I have searched the forum for a thread like this dating back to 2001 and have not found anything. If this is a repeated thread mods please delete.

I am in my teens and do not remember the date of 9/11/2001 as I was very young. I have always heard stories of people in New York, Washington, on planes, or people just going through their everyday life. I would like to hear your stories. Where you on a plane? Where you in a city directly affected? How did these events change you? I know this is a sensitive subject but I believe your stories will help me understand the events that took place that day better. Thanks- Ben

I was working at Boeing on the Sonic Cruiser program.

I was 10 years old at the time and I stumbled upon the news on CNN. My first instinct was "Why the heck is CNN showing a movie?". And then I realised the gravity of the situation.

I was a high school senior. They cancelled all classes and assignments and sent those of us who could go home.

I was here in Norway, walking past a shop that leased out various electronics items. A huge crowd had gathered in front of one of the windows and watched a television set as the Aircraft flew in to the WTC. My mother worked at a shop in the city back then and I ran to that store and told her what had happend. We both could'nt beleave it, as we had both been in New York several times and was just astounded that such a thing could happen. In the weeks that followed, there was wall to wall coverage in every media in Norway. Norway deployed specialforces into Afghanistan very early on and fought together With US and allied soldiers in Afghanistan. Norwegian forces, including specialforces are still in Afghanistan and was active yesterday in the fights at the Kabul Serena hotel, helping out Afghan police getting controll of the latest terrorist attack there.

Not sure this is civ-av related, but the responses should be interesting, so I don't really care.

I was living in Seattle, working afternoons/evenings at the time, so I got up around 8:00 (Pacific time). My then girlfriend had already left for work. I was (and am) a news hound and had a ritual of stumbling to the computer first thing on waking up to see what was going on. I was totally unprepared for what I saw and spent the rest of the morning until I had to go to work in a numb state of reloading over and over again waiting for more information; I had no TV at the time. I don't think I ate breakfast or lunch that day. I was in a phase of my life with virtually no money and so had not traveled by air in about three years, but I still felt as if I were in the airplanes as I watched.

I was on the beach in Barcelona. I only got the news a few hours later when I returned to my hostel called... Kabul ! Many yound American tourists were staying in that hostel actually. I flew back home the day after expecting long delays but in the end we took off right on schedule, something I had never experienced before.

I was a senior in high school as well. I was sitting in a computer class trying to watch it on the TV, but the teacher I had didn't seem to care and made us turn it off. I had to settle for online updates on CNN. I thought it was an accident at first because I couldn't comprehend that a terrorist group was able to hijack four planes and use them as weapons.

It was fairly surreal. I just remember super long lines at the gas stations and people hoarding food at the grocery stores. I think some people truly thought it was the beginning of an apocalyptic event.

I was asleep in Australia. I found out about it the next morning.

On assignment in Hartford Ct, got stuck there for 3 days (partying the night before just few a blocks from Ground Zero).

[Edited 2014-03-21 16:59:35]

I was training for my commercial license, about to go out on a flight lesson.

In Hawaii the whole thing was over by the time most of us woke up. My dad woke me up at about 5am and summed the whole thing up by shouting one very terrifying sentence, "Two planes flew into the World Trade Center and the buildings fell." I don't think I've ever woken up so fast. We ran to the living room to watch TV until it was time to go to school. I remember the radio station in the car played a few patriotic songs between constant news updates....especially the Whitney Houston version of the "Star Spangled Banner."

The rest of the day was a blur at school watching TV and checking the news on CNN.com in the library between classes. My statistics teacher made us take a planned test, but the school nullified all the tests/quizzes we took on 9/11 and we re-did them a few days later.

The next day the newspaper ran a photo of Waikiki Beach with ZERO people on it. I don't think that has ever happened before.

-Aloha!

I am like you, I am also a teenager and don't remember anything but i have heard great stories.
Here in the west ( Arizona) it was very early in the morning when the events happened so most people where sleeping. I remember my 5th grade teacher telling us a story that because of the time delay it made a more depressing impact on the people out here, some of them would have went to sleep with everything just fine, and wake up to there being no WTC, a crash at the pentagon and in Pennsylvania, very different compared to the 1/3rd of Americans that live on the Eastern Sea bored.
My dad does remember taking my brother to day care in he morning and they heard on the radio what had happened, my probably 5 year old brother at the time asked what that meant and my dad basically didn't respond because he didn't know how to tell him.
The last story is something I heard not until maybe a month ago, it gave me chills down my spine when I heard it. My mother has been a flight attendant for the past 25 years, and the past 20 she has been with Southwest. A few days before 9/11 one of the hijackers was on my moms' plane. She said she remembered him very well, he was wearing a lot of Cologne I guess. I guess he asked her and the other employees if he could have their uniforms and he would pay them for it (Literally) The entire flight he was very suspicious and My mom and her coworkers were discussing his suspicious attitude and wondered if they should tell the captain, they did but the Captain didn't take appropriate action apparently.... One can only imagine what today's world what have been like if he had...

On a 737 out of Newark.

Quoting BravoEchoNov (Thread starter):

Who knows... Maybe in a few years our generation will be able to ask " Where were you when MH370 crached?" and actually have something to reply with since its something we can remember.

I just finished Midnight shift at United Airlines SAMC- System aircraft maint. Control on the 737 desk. When I got home I saw the first American Airlines plane hit the Tower followed by the United 762 (nose Nbr 6212) .
It was downhill after that. I had to go to work that night as I had airplanes all over the country hat has to be properly cleared of rotting food, full Lav tanks, Needed Servicing, and open Log Gripes in the Log Book .
It was a MESS for the next week.
We worked a multiple of 16 hour shifts while we had mechanics in Trucks going all over the country to take care of airplanes in "Jablap- Jablam" (or for Navy Types "B.F Egypt" )
We wound up the week with airplanes with overdue Servicing, out of time Deferred items ETC.

In Moscow. Came home to the flat and when I glanced at the TV saw "America Under Attack" in big letters, against a background of explosions. For a second I absolutely shat myself as I thought war had broken out.

On 9/11, I worked in NW DC and lived close to the Pentagon. I relate events from my memory, which is still mostly good.

It was beautiful day, perfect temperatures, blue skies. I was taking a course on Visual Basic programming that day. During the morning class break, we heard that a plane had crashed into the World Trade Center. Most people in the class were horrified, but initially thought it was an aviation accident. When we heard about the second plane crashing into the other tower, we all knew it was no accident. The class ended and everyone went back to the office. As we were walking back, a co-worker heading the other way told me heard a report of a helicopter crashing at the Pentagon. Soon thereafter (I do not remember exactly when), while we were walking outside we saw F-16s roaring directly overhead very low, on afterburner, heading northwest.

When we got back to the office, we turned the TV on and saw the Towers fall, and learned a plane had also crashed into the Pentagon. Military jets periodically were racing over the building. An hour or two later, we were all sent home. For most people, that was away from the city, but for me, it was close by the Pentagon. The roads were jammed around the Pentagon, but I knew some back roads to where I lived and was able to get home in about 45 minutes. I could see the fires burning at the Pentagon, people heading home, and many emergency vehicles. I could see the rescue workers were going to be working late into the night. I hated the useless feeling and wanted to help, so I ordered pizza, water, and sodas and carried them to the rescue workers at the edge of the security perimeter surrounding the Pentagon that day. The whole city mobilized, trying to find ways to help---one friend, who was a general practice doctor, manned a phone bank for blood donations. Others raised money for 9/11 victims, or later enlisted in the Armed Forces. A lot of people who enlisted then cited 9/11 as their motivation. I was proud of the way the city and country pulled together in those moments, and I remember those from other countries who expressed their support.

I remember the days after being surreal: perfect temperatures, blue skies, and silence. National Airport was closed for many months afterwards, and it was just so quiet, so surreal. A few weeks later, I received a letter from the Arlington Police Department thanking me for the food the night of 9/11, apparently my name was on the boxes. The side of the Pentagon was rebuilt with impressive speed, with workers coming from all over.

You know the rest of the story. DC never went through quite the terror New York did, but I never will forget that day, nor those who lost their lives serving their country.

What I remember most was how united we were in the desire to do help and fight in some way, and can relate to others in similar situations. Even today. When I saw a story today of how young Ukrainians were voluntarily gathering and driving food and supplies to their Army near the Russian border, I felt a deep sense of empathy, respect, and deja vu. I hope, though am not optimistic, they will be left in peace to remember the moment where they came together to help each other out, in a world that too often encourages the opposite.

regards,

J

I was in a hangar at LAX.
We had completed an extensive overnight check and were huddled around a tool box BSing until it was time to take the plane to the gate.
A coworker came out and said a plane had hit the World Trade Center.
We figured it was a small plane and didn't think much of it.
Until he came running back and said a second one had hit.
It was stunning.
LAX went quiet.
I remember my girlfriend calling me and asking me to come home - she was concerned.
I remember the 50 mile ride home - car pool - other guy had news radio on at the time.
Growing up in NY I had a ton of friends and family in law enforcement - fire department and financial district.
It was really somber.
Crawled into bed - watched the coverage and just felt so helpless being so far away from family.
I lost a few close people that day - sad.

I was at the ENRON HQ in Houston in a conference room at a meeting when security came and told us to stay inside, keep quiet and do not open the door. They didn´t say why. We all suspected a looney was going around the office with a gun. Twenty minutes later security came and told us to exit the building and go home. There, I found out what was going on.

Since Houston is the US energy HQs, and possibly the world´s, we found out later that they were expecting an attack either downtown or at the refinery complexes.

I was working at Sky Harbor at the time. Driving a 40 foot bus for the employee shuttle and long term parking. I worked at 2 pm that day and woke up because I lived close to Luke Air Force base and every fighter on the base launched. The roar was amazing. I then turned on the TV and saw what happened. Shortly after I was called into work. It was crazy awesome to see all the different planes landing at Sky Harbor from all over the world, The next 3 days the quiet from no planes was very eerie.

Quoting atcsundevil (Reply 23): I recall being on several flights to DCA not long after 9/11 in which everyone was required to be seated and buckled for the 30 minutes prior to landing

Stronger aviation security measures such as this one were part of the reason the government finally agreed to re-open the airport.

http://articles.chicagotribune.com/2...l-airport-reopen-security-measures

There is very little reaction time if a plane approaching National decided to change course to strike a building, which is why there was talking about permanently closing DCA (which would have been extreme). No government official wanted to provide an opening for 9/11 to happen again through lax security.

I was in downtown DC - 3.5 blocks from the White House. I was working on the massive Steel trade case that was proceeding before the International Trade Commission. I had pulled an all nighter the previous day and had worked the entire weekend in the office.

It was gorgeous that weekend and that Tuesday: late summer day where it was clear, dry, slight breeze, little humidity, and downright pleasant.

I got into the office around 8:40 that morning - just before the first plane hit. We had a TV on in the big conference room on my floor to keep people motivated. I believe it was on CNN, and we saw the cut-away to the live shot of the North Tower. As a recreational pilot, I immediately had a sinking feeling in my gut that someone had flown a plane into the tower on purpose. Too clear of a day and too obvious to not be avoided.

Saw the second plane go in and that absolutely confirmed what I was fearing.

We then heard a bomb had been detonated at the State Department down the street and that there was a fire at OEOB next to the White House. Folks immediately began making frantic calls to folks we knew or could reach for info.

People were starting to consider getting out of the office when we got a call to one of our secretaries from her son who worked at the Pentagon and told her that a plane had just hit the Pentagon. One partner who is an ex FAA deputy administrator and still very well connected came out of his office - ashen white - after having heard that there were several planes still up there that were hijacked, and that the rest of all commercial aviation in the US was told to land immediately.

We also heard that folks were being told to run - don't walk - run from the Capitol, the White House, and the House/Senate office buildings.

That sent the $hit flying and people started a mass exodus out of the office. Downtown DC was absolutely gridlocked and the folks at Metro -shut down- the subway for a while. So, I walked the 4.5 miles home.... Saw the huge fire from the Pentagon - black smoke, flames, emergency lights (it was the second time I've seen a major crash and it all seemed very similar (first being PSA 182 which I actually saw come down)). They shut the TR Bridge down completely and only emergency vehicles were crossing the bridge - at well above the speed limit.

We lost one co-worker on one of the flights; I had worked with her on a project earlier in the year. We could have lost four others but they went out drinking/partying the other night and were too hung over to make the flight. One instance where drinking saved lives!

Still remember that day very vividly....

On mother' Day, a few years after my grandmother died, I said to my father, "you must be thinking of your mom today."

He responded, Zach, I think of her every day."

He taught me something. I see the same here. We don't have to wait for significant days to express ourselves regarding 9/11.

I was in LA, glued to the TV from 6:20-8:30 am. I then went to work at the synagogue and waited in the parking lot as pre-school parents came by, and I helped explain why school was closed for the day.

Our services were packed that Friday night - and for the subsequent month after.

I watched 9/11 happen from my balcony in Queens. When the second plane hit, my then-girlfriend (now wife) and I decided it was time to leave. We lived right underneath the approach pattern to runway 04 at LGA and with the FAA airspace shutdown, planes were landing right over us (as they often did) at about 200 feet - but that day, they suddenly didn't seem benevolent anymore. It seemed like any one of those planes could suddenly nosedive into anything - we didn't know who was flying them or what their agenda was.

As we were walking, the first tower fell. We heard it on car radios; pretty much everybody who was driving had stopped their car and were just listening to the radio with the windows down. Many cars had people crowded around listening too.

I remember the most surreal sight was that as we walked down residential streets in Queens trying to put as much distance between Manhattan and us as possible, we could look to our left and it was just a nice, normal sunny day, with well-kept houses, birds chirping, and nicely manicured lawns set against a perfectly blue sky, and then we could look to our right and see this giant dust cloud filling our entire view. It was just completely bizarre, this schism. Your brain doesn't really want to believe what's happening.

We eventually made it to Queens Boulevard and by that time there were people who had come over the bridge covered in dust walking down the street, and there was a firehouse with firemen standing outside putting on their protective suits, it looked like to get ready to go in. I remember one of them suiting up as he was looking at the towers from the sidewalk, with people covered in dust walking past him going the other way.

We finally stopped at a diner a few miles down Queens Boulevard, and we stayed there the rest of the day. There were long lines at the pay phones because cell phones didn't really work. I kept trying to check my phone for news, which still sort of worked because in 2001, not a lot of people used their phones for that and so I guess that system wasn't overloaded. That's how we learned that both towers had collapsed. We didn't actually see it until we went home that night after dark, and watched it on TV as the smoke blew right over us.

The smoke blew directly over our apartment for months. It was still blowing over our apartment when AA 587 crashed a couple months later.

The two other very strange things I remember after that day were hearing and seeing fighter jets patrolling overhead in the months afterwards, and then the day when commercial flights started up again. That was an uncomfortable first few days/weeks. I was not used to being wary of commercial airplanes. I no longer trusted them.

You can see that I joined here shortly after 9/11.

I wrote a long reply, but the thread got moved and it disappeared.

I was shocked at the scope, but not surprised that some type of attack had hit the US again.

I was at work, and it wasn't a productive day.

I first heard about it while I was taking a shower early in the morning before school. Living outside Sacramento, most of it went down while we were just starting to wake up. Anyway, mom burst in and shouted a "TWA jet" had slammed into the World Trade Center. I remember clearly thinking no way it had to be a Cessna or other small general aviation aircraft. Got downstairs and saw the smoke billowing out of the tower and thought, wow what a freak accident. It wasn't until we watched the second aircraft hit the second tower live that we realized just what was unfolding. Additionally, I remember watching Diane Sawyer interview someone live at the Pentagon as the plane hit there, however I've never been able to find that clip online. We heard about the fourth plane on the way to school and rumors continued to fly, no pun intended, about additional aircraft. I was attending a private Catholic school at the time and we had mass that morning and one of the parishioners invited us to join in an additional prayer. We kept our normal schedule that day, however we left the TV on muted in the back of the class. There was a lot of talk at the time about the certainty of war coming and how we would "get revenge." That night was probably the only time I ever voluntarily watched NBC Nightly News with the parents.

As for my father, he was a state worker at the time riding the Amtrak Capitol Corridor into the Bay Area when he got wind of the situation. He had to turn around in Richmond and head back as all state and federal buildings were shut down for at least the day.

Certainly a day I will never forget.

One of my law professors had an interesting comment about this. He is in his early 40s so he was working during 9/11. Every year the majority of students keep getting younger when 9/11 at first they were in college, then high school, now middle school. In a few years when he discusses 9/11 which is a big part of the course many of the students won't remember the day.

I was in middle school. A friend told me a plane crashed into the twin towers while in class. Did not really believe him and went on with class. Class ended and rumors were all over the place. I remember going to the library to check the news and look at this airplane book to see how many passengers the rumored airliners carried. I never thought about the people in the buildings, it just was not a thought which came to me. Then in math class we watched the news, the towers had already fallen. I remember leaving school early, the streets seemed empty, passing by a federal building with police all around it. I spent the day and night glued to the TV. Putting in a VHS tape and recording the news as things like YouTube were never a thought to me. I still have those VHS tapes. With the news, with many channels like the food network going off air and ESPN carrying ABC news. The next week was surreal, the country took a huge blow a
nd aviation would never be the same again. I visited NYC in November of 2001, flew a UA 767 to JFK from MIA. Everything was different, saw ground zero just two months after. A day I will certainly never forget.
I remember going to a Dolphins Game the next weekend the NFL started. That is when things started to see normal again. This game made the cover of Sports Illustrated.

I did a few things that day, including some that would have me fired on the spot any other day, but the one that sort of marks the day stands out by how banal it was. I went to the dentist in late afternoon. Why? Because I had an appointment and I was too stunned to do anything but act like a robot on auto-pilot...

Quoting BravoEchoNov (Thread starter): I am in my teens and do not remember the date of 9/11/2001 as I was very young.

I do wonder from time to time how many generations it will take before someone starts talking about 9/11 and other people don't catch on right away.... Just as World War II marked the generation two generations before mine and those still alive can probably remember where they were when the war ended, 9/11 is probably, hopefully (*), my generation's defining moment.

(*) hopefully because good news doesn't leave as deep a mark as bad news, and if 9/11 isn't it, then it means something worse is yet to come...

On 9th September 2001 I arrived to Tehran in Iran, for the very first time for holiday.
We arrived very early morning, so we accommodated in the hotel and fall to sleep. In the later afternoon after a walk around the city we came back to the hotel and switched on iranian tv. Everything was in farsi, so I didn´t understand almost anything and just saw the pictures. I absolutely didn´t believed to what I saw and thought it´s iranian propaganda.In the evening we were invited for a dinner to our iranian friends home and they asked us, if we know, what happened in the USA. I recommended them not to believe to the iranian TV, because this is really impossible. Later in the evening I connected via dial up connection to the internet and checked international medias, which were not blocked in Iran and after this, I started to believe, that it´s real.

It was very late at night here, around 10.30PM or so. I was watching TV, The West Wing, when a newsflash came on with a report that a 'light plane' had flown into one of the WTC towers. The show was back on for another 5 minutes or so, before another newsflash. This time the news stayed on, I saw the second plane hit, then the towers collapsing. I couldn't believe what I was watching, it was straight out of a Tom Clancy novel or a bad disaster movie. I barely got any sleep that night, I kept changing channels between CNN, Fox News, and the networks here. The networks here stayed on full time news coverage for the next few days. It was a very sombere mood at the office the next morning, one of our guys had a friend who worked in one of the WTC towers & hadn't been able to reach her. It wasn't until later that afternoon that his daughter finally managed to get in touch - apparently she saw the first plane hit when she was walking to work, but continued on. Then when plane number 2 hit, she high-tailed it out of there.

Theres a official 9/11 thread unless it was deleted recently that was linked on a 9/11 thread created last September to commemorate 9/11.

Anyways some of us weren't members here but I was living on Brooklyn NY, and remembered it well. The city went into shutdown mode all the bridges linking the city were closed. From my viewpoint I couldn't see manhattan but were about 6 miles away. You could see the smoke cloud in the sky. A minute later really fine ashes started to fall from the sky and the smell of burning paper. I was able to drive home via side streets avoiding the gridlocked Belt PKWY. By the time I made it home picked up my daughter from daycare found out my wife was stuck in a Staten Island because the Verrazano Bridge was one of the bridges closed off and she couldn't come home till the next day.

Edited to add: All I did was check recent 9/11 threads and found links in the threads.

Airplane Crashed Into The World Trade Center. (by Hustler Sep 11 2001 in Civil Aviation)

[Edited 2014-03-22 06:43:14]

4th grade english class, the teachers hadn't a clue how to react.

Quoting Mike89406 (Reply 32): Edited to add: All I did was check recent 9/11 threads and found links in the threads.

Unfortunately that thread is all bugged up because of the number of responses.

I’m a teen just like you...I was 2 years old when it happened.

I actually got to visit the World Trade Center in summer 2000, but the only picture we have is of my grandma looking out a window near the top. For a period I became really “interested” in 9/11. I think it was after we watched a video in 7th grade U.S. History class. So I spent a lot of time on an Internet Archive website, which has TV coverage of the event before and after from multiple news channels. It was frightening to see the reporters and witnesses proposing theories, as the news camera, focused on the towers, showed the 2nd airplane approaching.


- Ytraveller

This happened during the afternoon in France so I was in class in my first student year and learned about the events only when back home some hours later. I was glued to the TV all evening.

Quoting flymia (Reply 27): Every year the majority of students keep getting younger when 9/11 at first they were in college, then high school, now middle school. In a few years when he discusses 9/11 which is a big part of the course many of the students won't remember the day.

That's why I actually think a thread like this is good. If someone asks about it because they were too young to remember and want to know more, we should tell them about it, not try to shut it down. That's part of the whole "never forget" thing, isn't it? And now that this has been moved to Non-Aviation, I guess we can talk about it more freely.

I have no kids but I do have two nieces; one was 1 year old in 2001, the other was born in 2002. I've actually thought about how they're going to think about 9/11 as they grow up. Will they even care? At some point, they're going to learn about it, the same way I learned about Pearl Harbor or the Kent State shootings or whatever. I remember when I was a kid, after hearing about Pearl Harbor, I was amazed. I became obsessed with WWII, specifically the Pacific campaign. (Somehow I was never as interested in the European campaign.) On the other hand, once I became old enough to understand what the Cold War arms race was, I was terrified for years. I don't want my nieces to feel that way, but I do want them to know what 9/11 was like once they're ready. I think it's important for everyone to learn that we don't live on an island and you can't close yourself off to the world - that things happening around the world do affect us, often very directly.

That's a lesson I feel like is already lost on some younger people. But obviously not all of them, as the existence of this thread shows. And that's good.

At work, listening to the radio, early afternoon..... reports came in of a plane flying into one of the Twin Towers.... interesting, but not serious enough to break away from the program.

Then another plane flew into the other Twin Tower. This is serious.

Went to get a tv and found the news coverage. Twin Towers in flames, smoke rising into the sky.

Shortly after, one of the Twin towers collapsed.... and you don't expect to see a building like that collapse as you're watching the news. Then the other one.

For me it was similar like olyman720 described: sitting in the office, working, I first thought it was just a small GA aircraft, than later realized that this is extremely serious. Two things happened later on that I will never forget as well:

1.) A colleague of mine had used the lunch break to drive to IKA to buy some staff. When she came back everybody was very silent in the office, trying to work as much as possible. She, however, came into the office singing and in a very good mood. Then she started telling us “You know what? This time it was very strange at IKEA: I could rush through IKEA and pay very quickly because all people were standing at TV screens and watching “Die hard”. She had no clue what had happened…

2.) In the afternoon I had a meeting with a real estate agent to visit a new house. Unlike me and my wife, he was in full “combat-mode” talking all the way, trying to sell this house. I couldn’t concentrate and asked him if we shouldn’t make a new meeting in view of what had happened just some hours before. He looked at me smiling, showing his perfect white teeth and said “Ahh come on Mr. N14AZ! Life goes on!” Useless to say that I never ever met him again…

On a CO 777 (Peter Max) from CDG to IAH.

We turned around back to CDG somewhere around Greenland.
It was an 'interesting' flight. The captain told us the whole story over the PA, and just about everybody on the aircraft was up in the aisles talking to each other about the hell could have happened. It remained very calm and orderly, however.

I was at home, my nephew was visiting at the time. My daughter called and said the Trade Center was on fire. We turned on the TV, and watched the disaster unfold. My nephew was working for United, he was in charge of a group of Stewards and Stewardess's at the time. He was shocked when the news broke about the United Plane. It turned out some of them had worked under him, or were still working for him. I am not sure of that fact. He is now retired from United.

I was at work at the UN building. I started walking across the 59th Street bridge, along came a truck that already had 5 people hanging on the back. I jumped on and held onto one of the steel cables that assist in lifting the roll-down door. At a red light close to my house, I jumped off and got home quicker than usual. Crossing over the bridge, I could see all the smoke but had trouble seeing the buildings. It was only when I got home did I learn that they had fallen. I lost 3 close friends, 2 of whom were Jewish....so this BS about there ''not being any Jews killed on 9/11'' really gets me riled up.

I am little bit in shame to say that it was about twenty hours later did I know this had happened.

At the moment of incident I was watching a movie on Communication Satellite channel. It was about
11PM JST. The channel does broadcast only previously-recorded movie programs, no hot news.
They do not cease programs no matter what happens. Then deep midnight I fell asleep.

Next day I went out to Gyu Dong or Beef Bowl shop, a kind of Yoshinoya, and was buying ticket.
In the shop I heard live news on the radio with announcer in a tense mood saying something. I listened to it
with intense, It saying....US airfield is wholly blocked and they are in search whether there is or not
another aircraft missing....what??? I for the first time felt something tremendously horrible is going on
in this world. After the meal I quickly went back home, switched TV on and knew the whole of what happend.

By the way I am impressed that men in the generation that does not know 911 real time has glown
short to adult, being able to type letter in PC and start a thread in the forum.
I do hope that in following many couples of decade in the future their innocent soul shall never be hurt by
such terrible incident as terrorism, war, earthquake, and any kind of catastrophe, as we seen in this passed decade.
May the world last in so peace that the most terrible disaster he will experience would be something like that
the dog fed by the family next door walks in and shits on the window of his house.

I was working the overnight shift as an after hours travel agent in Southern California. Towards the end of my shift, I got a call from another one of our agents who happened to live in Florida. He called to say he had just seen on tv where a plane had hit the world trade center but didnt know anything more about it. He assumed that it was a small plane. Frankly, I was a bit skeptical, I wasnt sure how it was even possible that a plane could just...hit....the world trade center. Frankly, I thought he was pulling my chain. We disconnected after I admitted I knew nothing about it. A few minutes later i had a corporate traveler call in to ask if I had heard that a commercial airliner had hit the world trade center because flights were starting to get canceled and he wasnt sure what was going on. With no access to tv and no internet as i worked in a call center, i had no idea what was going on. After a couple of more calls like this with people suggesting that a plane had hit the world trade center but having no further details, I called my dad and asked if he could go turn on the tv and see what was going on. At seven o'clock my boss came in and plugged in a tv so we could at least know what was happening, but, our call volume was going through the roof, so i really didnt have time to pay attention to it until I got home from work. From the perspective of my line of work as an after hours travel agent, the week of 9/11 was pretty much the week from hell with all flights canceled, no information on when they were being reinstated, stranded travelers all over the country wanting to somehow get home not to mention it being impossible to reach the airlines as they were as overwhelmed as we were.

DFW airport. Working.

Growing up near MacDill AFB, I was used to seeing F-4's constantly fly over my neighborhood, but seeing F-15's fly low over Queens was surrealistic. And living on the approach to runway 04 at LGA, I'm used to airliners landing every couple of minutes. For that one week it was eerily quiet.

I was asleep at my parents' house, having fairly recently returned from a really fun 2 week rail pass trip around Europe, waiting for my third year of university to start (UCLA's quarter system meant school didn't start till the end of September/start of October). My parents, along with my aunt and uncle, had gone to Las Vegas for a few days.

My cell phone rang and woke me up. It was my mom with one of the more grave sounding voices I'd ever heard and what I heard made me think I was still dreaming for a second. She told me to stay at home and that they would be leaving Vegas immediately. Of course, as a result of the ground stop and everyone wanting out of Vegas, it took them forever to drive home.

I then watched the news for hours and hours.

I was at kindergarten, after all at that time I was 6 years old.

I do somehow remember watching a news report about the attack from TV later back home...

I was in 3rd grade and didnt know anything until my brother came home and put on CNN.

I was a third grader at the time. I remember seeing all the teachers looking upset. One by one kids were being picked up by their parents. Finally around 10:30 the phone called and the teacher was told my dad was there to pick me up. I walked out and asked him what happened. He told my brother and I that planes were hijacked into buildings. I had no idea what in the world that meant. When he explained it I was shocked and terrified. We went back to my father's warehouse. My dad did a fair amount of overseas shipments so he had these big wooden containers that they'd put people's furniture in. Well he converted one into a little clubhouse for my brother and I. We had a tv, our playstation, posters. Cool set up. Well my brother and I would always watch Pokemon when we got there. But it was only news. He came to check on us and we told him we were scared the terrorists would get us too. My father looked at his 11 and 10 year old sons and said "Chill out guys. If those bad guys showed up here I'd kill 'em." Probably not the best thing to say to his young kids. But it worked and we felt safe.

A couple days later my dad and the police department in the city organized this food drive. The rescue workers were in need of power bars, granola bars, water, gatorade, etc. So he donated his 10 trucks and his workers volunteered. In one day they filled 10 semis with food and beverages for the rescue works. The amount of people that came down was incredible. I remember one lady told me my dad was a wonderful man. He was like a superhero to me that day. I'll never forget seeing a picture the local newspaper printed. It was a shot of his truck being unloaded near ground zero. I get chills when I see it.

Quoting flymia (Reply 27): Every year the majority of students keep getting younger when 9/11 at first they were in college, then high school, now middle school. In a few years when he discusses 9/11 which is a big part of the course many of the students won't remember the day.

It's pretty crazy to think about. My youngest brother was two days old when it happened. He actually was coming home from the hospital just as the first plane hit. My sister wouldn't be born until the next year. My brother asked me on the anniversary what it was like. I guess it was just weird to hear.
Pat

I was at work, and found it odd that I couldn't get to CNN. Their was a headline that stated that a small plane had crashed into the WTC. I remember thinking if their was fog there.

20 minutes later, my roommate called me and told me what was going on. At about that point all real work stopped around most of the office. Folks were trying the BBC and multiple sites trying to get news. The company turned on the TV's downstairs, and I was down there when the 2nd tower fell. A lot of people around me broke down and cried. A very scary day. How many planes were there? What else was going to be a target? The rumors and the reality were all so blurred during those first few hours. I can remember a coworker who was in a meeting for 4 hours during all this, coming out and asking what occurred. His face went as pale as a ghost, as his brother worked in the south tower. Luckily his brother was on the lower floors and got out.

I know in my apartment complex someone must have known one of the pilots as his picture was put on a billboard with a loving note .