What do you remember about 09/11/2001? 12 years ago.

[jeff98902]

I will never forget that day!
I am curious about what others remember and what you where doing on this historical day?
And did this horrible tragedy effect you in any way?

I was getting ready for work and my phone rings. It was a co worker telling me to turn on the television.
I did, and the first thing I saw was a giant passenger jet crashing in to twin tower #2 with fire and smoke pouring out of tower#1! I instantly knew that I just witnessed massive loss of life!
I literately dropped my coffee cup I had in my hand on to the ground and stood there glued to the T.V. :shock: :?

I had a buddy that was in the Army at the time, He called me later that day to tell me that he thought that he would end up in the middle east in the desert somewhere! two weeks from that day he was sent to fight "Terrorists".
Miraculously my buddy did come back from his tour of duty alive, but he is not the same person. He has dealt with some bad post traumatic stress disorder.
And he does not like to talk about the things he had to do in the middle east.

 

[GemmaMarie]

I was in middle school- okay now I feel both old and young at the same time that I've admitted that- I was in 8th grade. They didn't really tell us a whole lot. The first plane hit while I was in Science class & we remained blissfully unaware, it wasn't until class change that we all found out. I remember I went to history class (of all classes, right?) & we watched the live news, we saw the second plane hit. I honestly don't remember what happened the rest of the day. If we went on with classes as normal, or just stayed there... watching. I know some parents came and got their kids that day.

Personally, I was too young and ignorant at the time to really understand the gravity of what was happening in front of me, and it took a while. I remember the "outrage" over showing so many graphic images "too often" that followed- at least in my town- it was like we were divided, do we continue to report on it or leave it in peace? That's honestly all I remember of it, at least that first year after. I wish I could say my class had some life altering talk about terrorism and the evils of the world, but we didn't. Life just went on normal for us. I guess that was good though, too, in it's own way. No one in my classes had lost anyone that day and that was a blessing.

 

[MemberEd]

I was running late for work that day. As I was driving east on Rt 3 in NJ, I saw a plane flying very low and fast. I remember thinking wtf is he doing but put it out of my mind as I continued to navigate New Jersey traffic. I didn't turn my car radio on till about 15 minutes later and I heard the reports of planes crashing into the world trade center. Soon after I came to the top of a hill on Rt 17 and could see the smoke coming out of the towers in my rear view mirror. We did not have a TV or even a radio where I work so news of the collapse of the towers, the attack on the pentagon and the crash in Pennsylvania came from phone calls an visitors. The company sent everyone home around noon. One of the Admins and I decided that neither of us wanted to go home at the time so we went to a nearby bar and grill to get something to eat. They had several TV's and it was the first time I saw the images. We were both stunned and speechless. Needless to say neither of us felt like eating or even drinking anymore. On my way home I could see the pall of smoke hanging where the towers used to be and thinking how it reminded me of the Pearl Harbor photographs. I didn't realize till days later, when I saw the paths of the two planes in a newspaper, that the fast, low flying, plane I saw was United 175 on its way to the towers.

 

[CallMeWilliam]

I had just gotten into work (8 am-ish CDT) and was reading emails when a co-worker came into the office and said a small plane has crashed into one of the World Trade Center towers. At the time not knowing the full extent of what was happening we talked about how we were surprised that something like that had not happened before given how tall some of the buildings were and how crazy some people were.

About 10min later I tried visiting CNN.com which was completely down at the time, I then moved onto other big news sites which were also down, I ended up getting to Reuters site and was able to read the ongoing story. I told my co-worker that it was in fact a passenger jet and not a small plane.

I headed into the large board room where we had a TV/cable service and started to watch the news live; as time went on more people entered the room and watched the events unfold we were all completely stunned, then the footage of the second plane hitting the second tower and everyone was in a state of shock. One of the only things I remember someone saying was “That is no accident”.

We all watched as the rest of the event unfolded in utter shock at what happened.

 

[MsAllyCat]

I was laying in bed watching the evening news. It was breaking live during the standard evening news, and like most of Australia we all watched Sandra Sully (newsreader) on air doing an amazing job as the live footage was coming in. We all sat glued watching it all, live, unedited, trying to make sense of it all.

Horrifying.

 

[JerryBoBerry]

I was visiting my parents on vacation. We were out fishing that morning. When we got back to the dock the owners told us all hell had broken loose in NY and planes were crashing into buildings.

I laughed because I thought they were joking.

 

[CharlotteLace]

I walked into sophomore history class and they had just turned the television on. We watched the television for a good half-hour, and then our teacher put it on mute and we had a class discussion on our feelings and fears.

We were really pretty lucky, our history teacher also taught psych, and had a degree in psychology. She handled our emotions well, and kept us pretty grounded. Looking back, I'm really grateful we had her to guide us a bit when this was all happening.

 

[Crumb]

i can't remember yesterday... what happened 12 years ago?

 

[NataliaGrey]

I was in elementary school (3rd grade? maybe?) and a couple kids were called to the office. Everyone was a little curious about why some kids were going home all of a sudden, but no big deal, moving on. Then the teacher sat us down. She said the school had decided to let us in on something. Apparently some of the 5th graders knew what happened, and the school didn't want them telling us what happened and freaking us out. So the teachers told us. A lot of kids started going home early after that. I don't think it really hit me until one of the boys who was considered "cool" started bawling because his dad lived in New York. I grew up in Pennsylvania so a lot of parents commuted or made frequent trips there, anyway.

 

[mynameisbob84]

I was still at school. This was before the days of mobile internet but I remember hearing vague mumblings of "something big in America" happening before school was out. I think by the time I got home and saw that my parents had the news on in the front room, both towers were down. It sounds really callous, but at the time it didn't really affect me. I was working in a shop at the time and went to work that night just like it was any other day. I remember customers talking about it as they came in and distinctly remember a woman saying that when she found out, her "blood ran cold" and I remember thinking she was gonna burst into tears but she didn't.

It wasn't really until a few years later, when I was a little older and a little less self-absorbed, and through watching documentaries on TV (probably the second or third anniversary) and hearing some of the phonecalls and seeing people react as the second tower came down that the magnitude of the whole thing and the tragedy of it all really hit me.

 

[HarmlessSquirrel]

I was up early in the morning, talking to a friend on AIM. He said a plane had hit the World Trade Center, and I figured it was some drunk guy in a Cesna who went off course. Then the second one hit, and I think to myself, "This can't be a coincidence." After I got a more precise description from the news, I was pretty much in a daze all day.

The next day at work, at lunchtime, several of us went up a hill that has a clear view of that part of the city. There was just a big cloud of smoke where the towers should have been. We just stood there and looked for probably 15-20 minutes. Nobody said a word.

 

[ScarletVixen]

I was 13, and my home-schooling was in session. That consisted of me on the couch with my english and math textbooks scattered around me, some open and others piled up, a few binders next to me, and the TV off while I was doing some sort of test or practice sheet. It gets fuzzy on the details on that part.

My Mom was on the other side of the house on her computer (she worked from home) and Dad was at the office in another town. Dad called, Mom answered. Nothing seemed unusual, just another day. I remember my dog, Killer, was laying next to me on the couch dozing.

Mom walked in all of a sudden and said "Somethings happened". I was a kid, really had no clue what that meant. She turned on the TV, went straight to Fox News. By then the second plane had just hit before we tuned in. I just remember being confused and it took a good 15 minutes of watching and hearing the reports for it to sink in. It was like watching a movie at first. I knew it was New York, only a few hours from my house. I'd visited there a couple years before with my Church group.

I clearly recall putting down my schoolbooks and picking my dog up. I was holding him close in my lap and kind of rocking back and forth while staring at the screen. My mom started calling other people she knew. We lived in a tiny farmtown and a lot of people worked in the fields and on their farms without radios and TVs nearby all the time. I think she called our church too (her and my dad were Pastors as well).

I held my dog really close and watched him looking around, he was confused too about the weird atmosphere in the house while we watched the news. I was still kind of in shock, everything went from a normal day to a very abnormal day so fast. I whispered to him "Man, ignorance is bliss, isn't it, boy?" because he seemed so normal still and had no idea what was happening. I wished in that moment that I could be the same way.

And that's the clearest thing I remember. The rest of the day was spent watching the TV, crying, phone calls, long silences the rest of the time. Dad came home in the evening. We prayed a lot. The rest is too fuzzy.

 

[Red7227]

It was 10:30 at night and I was trying to find a Star Trek of some description after the news finished. I ended up with a direct feed of a news anchor in the US somewhere. The second tower had been hit about 20 minutes ago and they were talking about the possibility of the building collapsing. The anchor was saying that skyscrapers were designed to survive impacts by airliners and that there was no possibility of that - while the first tower collapsed behind him.

 

[LuckySmiles]

I was a senior in high school. Seniors had homeroom in the cafeteria since many didn't get a lunch period and instead got out of school earlier than other grades. So I was at a table with friends and it was noisy. The principal sounded like she'd been crying got on the intercom and said, "girls, pray." She tried to explain what was happening and didn't make much sense. Said we were under attack, that the pentagon and twin towers were bombed.

My high school was a bit far from where I lived. Everyone started going home. It was a couple months before I bought my big boat of first car, so I got rides with a girl from my neighborhood. Her father came to pick her up in a panic and got me too. She left her car at school.
I got home and no one was there. I put on the news and half the channels were choppy. I was scared and felt a bit helpless. The phone rang, my family was at the hospital where one worked. When the twin towers were bombed in 1993, over 1000 people were injured. Since manhattan was bombarded that day many people got on the train went to the hospitals in their neighborhood, and this hospital was crowded in 1993 that day with some of the injuries.
So they expected 9/11 to be 10 times worse and went there to help.
I can't remember if I took the bus or walked to meet them. I think I walked.

(This might sound "duh no shit" to some, but many people I've met don't realize NYC is made up of 5 boroughs, and that Manhattan is just one,and it is an island.)

Manhattan had been sealed off, bridges, tunnels and trains all closed. Many people spent hours walking to leave or were a bit trapped in places overnight.
No one showed up at the hospital. We went home.

 

[Ann_Sulu]

I was home-schooled so I didn't really get to hear much like a lot of other my age probably did. I remember I was getting ready to go to guitar lessons, putting pop-tarts in the toaster when I heard my mom talking to someone about it on the phone. I remember seeing the 2nd tower being hit too.

 

[Shaun__]

I was at work when I learned, and everyone was wondering if they would attack us there. They started putting police snipers on the roof for a while after that day, until things calmed down.

 

[Sevrin]

I was at work and overheard some people at nearby desks talking about *something big happening* on the phone, sort of on the hush-hush. I had a lot to do, and was caught up in my work, so I didn't pay particular attention. Then I went into the warehouse and they had the radio on and someone told me that the towers had gone down. I thought it was a hoax.

 

[Goddess Victoria]

I was 9 years old at my small, rural primary school. The school secretary came into our class in the morning and whispered something to the teacher, presumably telling him what had happened after hearing it on the news.

The entire school was shut down for the day and we all went and sat in the assembly hall and watched the news stories on TV all day. I remember parents coming to get their kids and everybody being in a panic about the world going to war and New Zealand having to send troops to fight. I was so scared that my Dad was going to have to go and fight.

When I went home my whole family continued to watch all of the footage that was playing all day on the TV. It was my first real exposure to the concept of humans doing terrible, horrendous things to one another. We also phoned our relatives who were living in the states to check that they were all ok and thankfully they were.

It was one of the most strange and surreal days of my life. Amazing how hugely it affected people in far corners of the world.

 

[Remykins]

I was in 12th grade World Issues class, my first class of the day. I shit you not, we were in the part of the curriculum where we were studying the history of terrorism, and we had our textbooks open when someone ran into the classroom and told us to turn on the tv. So we did, and we watched it all unfold for the rest of the class. Watched the two towers fall live. My teacher muted the tv for a moment and told us all to "close your textbooks because this is going to be the greatest lesson on terrorism you'll ever have"

The rest of the day everyone just hung out in random classrooms to watch the news, classes were basically cancelled. I remember seeing my dad walking through the halls and I was like "wtf are you doing here" and he told me that his friend, who happened to be a math teacher, called him to come pray with him because his sister lived in NYC, worked downtown and he couldn't get a hold of her. (he was born and raised in NY, moved to Canada to teach) so they prayed together, and everything turned out ok thankfully.

 

[Anonymous]

I remember going to school and like the all the kids asking each other "did you hear about New York? did you hear what happened?"

When class started the teacher said that yes, planes crashed into some buildings in New York, but we are not going to talk about it anymore after right now.

Finished the school day as per usual and I got home and asked my mom if she knew anything and she seemed very surprised that my teachers would just ignore it.

 

[LadyLuna]

It was my first year at boarding school. Every morning there was assembly in the theater. That morning, the assembly was going on as normal until the Principal of the school came in and whispered in the ear of the teacher talking. Something was stammered to give a bit of a seguay into the news, and then we were told that a plane had hit the twin towers, that those with family in New York were excused from classes to make phone calls, but the rest of us would go to class as usual. My first period teacher ignored it, but after that class in the hall the rumor was that there were two planes, one for each tower. My third period teacher took us to the library to watch the news, so I saw replays and some scenes of the firefighters. Announcements for the next few weeks included a moment of silence for the victims. When I got my chance to use the phone, I called my parents just long enough to ask to call my best friend. She was Muslim, so I thought she might have trouble.

At first, her community reached out to her and her family. A month later, her family was shunned. I couldn't reach her for a few months after that, and I don't know what happened to her. I still spare a thought for her every year.

 

[curvyredhead]

I was in 7th grade.

I was in NYC. South West Queens.

The teachers were told NOT to tell us anything. They were told to remain silent on the issue and keep everyone calm.
We had no idea what was going on.

Within a couple of hours my school of over 3000 was almost entirely empty. Parents were coming to pick there children up. It was only myself and one other kid left in my grade. I was scared out of my mind and went to the bathroom to cry because it was soo clearly something was going on..and I had no idea.

Last period my social studies teacher was listening to the radio with headphones shouting about the Russians and how females would be drafted now

I got out of school..to find empty streets and a subway that was not working and smoke/ash everywhere. It was clearly comming from the city (manhattan) I stood and waited for the bus until someone told me it was not running and I should go home as fast as possible. I spent 3 hours walking home to find an empty home. I turned on the news to find out what actually happen.

My mother and step father and Aunts and both sister's cell phones were not working. I waited by the door watching the TV hoping someone would come home.

My step father showed up first and then my aunt.

Finally my mother called from a hotel phone saying she was ok and was with my sisters.

They all had to walk up town and over the bridge and then to the house.

They did not get home until almost the next morning.


On 9/12/01 The New York City Public School system was closed for the first and last time of my 13 years with them.

We were back on the 13th.

 

[Poker_Babe]

Well after reading how young most of you ladies where during the attacks on 9-11-01, I must say I now feel like an old hag LOL.
It was my day off that day. I had closed the store that I worked at the night before, and hung out with some friends after work, stayed up pretty late. So I slept in pretty late that day. Woke up around 4pm-ish, didn't watch any TV or turn on the radio or anything, so I was totally clueless to everything that happened until I went over to my next door neighbor's house around 5pm to say hi, and she told me what happened.
The next day at work, instead of playing music in the store (I worked at Petco.), we played talk radio. Everyone, both customers and employees, seemed to be in a state of shock, disbelief, and heartbreak.
I heard a one of the store managers talking about how the best thing to do is have the government round up all of the Arabs and put them in concentration camps. I spoke up saying that would be unconstitutional and just flat wrong, and nearly got my head bit off by everyone for doing so.

 

[curvyredhead]

First of all thank you all who posted in this thread.

I would love to know what the day/ the week/ the month/ the year after 9/11 was like for you all?

What was different? Did you say an immediate change? Did the change last? How long did it last?


Keep in mind this was all through my 12 year old eyes living in the City

For me: The next day I spent my morning listening to Howard Stern..as I did every morning. His broadcast was a big influence on me, I have listened to it 25 to 30 times since then..so it's hard for me to really distinguish what my feeling really were that first time. I took my shower and got ready and we all kinda sat around the living room watching the TV, not a lot of people talking. People were taking terns using out house phone (which was ironically the last month we had a house phone) calling people making sure everyone was "ok".

The weeks following I saw people really come together. It was somber but there was a sense togetherness that as a preteen I really responded to. You could not get away from in it...every store had pictures of missing people that family members could not find. The american flag was all of a sudden...everywhere! We were all of a sudden saying the pledge of aligiuence in school and singing patriotic songs every morning.

I have had so many people tell me that for them this "togetherness" only last a day or two..where as for me I saw this for weeks...maybe even months.

I also remember that for weeks there were people who would not go anywhere without a mask over there face because we were told the air was not safe (of course in the following years, we know this was very true)

I felt like I was soposed to have this intense sense of pride for my country..and felt guilty because I didn't...I had not hate, i just felt neutral. I really didn't really understand what was going on. I got the general gist I guess, but did not feel that I knew enough to have an opinion.

Then the anger came...The missing person pictures turned to hate posters. Racist cartoons, and signs saying "No towel-heads admitted" I regret not taking pictures..but I didn't think of those things.

Then came the war protests. My church/religion is very publicly political in nature. We don't have a bible or tora or anything similar. Our weekly meetings were often speakers from the UN, or a local member of society with power (like the police commissioner, or mayor).
I felt like it was impossible for me to get away from.

And then came the lock down of the city. Within a couple year the city become what I am going to call as close to a police state (some might disagree) as i could ever imagine...By the time I graduated highschool, I could not walk through midtown without seeing men linned up on certain blocks with huge guns. I could not enter my school or leave my school without seeing the armed men guarding the building. You can't ride the subways/bus's/ or cross the bridge tunnels or ride the ferries without seeing the armed men. Public School's were no longer allowed to take there kids on trips (this lasted a number of years).

This might seem like a no brainier..but non of this existed before hand.

So what did you see change around?




I also just want to say that....even if no one actually answers this...it was really cool for me to be able to get this out. So thank you.

 

[LuckySmiles]

First of all thank you all who posted in this thread.

I would love to know what the day/ the week/ the month/ the year after 9/11 was like for you all?

What was different? Did you say an immediate change? Did the change last? How long did it last?

I wish I could share more detailed stories without giving away too much. But I can still go on and on! I don't remember the first days after. I remember that friday we had a "dress down day" where we all gave a dollar to wear street clothes expected to be red, white, and/or blue. The dollars were donated. We also had our high school id photos that day so my pic was in a red shirt with white under it.
I knew a great deal of people involved in the clean up efforts in the following days/weeks. You could see the smoke from my building for weeks.

A month later I was in the prime of my yankee baseball obsession (cause come on they fucking ROCKED)
And I remember the final moments game 7 of the 2001 world series like it was yesterday. MLB Baseball was put on hold for a few days after the attacks and pushed the post season later. The Yankees made it all the way to the world series and everyone was super emotional. They had to win. They were going to for NY and the whole country. They had a 2-1 lead but
Mariano Rivera was pitching and was/is my favorite player, everything was going to be fine. Mariano gave up the home run to the Arizona Diamondbacks in the bottom of the 9th with the bases loaded. Game over. I cried like an infant for like 20 minutes straight.

A lot of guys I knew around my age, were 17-20 in 2001 and ended up involved in iraq and afghanistan in the following years.
My freshman year of college was one year later and an "away" school but in ny state. There was a candlelight vigil on campus and most people didn't know each other yet but A LOT of people there had lost someone that day and many shared their stories in a big circle of people.
All of my professors in college starting my second semester were like pay attention to the Patriot Act, had us read 1984, all of the things that were starting then and set the framework for what goes on now.

Since i graduated high school most of my family moved away from the city area, and I was away for college so I wasn't back for a few years on the day. My first major "real job" in the city after college was very close to and involved commuting using the train stations located at the world trade center. So every single day I went to work, many years later but still just a giant hole in the ground, you had to walk around/through. You knew what it was but it became just the mess of a construction site, part of the daily commute. My job started at 8:30, and that year on Sept 11 I was late (as usual) for work so I was walking through the site during the first moment of silence at 8:46am. It was 7 years later and the pictures came back to the fences, flowers, people were in their dress uniforms. I walked with the usual sidewalk crowds that hop train to train and you could hear a pin drop despite being surrounded by people. It was very surreal and made it easy to imagine what it would have felt like if I had that same job 7 years earlier, running late to work.

 

[ThunderWeasel]

I was working a night shift job at the time, and taking care of terminally ill family members during the day. I recall one of them waking me up from what little sleep I was able to get back then, telling me "A plane had hit a building." I mumbled something and went back to sleep, thinking it wasn't too much of a big deal. (I spent most of my time really worn out.) When I woke up & was getting ready for work, I saw the TV news and realized it was WAY bigger than I had thought. Didn't seem real to me for quite a while after that, seemed more like a movie plotline. I attribute that to my near-constant state of exhaustion back then.

 

[Anonymous]

I was 19, living in New York, and attending a music school. I think I was in my first class of the day when the attacks happened. Some guy in my class had said to someone "Did you hear what happened?," and I didn't know what he was talking about. That afternoon I got back to my apartment, and I had voicemail messages from my dad and my uncle saying "Hey, let us know that you're okay!!!" And News 12 Long Island kept playing that video over and over again.

Every bus or train ride to New York after that, it was just so weird to see the NYC skyline without the Twin Towers.

 

[IvyR]

I'm going to be the unpopular opinion puffin on this subject, but this is an interesting event (which was announced today):

An Italian MP has described the 9/11 terrorist attacks, in which around 3,000 people were killed, as "an inside job" and slammed the official version of events as a "conspiracy".

http://www.thelocal.    it/20130912/video-911-was-an-inside-job-italian-mp

 

[SweepTheLeg]

I was 18, freshman in College. Had just got home from a morning class turned on the news and saw smoke coming out from one of the towers didn't think too much of it at first. then I saw the video of the plane going into it and seeing everything else and was thinking oh shit, but still didn't over react like a lot of others did. Gas stations jacked up the prices to almost 7 dollars a gallon, cars lined up around the block because of the hysteria that there was going to be a gas shortage. Got into an argument with my parents over that and why I wasn't going to. few days later it was found of what the gas stations did were illegal and prices fell down back to Normal.

I remember fearing for the draft, I remember hating how people were cashing in (and still are) on the event and getting away with everything they got away with because of 9/11, I remember hating the if you aren't with the president then you're a terrorist that hates America.

 

[Red7227]

I'm going to be the unpopular opinion puffin on this subject, but this is an interesting event (which was announced today):

An Italian MP has described the 9/11 terrorist attacks, in which around 3,000 people were killed, as "an inside job" and slammed the official version of events as a "conspiracy".

http://www.thelocal.    it/20130912/video-911-was-an-inside-job-italian-mp

Its interesting stuff. The thermite in the building and the way the windows were blowing out is all suggestive. How much might be CGI added after the fact or otherwise fabricated is the question.

http://video.cpt12.org/video/2270078138/