September 11

[cyrus buelton]

Thanks bro, you said it better than I could.

Nah, we just have had different experiences with that day.

I didn't know my wife in 2001, but her story about her cousin really gave me my first look in to a direct effect of the day.

The thing was, nobody knew where he was because of his urgent client interaction that took place that morning. It was literally a "on my way to work, oh shit, client urgency in boston, go to Penn Station for the next train out."

nobody in the family knew about his immediate change in plans.


Reminds me of the book The Bridge of San Luis Rey by Thorton Wilder.

Google it if you aren't familiar.

Basically it is a fiction book about a bridge that collapsed that killed xx amount of people and a priest researched their lives and why they were on the bridge at the time to see if their lives warranted them dying that day.

It is a great read.

[triangleforge]

I was working in downtown DC that day. These are the things I remember most vividly:

Lots of smoke on the southwest horizon, with clear reports of the attack on the Pentagon and wild rumors about other attacks -- the White House, the Capitol, many others. Blessedly, those rumors proved untrue.

Riding my bicycle home into Virginia through gridlocked streets -- three lane roads were carrying five lanes or more of traffic, National Guardsmen were in every intersection trying valiantly and largely unsuccessfully to keep traffic moving, absolutely the worst traffic I'd ever seen in a city that is daily strangled by it and this, the strangest thing I remember from that day:

I don't remember hearing anyone honk.

[Porsche Monkey]

My brother who lives in NJ and works in NY was on a United Newark flight that left 60 minutes before the United Newark Flight 93 that crashed in PA.  It was very scary and difficult trying to find his where abouts since all air traffic was diverted and grounded.

mitt

My girlfriend of five years was in the air at the time.  I was at work and my asshole boss wouldn't let us use the phones, watch the news or whatever. We heard it all on the radio.  Finally I was able to use the phone and found out my gf was diverted and made to emergency land but safe. 

[badgalbetty]

I remember that day . The memory of those that perished should never fade. My sincerest condolences to those who lost family and friends on that awful day.
As we all know sometimes life is just not fair.
BGB.

[Speedbag]

I will never forget that day, and remember it now as if it were yesterday.

I have yet to experience a time of absolute anger and rage since then, and really hope another does not come to pass.

[cyrus buelton]

I was disappointed to see a hotel near the bar I went to tonight didn't have their flag at half mast.

[koko64]

Condolences to all those who lost loved ones and to your nation, from your Australian friends and allies.

[ungeheuer]

Condolences to all those who lost loved ones and to your nation, from your Australian friends and allies.

+1

Half a world away we too remember your loss. Whilst the pain is yours alone to bear, the shock, the grief... and all those dreadful images... still cut deeply amongst we, your friends.  I'm sure America is in the thoughts of many Australians today.

[redxblack]

My employer sent us home with pay around 1pm. They thought it best for us to be home with our families. My wife worked at our son's Montessori school, so I went there. People were picking up their kids and the staff was alternately trying to care for kids, watching the news on tv and crying. My wife and I stayed there with our son and kept the kids playing on a beautiful fall afternoon on the playground. I remember vividly looking up at the sky and not seeing any contrails. There was a lot that was surreal on that day, but the closeness and kindness that people exhibited toward each other deeply affected me.

[MendoDave]

I was with my soon to be wife that day in bed sleeping when we got a call from her sister in Houston. She says turn on CNN. One tower was already burning, an American Airlines plane had hit the building. The Both of us worked for United at SFO, and we were wondering what could possibly be that wrong over at American, that an accident like that could happen in broad daylight with good visibility.

When the second plane flew into the other building this sickening dread feeling came over me, and then I knew that it was no accident.
A couple of hours later I got a call from my supervisor telling me not to come in to work that afternoon.

My neighbor was flying back to S.F. that day and he made the decision to fly Jet Blue instead of using the "Buddy tickets" I gave him because they were stand by tickets and the possibility that he might have to take a later flight. So he dodged a bullet on that one..

Things were very tense when I got back to work. We had all these new security procedures that didn't make any sense. One afternoon when I was going to the cockpit, I noticed that the crash axe was between the pilot seat and the center pedestal instead of behind the seat on the bulkhead. I commented to the pilot that the crash axe was not secured, and she told me in no uncertain terms that she was keeping it right there and "did I have a problem with that?" I said "nope, it's your airplane" I finished doing what I was doing and left. They had not yet reinforced the cockpit doors and there was still a lot of fear that there could be more attacks. 

Three weeks later I was laid off along with 30,000 others. I've never been recalled. I moved from the Bay Area. Its been a life changer for us and we were never even there in N.Y.
I'm not complaining, I'm just saying that our lives took at different path because of Sep 11th. I hated working for UAL anyway, management was sticking it to us (Mechanics) and I was sick of it. All that is water under the bridge now, but when I think of the images of those planes and the buildings it still hurts.

I know everybody says never forget and I understand that, but I wish I could forget,  I just can't.

[Randimus Maximus]

To me, it will always be one of those days that you "remember where you were when...."

The previous day, I closed on my very first home.  It was a Monday.  Football, pizza and beer that night at my very own place with a few friends who helped me move a few things in.

Woke up on the 11th to a local radio station morning show with their regular jocularity.  (keep in mind I'm on Mountain time)

Turned off the radio and jumped in the shower.  Got dressed for work, hopped in my car (set to the same radio station), and started on my way to work.

The earlier jocularity on the morning show had turned to a mix of confusion and panic.  I had left for work between the two planes hitting each tower.

I got a call from a coworker who I was supposed to meet up with, wondering if I had seen the news and what was going on.

Shortly after that, I received a call from our office telling us to go home for the day.  There were a number of my colleagues who were on planes that morning in Denver waiting to take off, but never left the ground.

It was such a surreal day.

I remember the eerie silence in the following days with no planes outside of military jets in the sky.  Quiet, but not normal.

Being that I had just dimed up for the biggest purchase of my life (at the time) and the resulting uncertainty of what might happen, I had a fair amount of anxiety.

And as BP mentioned, the days following were incredible as everyone seemed to come together as one nation, regardless of anything they knew in the past.  I long for those days once again.

However, I'm grateful that we are still able to go about life like we did before the attacks. 

[Grappa]

Living in Hawaii, all that shit went down while I was still asleep.  Woke up in the morning and was going to watch a surf competition.  While driving I heard something on the radio, but didn't quite catch it.  When I got to the beach park, nothing was going on, and I asked a guy who looked like one of the organizers what was up.  He said something brief about some planes crashing and terrorism.  Nobody really knew what the hell was going on.  I was really weirded out.  I didn't have a T.V. or internet connection at the time, so I drove to a local place for breakfast where I knew there was a T.V.  I sat there with my jaw on the bar, watching the footage for a few hours. 

And I knew two things right away...  1)  We were going to be doing some serious ass-kicking.   2) The world as we knew it would be very different for the rest of my life, at least.   

On Maui, it was really weird to not see planes in the sky for days.  And none of the helicopter tours either.  I worked at a hotel at the time, and many of our guests ended up being "stuck" on Maui.  Two good friends of mine were "stuck" on the Big Island, just a 20 minute flight away from their home on Maui, but there was no way to get from one island to another.  I found a T.V. and hooked it up and was glued to it every moment that I didn't have something more pressing.  I think that is when I started to pay a lot more attention to the world and to politics.  I became a bit of a news junkie, still am today. 

Obviously, tourism took a bit of a nose dive after that, for awhile.  But people did what they had to do.  When people started to really travel again a few years later, we seemed busier than ever.  Probably because people were coming to Hawaii instead of going overseas to foreign countries.  I think for them, Hawaii was still far away and different, but still within the U.S.A.

The images of the planes going into the buildings still seem surreal to me.  And the falling bodies too. 

About a month later I took a trip to Japan, and I just remember being hyper-vigilant in the airport.  Studying everyone.  Watching everything.  Creating scenarios in my head of "what would I do if"  and  "how would I handle that."  Sizing up the other males on the plane, wondering how I would fare in a fight with them if they turned out to be a terrorist or a nut job.  I think in the following months/years that most people flying had probably made the same decision that I had made with regards to the "what if they try again" scenario.  The decision that it would be better to die fighting than to just die. 

Greatest respect goes out to those in the armed services.  Thank you.