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#WhereWereYou That morning, I had just started a new schedule and was due into the office @ 9:00 a.m. a few blocks from the WTC. I remember leaving on time but, the train kept stopping & starting after leaving Grand Central.
When I finally got off at the Bowling Green & walked out onto Broadway, I smelled the burning jet fuel immediately & stopped. In the few seconds it took me to recognize that something was wrong, I heard a loud noise overhead & looked up.
I saw the flash of the tail as something flew above the downtown buildings & heard a loud boom. My view was obscured but, it sounded like an explosion. Immediately, I could hear people on the street screaming & dozens began running in my direction.
I called out "What's Happening?" A woman running towards the ferry stopped me & said two planes had crashed into the WTC. I worked Network for a major financial institution & realized this was a d/r scenario, so I immediately started running to the office.
As I tried to get to work, debris began drifting down from the sky. I saw a woman collapsed on the ground crying while the man with her, was trying to get her to her feet. "OMG, all those people" she sobbed.
Within minutes, the normally busy streets were filled with traffic as people tried to get out of downtown. I got to my building & dozens of my co-workers were standing on the street, they did not want to be in the building.
I went up to the 20th floor command center. The televisions were tuned the news & the footage of the 2nd jet were replaying so I could see what had happened. From my desk, I could see both buildings on fire.
My co-workers & I set about dealing with procedures for disaster recovery. We sent a co-worker & some other employees to our d/r site. I went to fielding calls from distressed customers while we waited for instructions to leave our building.
About 5 minutes after my team left, the south tower began to collapse. I watched it from my window. I was on the call with a customer who kept asking me if I was okay. After a few minutes, I collected myself & began to worry about friends who worked @ WTC.
Then the north tower collapsed. This time I stood at the window & watched people running as smoke & debris seemed to engulf them. Within minutes, our building was smothered in debris & there was no sunlight, just a swirling mass of dust & smoke.
When the dust began to settle, I began paging my team to see if they had gotten to safety. We did not get a response for about 20 minutes until they came back into the command center, covered in dust & clearly shaken.
That day, we worked until around 8:30 or 9:00 pm (long day). When we finally left, I walked up Water St with two co-workers. There was no power so it was like walking through a dark canyon. Only a few peeks of the glow from the fire was visible.
We got to the small hospital off of City Hall & there were dozens of people standing outside in emergency lighted area looking for info on missing loved ones. After we rounded the hospital, we came upon City Hall.
There, in the open area were hundreds of emergency personnel. Police, firefighters, rescue workers all covered in soot & watching as 10 WTC burned out of control. The looks of sadness & exhaustion on their faces I will never forget.
And yet, one of them accompanied me & my colleagues safely out of the danger area. I will never forget them. We finally made it to Chinatown to catch a train out of downtown & home safely. So yes, I will never forget.
