September 12th

[Hamdonger]

I'm going to start this in basketball and (hopefully it gets rolling...or maybe it won't) then maybe Quinn can move it to off-topic.

Sincere question, no games, no politics, no ripping on each other...just perspective. Tell me your 9-11 experience. I'm curious if anyone was there or knew someone who was in NY at the time. Even if not, it was still YOUR experience. I'd love to hear it. And then, tell me about your perspective on 9-12.

This documentary is a great great watch btw. Well worth the time. FYI Quinn...there's no politics in it. Just people's first-hand up close experience
https://youtu.be/pBQSdnCkiPE

 

[TIMMY]

I'll watch the video later and thanks for posting this.

That day. I had some students in my office and the TV was on. I always watched the Today Show and they were showing smoke billowing out of one of the twin tower buildings. Then we saw the second plane hit. I had one of the few TV's in the building that had cable back then. So at first we crowded in my office which abutted my gym. Later I pulled the TV out into the gym. There was a lot of crying. We did the best we could with the kids. We had some kids who had parents working in downtown Chicago and they were afraid Chicago would be attacked. We had parents picking their kids up early which didn't help with their fears, so at some point we dismissed early and cancelled after school activities.

Your thoughts are always on the kids, but I remember at some point decompressing and the scope of what happened hitting me. We did have friends who worked for Morgan Stanley. We found out later our friend Bill had dropped their son off for his first day of school so he was running late. He saw the smoke from both towers and turned around and went home. His wife, one of my wife's high school friends also worked for Stanley. She got out and walked through the fallout and debris to the Brooklyn Bridge to get home.

We were hosting that Friday night and I already had fireworks planned for halftime. We went ahead with that. Instead of going in at half both teams stayed on the field. We played some patriotic music and did the moment of silence. It was all kind of surreal. It's something those kids, now men talk about when I see them. It's weird what you can or can't remember 18 years later, but my thoughts always go back to those lids.

 

[Hamdonger]

That's a great share, CoachT.

 

[JHBird]

My little brother (he's actually taller than me now) was working in the Pentagon at the time. He worked one wing over from where the plane hit. His office filled with smoke and he had to run for it, but he was okay. He knew some of the people who died though. Years later I visited him over Thanksgiving. He gave us a tour of the Pentagon and showed us around. They had a little room set aside as kind of a chapel to remember the ones lost that day. It was all pretty moving.

 

[Sanantoniobird]

Haven’t watched the video:
I was still at ISU, and my roommate woke me up and told me about the first plane, as I sat up on my futon and groggily watched the second plane fly into the tower, I honestly was horrified.
Ironically, an Air Force recruiter had visited the grad class ahead of me only a month before. That moment was probably the first time in my life I began thinking about someone else other than myself. I had poo-pooed the idea of the military pretty much my whole life up to that point.

 

[Hamdonger]

Great shares. JH...your BROTHER was in The Pentagon?? WOW. SanAntB...great revelation. :clap:

 

[Redbrd1]

I was a Jr. in high school and knew a girl who was taking a college visit at NYU that day. Part of her tour was at the NYU campus inside the towers (not sure which one). Her tour didn't start until 9am so she was literally right outside the tower. Talking to her when she got back was insane, i remember her telling me their rooms were like on the 50th floor or something crazy like that.