Where were you? - September 11th, 2001

mod: reopened after discussion with the OP over PM.

Jet fuel does not burn hot enough to melt steel beams.

I did a summer job that year which I had finished the previous Friday which involved cold calling into companies in the US. mostly along the Eastern seaboard, mostly in WTC. I found it eerie that many of the people who I'd spent the Summer talking to, were probably killed in the attack.


That day I was outside painting, with no radio or anything. Didn't know anything was happening until around 4:20.

For OP: An interesting insight. One of the AH threads from the day as the events were unfolding

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=30985

I was 5 at the time and only started Primary School that year. I can only remember being sat at home with my family (I think my older sister who was in secondary at the time was sent home, but not too sure). I just remember sitting down staring at the TV not really understanding it but realising how serious it was. We had family who were on holidays in NYC at that time and more family who lived on the East Coast so my parents were obviously very upset (luckily all were okay!)

It's just weird that 9/11 is essentially one of my first memories (other than first day at pre school and primary school that was only a few weeks before)

I got a call from a friend who was in the pub and he encouraged me to come on down as the craic was 90 - a few lads had bumped into each other, and things developed. I 'excused' myself from work, and (not having a bob) drove to the nearest bank to drain the machine of what I could. I heard the news on the car radio, an urgency that was palpable, and raced into the pub to get them to turn on the TV, if only to confirm what I'm sure I'd misunderstood. As a few of us stood in utter shock watching the second plane hit, a prick walked out of the back bar and demanded that we turn off the TV as he needed someone to play pool with.

It was everything that people here have said, and more - unreal, surreal, shocking, mind-boggling, stunning, jaw-dropping, unbelievable, ..... words fail. I had an overwhelming realization, there and then, even as I watched it happen, that the world was now a very different and worse place.

I was working in a clean room in a multinational in Newbridge. I swiped into the cleanroom more or less the time the first plane hit just after lunch. I was repairing a 1 tonnes scale in there on my own with no phone or computer for about 4 hrs and when I came out the world had changed so much.

I was working for an IFSC company in Dublin that also had offices in the World Trade Centre so we were naturally concerned for those colleagues along with all other potential casualties (2 colleagues died - the offices were below the crash impact floors so it could have been much worse for our office). I remember not much work being done for the rest of the day once the news started unfolding and I just kept refreshing Sky News on my work PC internet and groups of us would hover around various PCs as some significant update was announced (eg the towers crumbling). My colleagues in our London office were all sent home as there were rumours floating around that key European financial hubs were also going to be attacked. All our other staff in the other US cities were sent home. I worried for my brother and sister both living in Chicago at the time should that city also have been targeted. There was such fear and uncertainty I remember as we gradually then heard about the Pentagon and then the crash in Pennsylvania. I seriously wondered was this the start of WW3?

It resonated as well because the previous September in 2000, I visited the Twin Towers as that was where half price Broadway tickets used to be sold for same day performances. My sister took a great photo of me with the two towers soaring above me which I framed.

I also bought the next day's Irish Times and Irish Independent as I just knew this would be my generation's JFK assassination moment (both papers are yellowing in the attic somewhere - I must have a look for them).

May we never relive such mass terror again...although the events in Nice, Paris and Brussels are sombre reminders of the terror that is still out there.

I was in school. Our English teacher walked in to class fashionably late, and told us that The Twin Towers had been hit. He was the sort of person who often joked, so at first we didn't believe him. It was only as the day went on, the reality began to set in.

I had been doing after school study, and the teacher supervising in the school hall spent the time with an earphone in, and kept the whole hall updated as to what was happening.

My mother had been at home doing ironing when things were unfolding. She was glued to Sky News, and was in disbelief as to what was happening. I can't remember where the rest of the family were at the time.

But certainly, it will be a day where everybody will know what they were and what they were doing when they recall the events of that day for years to come.

I was working on a new building (for Navillus ,an irish firm, kerry brothers made good,shout out to fellow Navillus'ist)not far from the twin towers, when word spread through the building that a plane had hit one of the towers,the lads on the 14th floor said it had passed over their heads very low, got a call from my then girlfriend-later wife- asking me was I okay and maybe I should come home. When word came through that a second plane had hit soon after most of us wandered to the the corner of the block where you could see both towers on fire down the street.
The sidewalks were thronged with people but everybody seemed to be on their cell phones and not talking to each other, went back to the building where word was that everybody was to go home for the day until the situation was clearer,soon there was no more mobile coverage.
Got a spin from one of the engineers out of Manhattan to Woodside,Long Island, remember seeing the towers with smoke rising off of them as we drove over the bridge along with hordes of people streaming over the bridge as the subways were shut down or too risky.
Got a yellow cab from Woodside out to West Hemstead, traffic was getting heavy now as they were closing down the approaches to the city, but as we were going away from the city it was still clear but the off ramps were beginning to be closed off
I often wonder how the taxi driver made it back to woodside that day,I don't think she did.
Arrived home about 11 ,where my future wife came running out of the house with our 6 month old daughter,hugged me,hugged the taxi driver for getting me home safely and I gave her(the taxi driver)$150 dollars for an $80 fare.
We spent the rest of the day huddled up on the couch watching the news.

Was at home messing in the pc, playing ms flight sim funny enough. Sister came in and said mad **** was happening in New York. Spent the rest of the day glued to the news.

Twas a mad day in fairness.