Where were you on Sept 11 2001?

I was on the Gulf of Mexico fishing for Red Snapper on a free day from a week long sales meeting. We just pulled up a bunch of Snappers and were moving to a new fishing site to catch something else.

One of our sales reps stuck his head out of the boat's cabin and called out that Tower one was just hit by an airplane. I'm thinking a small Cessna not an airliner. I walked into the fishing boat's cabin as the second airliner made the turn and crashed into tower 2. That vision will be burned into my memory for the rest of my life.

Some of my friends drove from Mobile, Alabama back to their homes in the Mountain states. I drove from Mobile to Atlanta, hoping to take the first flight out of Hartsfield to Los Angeles.

Hartsfield, which is one of the busiest airports in the world was a ghost town on September 13th. It was weird driving into an airport that was deserted. No one was there. No Pedestrians. I don't remember seeing police for that matter. No one in the shops or restaurants. The flight to Los Angeles may have been the first flight, period, from Hartsfield and we took off after 9pm when we were scheduled to leave mid-afternoon.

We weren't sure if any flight would leave from Atlanta that day. Stewards and stewardess were nervous as heck. We were all nervous. The pilots showed up hours after the flight was supposed to leave. We were still not sure if any flight would take off.

Everyone on the plane clapped and cheered as we took off.

God bless our men and women in the Armed Services. Never forget...
 
A-train said:
I was in a chemistry class my senior year in highschool...and as a result of that day i joined the Marine Corps and was in Iraq 3 years later. Best decision I've made.
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Thank you so much for you service Mr A-train
 
I was taking my then toddler twins to their speech theraphy class. I remember hearing about the first plane on the car radio while enroute. While at the session, I remember another therapist talking about the first plane and had the television on and we saw collectively the second plane hit the tower. I can still vividly see the looks of all the faces of the parents/therapists and how we all had to put on a brave face infront of our kids.

I was off from work that day. I was an airline ramp manager(PHL) and immediately called work to check the status. I went to work the next day and was greeted with the most surrealistic experience. I will never forget actually going to the airport essentially a ghost town (we ran a skeleton staff for the next couple of days). I remember walking throughout the ramp area (the AOA) without having to use earplugs as the activity was nil and the area was silent.

Things I also remember:
*Prior to this horrific event, I remember telling my wife about what a beautiful day it was.
*There was alot of incorrect reporting during that day. There were reports that the USAToday building was being attacted and other similar reports that thankfully did not come to pass.However, there was a feeling of dread about what horrible thing was going to happen next. For weeks afterwards, I remember always glancing up when we heard a plane overhead.
*Cell phone activity was spotty for much of the day
*My brother worked in DC and after evacuating his office would up having to abandon his car on the GW parkway and walk (all non-essential traffic was basically halted within DC)
*The airline industry was basically in a state of limbo for the next week following that event. It forever changed that industry and it changed me. I actually went into law enforcement shortly afterwards in the DC area.
 
I was in midtown Manhattan. Watched the whole event from an office window. I wound up heading downtown with another contractor. Very surreal. Fighter jets overhead. People walking around covered in dust and debris.
I'll never forget the smell.....
 
I was at work about 3 miles away from Three Mile Island Nuclear power plant. I thought they were going to hit TMI next. With Harrisburg International Airport just a few miles away it was very surreal seeing nothing but a few A-10's flying overhead when typically there would be commercial and passenger planes in and out all day.

God Bless America!!
 
I was sleeping at the time it happened. My dad woke me up to tell me watch TV- which i did at the time anyway,since i wasn't working.Haven't celebrated my B-day since then.
 
I was at school back when I lived on Long Island NY. My father was driving into Manhattan for work that day and witnessed the second plane crash into the WTC. School was crazy that day. A lot of people had family in there and the whole school was in a state of chaos. They didn't even take attendance or have any kind of instruction for the rest of the week until some sort of normalcy returned.
 
I was at home, asleep, when plane 1 hit. A few minutes later a friend called and woke me up.
He filled me in on what had happened.
I told him "it's probably a terrorist attack" He said how long will it be until we know?
My answer "when the second tower gets hit by another plane, and the White House will probably be a target too". And we all remember what happened next.
But I was already on the computer selling every thing I had in the stock market. I was all out before the second plane hit.
And the next thing I did was put up my American Flag on my front porch. It's been flying 24 hours a day ever since.
Then I went to the store to stock up on food and drink. Wasn't really worried about prices going up, but inability to restock.
 
Midtown Manhattan at my desk as usual. Didn't take me long to leave my office after th first plane hit, my building was right on Central Park with clear access for a plane. Housed people in my apartment for hours and even days as they were able to return home when transportation returned. Will forever remember the plumes of smoke I saw rising from downtown, the view was clear from 3rd avenue as it was a perfect weather day in NYC.
 
I was in high school and I heard a few people run down the halls screaming and crying. We turned on the TV and saw everything going on, we live near the Pentagon so a few of the kids in my class' parents were there and they couldn't get a hold of them by phone. Was extremely frightening. Like some on here have stated, my thought process on a lot of things was shaped that day.

One of my biggest fears of living and working within 3 miles of downtown D.C. is something like this happening again.
 
It's amazing how you can remember exactly where you were that day and what you were doing...
Only one other event do I have such a memory and that was for the Challenger disaster in 1986.
Thank you all who serve and protect our country, not just the armed forces but the police and firefighters that ran into the buildings that everyone was trying to run out of that day!
 
I was in the air on a flight from LA to Atlanta to catch another flight to DC whne the first one hit. Captain onky informed us of the plane not the type or an assessment of the damage. Soon after people begin getting phone calls and I got one from my daughter who was 14 and very concerned. I was stuck in Atlanta for 2 days until I got back home but vividly rememebr the day I left there was no one at the airport and for Atlanta that's a feat.

To Meghan's comment it;s funny what the mond remembers and the details. I remember vivily JFK getting shot(was in Kindergarten), RFK MLK shootings, LA riots etc.. Maybe I am a morbid individual as I rememebr tragedies way better than happy moments? Paging Dr Freud!!!
 
I was sitting at my desk, getting ready to send cash numbers to my portfolio managers. One of our clients group lost several traders in the whole 9/11. I have yet to visit the New York site. I was able to make it to the PA site....if it doesn't move you, you're not human.
 
I had just gotten home from a night tour of duty at the firehouse, a friend of mine called and said "turn on your TV".. I asked what channel, he said "it doesn't matter"...
 
First week of highschool for me. 9th grade, sitting in Japanese class of all classes. Ended up watching the news for the rest of the day at school and at home.
 
IBM, Boulder, CO, 3rd floor.

Regards,
GEWB
 
I will always remember this day...

I was taking classes at Anne Arundle Community College. I was taking a counter-terrorism course taught by Dr. Tyrone Powers, which that Tuesday was the day of my class. I woke up and turned on the news to images of the North Tower billowing with smoke. The headlines read "plane hits North Tower." I thought that this couldn't be right...this was a no fly zone (atleast I thought). I watched as the second plane hit and I thought to myself "this is not an accident...this is a terror attack." I went to class, which was about a 35 minute drive, and my professor had the news on, of course. We all sat there and watched in horror. At one point you could see people jumping out of windows (that is until they told the media not to show this). When they said the Pentagon was hit, I tired frantically to call my Dad, who frequented the Pentagon for work. I couldn't get through. So for an hour I went through the motions in my head and I started thinking that my Dad could have possibly been in the Pentagon at that time. Finally I got a call from him saying he was ok. My school was locked down because they found out that there was internet communication from our library traced back to a cell in Germany. We couldn't go anywhere until later that afternoon/evening.

I couldn't imagine those individuals who went through that horror...for those that perished and for those families that continue to deal with their loss[es].

Although I didn't lose anyone in those attacks, but that day forever changed my life.
 
I was in 8th Grade GYM class, petrified that my father was stuck in the midst of this horrible event. Luckily he got out in time and everything was ok with him besides the terrible event he saw in first person.
 
Meghan said:
It's amazing how you can remember exactly where you were that day and what you were doing...
Only one other event do I have such a memory and that was for the Challenger disaster in 1986.
Thank you all who serve and protect our country, not just the armed forces but the police and firefighters that ran into the buildings that everyone was trying to run out of that day!
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Indeed!!! I second that! To all who serve our country....thank you!
 
Was in shop class my junior year of high school. We all moved to the lunch room and watched. Went to the high school later that day to pick up my girlfriend at the time and they were just finding out. School didnt tell them to reduce the "panic":wow:

That is why I now give good discount to the fire,police,ems and especially our military people, thank them every time for doing what they do.
 
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