news coming through?
I was at work as an air traffic controller at the main site nr heathrow at the time.
My wife (fiance at the time) was an air hostess on a virgin flight to San fran.
Horrible day. We had planes returning on low fuel and all the time worried about our lass.
She ended up stuck in San fran for a couple of weeks untill she was allowed to fly bsck. (what I'd give for a few weeks of freedom now BTW!)
My supervisor wouldn't allow me to work for quite a while iirc as I was stressed about her flight

I was working offshore, just going back to work after lunch. My wife and I were due to go to New York on holiday the following Thursday and a colleague said to me "Where are you going next week, because I don't think you will be" The OIM (platform boss) had a television in his office and we watched the events unfold in a state of horror and disbelief. Our plan had been to go to New York, tour New England and return from Boston. We considered cancelling but decided to do the trip in reverse and see whether people along our route thought we should go to New York or not which they all, to a man, said we should. Most of them couldn't believe that we'd got on a plane to come to America after that but were hugely appreciative that we had. New York was brilliant and resilient but there were reminders all over the place, cork boards with photos of missing persons, fire stations with tributes, trucks still removing debris from the site even a fortnight after the event. Lower Manhattan was off limits to tourists, as you would expect but the New Yorkers were trying to get back to normal. I went to the first baseball game after the atrocity, Yankees against the Chicago White Sox. The Yankees won but it was a surreal atmosphere and all eyes turned to the skies whenever a plane passed overhead. It wasn't the holiday we planned but I'm glad we did it.
I can't remember when international flights started again, but I'm pretty sure our lass didn't fly back till nearly two weeks.
If you went 9 days after can you remember if you were one of the first flights across?

The bit that gets me is the choice peoole faced, burnt to death or to take their own life in a terrifying way. Makes me shudder. God rest their souls.



School finish early?
That was the bit that hit me the most, seeing folk jumping to their death from so many floors up as it was a preferable way to die. Jumping holding hands.
Poignant
 
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It was my day off. I sat absolutely transfixed by what was happening. Always remember as the news coverage was on, the tower collapsing in the background. Went to the Harbour View on the night and just sat watching the news there as well. I fully expecting something else to happen. Thankfully it didn't.
 
I was at work as an air traffic controller at the main site nr heathrow at the time.
My wife (fiance at the time) was an air hostess on a virgin flight to San fran.
Horrible day. We had planes returning on low fuel and all the time worried about our lass.
She ended up stuck in San fran for a couple of weeks untill she was allowed to fly bsck. (what I'd give for a few weeks of freedom now BTW!)
My supervisor wouldn't allow me to work for quite a while iirc as I was stressed about her flight


I can't remember when international flights started again, but I'm pretty sure our lass didn't fly back till nearly two weeks.
If you went 9 days after can you remember if you were one of the first flights across?


That was the bit that hit me the most, seeing folk jumping to their death from so many floors up as it was a preferable way to die. Jumping holding hands.
Poignant

Was about three days in the US iirc.
 
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Watched this earlier, but didn't post - couldn't think of any words tbh.

Still don't have anything useful to say. Other than f***ing hell.
 
So was I. In a building about 100 yards north of the North tower. When the first plane hit we all went to the south side of our building to see what was happening. A tannoy announced we were to stay in the building. When the second plane hit we were told to stay in the building but to go to the north end. When the South tower collapsed we were told to get out. I did and up walked to Penn Station in midtown.

I have the same feeling about the footage as Yankee Mackem.

what was it like the rest of the time you were there? was the city still functioning or did you just stay in hotel?

The bit that gets me is the choice peoole faced, burnt to death or to take their own life in a terrifying way. Makes me shudder. God rest their souls.



School finish early?

There is a massive stigma in America about the jumping thing, religious folk just refuse accept that it happened, which is ridiculous

Also if you read lof ot the inquiry reports, not all of them were jumpers. The shocking reality was a lot of witnesses said people who fell from where the plane hit sort of stumbled out without any idea where they were. A lot also witnesses saw people just falling out through force when there were massive crowds gasping for air next to windows

Its horrific like
 
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what was it like the rest of the time you were there? was the city still functioning or did you just stay in hotel?

I lived in New Jersey and when I eventually got home I just worked from home for 16 hours a day for 9 days (I worked in IT and our main data center was in lower Manhattan and it was out of action). Then the company got us space on the lower east side before moving us to midtown for 8 months. I returned to the original building in June 2002. The city, apart from a few blocks around the WTC, quickly got back on it's feet.
 
I can't remember when international flights started again, but I'm pretty sure our lass didn't fly back till nearly two weeks.
If you went 9 days after can you remember if you were one of the first flights across?

I guess it must have been one of the first. I started to doubt my recall for a minute but my missus always keeps a diary when we go on holiday so I've just checked it and it was definitely the 20th that we flew (KLM/Northwest via Schipol to Boston).
 
I was working from home and the TV was on for the lunchtime news. I watched the whole thing for hours. I kept thinking who in their right minds would do something like this - shocking, disgraceful, no excuse at all for it, over 2000 murdered. Then I started thinking Pearl Harbour had similar number of deaths and the quote from Tora, Tora, Tora, "I fear all we have done is to awaken a sleeping giant and fill him with a terrible resolve."
 
Came home from attending a computer course and flicked on the TV and thought this fillum looks quite realistic. Then it registered that this was actually a live broadcast!!!
I sat there watching the horrific events unfold as the 2nd plane struck the tower. The most powerful wtf scenes ever.
 
Working for Vodafone at the time, my boss came in and said that some idiot had crashed a plane into the World Trade Center, I laughed at first thinking it was a light plane and said ‘well there’s a stag Do that went right out of control’ we turned on the tv down stairs.....stood mouth open at the scenes, I think I went home and stayed up till at least 2am watching reports etc...my ex girlfriend phoned me in tears...mumbled something about it and then hung up...
 
We had an estate agent round to survey the house etc to put on the market. Ended up with us all just sitting watching it on the telly, estate agent included.
 
I was on a conference call to a colleague in Manhattan. He was just a few blocks away on Lexington. He cut the call short saying a plane had crashed into the tower. At that time before proper reolports came out thought just a light aircraft.

Went back to the floor and mentioned it so all TV's put on and we all just stood and watched in shock as it unfolded.
 

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