5 Years Ago Today...

[THL]

A day of mixed emotions for me...bad, confusing, strained, excited and good - all in one:

My ex-husband and I had been trying for months to conceive our daughter. We had been through one confirmed miscarriage (one can never be sure how many unconfirmed ones).
My ex-husband had saved up all his days off and left the Marine Corps early so he was making the transformation from active to inactive duty.
I had an appointment with the fertility doctor that day which I was going to cancel after confirming with my ex-husband that he could very well be called back due to the events in NY.
I went to the Dr anyway that afternoon and they confirmed that I was finally pregnant with who turned out to be my wonderful blessing of a now 5 year old daughter.

[tankie]

i can still see the face on that poor black guy as he fell to earth , so sad for all that were killed and for their relatives

[omon]

this day 6 years ago, i was by trinity church, saw everything happen with my own eyes, the first plane i didn,t see, missed it by 5 min, the rest was happening in front of my eyes, than clean up starting wed. my cooling towers got 3-4 inches of ash, all 7 of them, for a half hour after collapse, it was pitch black, by 1pm it was snowing ash, every piece of ash that landed on me made it feel like it was burning, than long walk home over manhatten bridge, to brooklyn, first fighter jet we heard crossing the bridge, made ppl duck and scream(you hear it before you see it), than someone said, it is our af, than we kept on walking, looking back on smoke coming from wtc, lots of smoke, lots of ppl were gray from ash, the city smelled like ash for about a week, untill tanker trucks spraying water got rid of all ash downtown,

[Ray]

Omon,

It must have been sight that you won't forget in a hurry!

Must be really scary and horrifying.

Did you fathom as to what was happening or was there total confusion?

Give us some first hand account, please.

[entropy]

Hereby my apologies for having thought it was an inside job.

[omon]

well it was something you don,t forget quickly, i wasn,t confused, i knew what had happened(after 2nd plane) radio in our office, said pantagon was attaced as well, nobody from my crew thought it was an accedent, thou we did think that right after the first plane, the scary part was when towers fell, the first one, it sounded like another plane just buzzed by you, but surprisingly i felt no ground shaking when it went down, it was very dark on the street level, but on the roof it was not right away, the second tower made it very clear we have to get off the roof. than after the ash cleard a little it was very eiry to see downtown all gray, i had 2 boxses of masks, about 2 min later i gave away all, to anyone on the street who didn,t have one, the scariest part was sound of all fdny locators, sounded like horn, you could hear how many firefighter were not moving. after that all rubble, shoes,, that broadway was covered with, wasn,t so disurbing, the scene was like something you,d see in a movie, gray snow gray sky, there was a clear message, something unusual happened, ash looks a lot like snow flakes, big ones
also something unusual(for nyc) happened, everyone felt more united than ever before, crime went down, i guess everyone forgot about their problems at home, work, made all ny'ers feel like we are on the same boat, and have bigger issues in front of us, too bad we need a disaster to make us feel like that

[dave lukins]

It was my day off and I thought I'd have a nice relaxing day just watching TV and pehaps give the bike a run out. I switched on the box and the first thing I saw was a long shot of lots and lots of "smoke" coming from around the Towers, there was no commentary at the time just pictures...I am sure like many others, who was watching, thought it was a movie. It took some few minutes to realise that this was for real and something drastic was unfolding before our eyes. I watched the second plane fly into the Tower and that is when reality hit home. My thoughts since are, there where a lot of Heros born and died that day. A very sad day indeed.

[snc128]

I was studying very hard for the OSS exam.when I look back, I can say that those were the unutterablly tiring but nice days.

[SteeljawScribe]

2996 Project: Capt Bob Dolan, USN (Pentagon) and Mr. Colin Arthur Bonnett (WTC)

and

09:37:25 EDT 11 Sept 01: We Remember...

[SteeljawScribe]

...and I was there.

[glyn]

I remember my old schoolfriend 'Rick' Rescorla on this day each year. He was the head of security of a big financial corporation and had predicted something like this would happen after the first bomb attempt at the WTC by an explosives filled truck in the tunnel underneath. He had trained his company in evacuation techniques and every few months would hold a practice. On 9/11 he began clearing the staff down the steps, not in the lifts. He kept going back up to absolutely make sure his people were out and to assist workers in other firms. About what you would expect from a man who had earned the bronze and silver star during his 2 years in Vietnam. Unfortunately he went back once too often. I can never forget him.

[entropy]

You should never forget him, sir. It is on shoulders of men like him that great nations stand.

[dalem]

I posted this originally on 9/10, now it's a year later, 9/11. 6 Years ago I was asleep on my friend's couch in the basement/TV room (recall I had just moved to MN the day before) - the bedroom I was using was buried int he boxes and stuff I had kept out of storage.

I woke up to a phone ringing upstairs and some kind of incoherent message being left by my friend's mom.

It sounded bad and urgent.

I stumbled off the couch and flipped on the tube, hit CNN. If I remember right, and since I was half asleep I make no claim that I do, I caught the immediate replay of the second tower being hit. I don't think I caught either hit live.

Amidst the "Oh my god"s and quiet commentary from the anchors on scene, it took me about three seconds to figure that Something Big was happening. I went into my borrowed bedroom and loaded my guns. It's all I could think of to do.

-dale

[dave lukins]

You should never forget him, sir. It is on shoulders of men like him that great nations stand.

His Story was on the BBC TV just last night..quite a remarkable man indeed

[Bluesman]

I remember my old schoolfriend 'Rick' Rescorla on this day each year. He was the head of security of a big financial corporation and had predicted something like this would happen after the first bomb attempt at the WTC by an explosives filled truck in the tunnel underneath. He had trained his company in evacuation techniques and every few months would hold a practice. On 9/11 he began clearing the staff down the steps, not in the lifts. He kept going back up to absolutely make sure his people were out and to assist workers in other firms. About what you would expect from a man who had earned the bronze and silver star during his 2 years in Vietnam. Unfortunately he went back once too often. I can never forget him.

I've read his story, and I am amazed.

You're an honored person to have known him; I wish I had, too.