Still a mixture of sadness and anger.

the people jumping was a vision i'll never get out of my head.

I was in college when it happened. A few of my friends lost parents. Tough time in the area.

I was working east departures at Chicago Center. Never trained for a day when you immediately direct all air traffic to the nearest airport. Now

For those who saw the days events unfold in real-time, I doubt they will ever forget it. I sure won't.

Everything changed after that day.

Although, for a short while, it seemed like everyone pulled together to help. Everyone was kind and generous. For that short time, even though the shock, heartbreak, and loss, it was just a little bit magical to see people coming together like that. I don't know if we'll ever get to see that sort of togetherness again, but I hope so (but without a tragedy preceding it).

Complete sadness, rage and an overwhelming sense of patriotism. I visited the memorial in New York with my family while on vacation in 2019. If you are in the area I would highly recommend it. As you take the tour you get all of those same feelings again. The volunteers that work in the memorial are wonderful people. Most if not all of the volunteers had lost a loved one in that horrific attack. My deepest condolences for anyone who has lost a loved one on 9/11.

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I was in the city at the time, on the street having a cup of coffee from the cart and a cigarette when a guy pulled up and told me a plane just hit the tower (think it was a cabbie if i remember). I went to the roof of the building I was taking a class in and we saw the second plane hit. I remember feeling this terrible feeling that everything was about to change, like the life I knew was going to be drastically different in the future. Getting home was nightmarish, cell phones didn't work, there were few payphones around and the ones you could find had lines a mile long. No subways, no trains, then cars full of people covered in grey dust started coming.. it was surreal.. I ended up getting I ride to queens and home to long island after hours of walking with no communication to anyone I knew. The parking lot at the train statin in my town was full of unclaimed cars for months. Thant day changed me in many ways, new levels of paranoia that have been with me since, fears of large crowds and airplanes (haven't flown since), but it also led me to be different in many ways that might not have happened otherwise. The paranoia led me to leave the suburban and urban areas for the much more rural. I've taken to homesteading and purchasing a small farm. I now live how I want on my own terms without the stresses and fears I would have endured indefinitely otherwise.

Saw the Manhattan skyline just about daily as a kid growing up in Clifton, NJ. My church sat on a hilltop. The view was astonishing. My middle school was up Van Houtan Ave and the car ride home had a magical view of NYC. So did driving along Route 3 East. I always thought it was harder/more emotional for those of us that lived with the towers in our backyards. (I took the elevators many times to the top of the towers with relatives and friends that visited our family and wanted to see NYC. I used to take rides to the city to buy Broadway tickets from TKTS in the tower’s lobby when I wanted to impress a date without them knowing I was getting discounted show tickets.) The towers just went from being there to not being there in a matter of a few hours on that horrible day. I wished and prayed the morning of 9/11 that the building would survive. That they could take the blow and stand up to it. Unfortunately that’s not how it played out. My body crumbled to the ground as the South and North Towers collapsed. The view of the skyline still haunts me till this day every time I see it. Most times, I don’t see the Freedom Tower at all. I actually see what I saw on 9/11 when I raced up to my church to see what happened with my own eyes. Just smoke covering all of lower Manhattan. Or I still see the Twin Towers in all their majestical glory, raising into the clouds. Weird but true.

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Thanks ForceFlow, after the sadness the main thing I remember is the togetherness. I was born in Manhattan , raised on LI and worked in the city for 2 decades. That horrible day I was working as a sculptor for the jewelry industry, listening to Howard Stern's broadcast when I heard the news and let my shop know. We all listened to the second plane hit and looked at each other in horror. When I got down to the street I could see the smoke and smell the destruction all the way from 47th street! No way to get home or contact anyone, I decided to walk up to the 59th street bridge and made my way to Shea Stadium before my wife picked me up.

What I remember with pride was the way everyone looked out for each other that day. I'm sure NYC has a reputation for being a hard place to live with strangers everywhere, on that day it was the exact opposite. Everyone pulled together and helped each other. I was one of the lucky ones to come home that day and thank God for my fortune. I pray for the families who were destroyed that day.
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The attack was more successful than Al Qaeda could have ever anticipated as it drove a wedge between Americans who were for/against the war in Afghanistan which has carried over to today and in turn helped exacerbate a pandemic.

I was living in San Diego at the time.
My girlfriend at the time (now wife) and I we’re laying in bed and my phone rang.
It was my father who was supposed to be on a flight to Mexico City.
He told me he was stuck on the tarmac and needed me to be ready to come get him and explained that terroists had hijacked a plane and flown it into the World Trade Center.
My wife and I watched the second plane hit on TV in real time.
I remember the chaos and confusion of them not knowing how many planes were unaccounted for and might be still in the air.
Finally after several hours, my father said they were going to taxi the plane to a gate and let them off.
Our condo was in the North Park area (basically uptown) and I took surface streets all the way to the airport.
Driving to the airport there was no one on the streets at all and only the occasional car. It was almost apocalyptic like some kind of plague movie. I was driving with the windows down and all you could hear was the sound of military jets in the air (and there were a lot of them). San Diego is a big military town and I imagine they scrambled just about everything.
I picked up my dad and went back home and basically watched the news continually for the next few days.
Very surreal time.

I was in line for departure from CLT enroute to EWR. Heard local tower redirecting all traffic back to CLT. Strangest transmissions I've ever heard, didn't know what to tell the passengers as we taxied back to the gate except that the FAA shutdown all the US airspace and aircraft currently flying had a mandated diversion / land at nearest suitable airport immediately order as inflight safety could not be guaranteed. What that meant at the time, we had no idea.

Our dispatchers first told us it was an ATR 72 that hit the tower

Watched the towers falling on the airport television

Still have the flightplan paperwork from that day

Was then stuck in Charlotte for a week with a newborn at home. Very depressing surreal time.

The day the Earth stood still....and just watched.

I was in middle school then. The teachers brought in tvs on carts so we could watch the news. I still find it strange to this day.

The National Patriotism was awesome and lasted for years. Unfortunately, the aftermath was devastating: two bullshit costly wars, the Patriot act, government surveillance, TSA changes.

It was around 10 or 11 at night here . I was watching TV and changed the channel and saw the first Tower with smoke coming out of it .
I thought it was a movie at first but then realised it wasn't . Then the second plane hit and you knew it wasn't an accident anymore .
Our prime minister was in Washington when it happened . By the end of it , I knew we would stand with you guys and do what ever was needed to get the bastards .

Sad. Very sad.

i was working the first job in my career in logistics for an air freight company, and I remember watching the planes disappear from radar and the skies go quiet over Detroit Metro Airport. Very surreal.

And as mentioned above, it was a huge success for Al Queda, exploding our national debt while eroding personal privacy rights, driving a wedge between Americans on the unwarranted war in Irag, then the war in Afghanistan, and everything since. How do you destroy a larger adversary? From the inside out. They have been wildy successful, probably more than they ever dreamed. They were probably toasting each other with champagne as we executed our Vietnam Part 2 exit from Afghanistan.

I have to chime in here. The idea that 9/11 was some kind of victory for al Qaeda is categorically false.

Osama bin Laden wanted the US out of the Persian Gulf after Desert Storm. He viewed us as invaders, and not just in their region. Invaders as in Europeans who invaded North America hundreds of years ago and forcibly took land from the Native Americans. OBL looked at the world generationally, not in the short term.

Amongst other things, 9/11 was intended to get us out of the Persian Gulf. Instead, the opposite happened. We’ve maintained a presence in Afghanistan for 20 years and decimated al Qaeda. Is that what they wanted?

It’s easy to view history in hindsight and say what happened in Iraq or last month was part of some grand plan. It’s revisionist history.

Anyway, I still believe we live in the greatest country in the world where we can have these types of conversations. Take a moment to reflect on those we lost.

I had a customer recently fixated on it was demolition and not planes.

I pointed out that it would take a couple years and tons of equipment to do it. And all that time nobody saw holes cut in walls and primer cord and explosives being packed in. In almost 20 years no death bed confessions ?

They countered with the explosions seen floor by floor going down.

I asked if they thought about all the natural gas lines, propane lines, going up through the towers to all the businesses ? The electric cables from the ground to the equipment on the roof and each floor, and not extension cord size, I mean thick thick huge cables, hitting steel on the way down and grounding out each time ?

Didn't matter. I knew nothing. And what about the other building that collapsed later. I pointed out buildings have been know to collapse over time just from street traffic. And in this case two towers, over a billion pounds each. Slammed down into the ground. At least one of them cracked the planet. They had water coming in from the water around Manhattan. Don't you think that effected other buildings in the area ? Ones left standing were inspected for possible structural damage afterwards.

I suggested they find someone that was there and in one of the towers. See if that changed their mind.

LTG : )

And those that were there who escaped. Many have health issues years later from the dust and debris.

There is at least one Pinsider that I know who worked there. He was hungry and went downstairs to get food, when the plane hit. Or he'd have been vaporized.
He avoids the day.

LTG : )

Those who know me personally know, I was there at 9/11. I was in tower one evacuating civilians, still in tower one when tower two was hit. We stood evacuating even as tower two came down (first one to drop), we stood until the last possible second to get as many as we could and even when they sounded the alarm to clear out we tried to stay longer and so did some partners and friends. It's the worst feeling knowing there were your fellow citizens up there trapped and we stall weren't able to reach them and had to clear out knowing a collapse was imminent. We, I have a lost a lot that day and we still are as many of us are devolving cancers and other aliments that were never heard of in young healthy people.

I still don't discuss it to this day nor have I ever been back to site despite even being ordered too for ceremonies, no way no thank you.

Another thing we loss as of today is that American bonding the country had after 9/11, now a days it's all about division of color, gender, vax'd vs un-vax'd etc. We went from uniting as a country of one due to being attack, to being dived by 57 little things on top of being offended for everything and attacking ourselves now. So it's just best to never discuss any of it in my honest opinion, but glad so many do reflect on the impact and sacrifices many made that day.

It’s sad the EPA told everyone(first responders)it was safe to breathe the air.

Indeed, and I absolutely agree with you. I’m also glad we got to chat last year, thanks for talking me out of the game I wanted to buy!

Here’s a commercial that aired one year after 9/11. It’s 30 seconds, and worth a watch. It’s painful to see the difference then and today.

Was that a good or bad thing

You're wrong - he/they don't want us out of the Persian Gulf. We are infidels, a blasphemous perversion on this earth. They want us DEAD, period.
There is no co-existence.
And they willingly strap bombs to themselves and detonate them in crowds just to take a few of us out.

It was a win for radical Islamics regardless of the name on their membership card - Taliban, Al Qaeda, whatever. They all took a victory lap.

It's sad that the cowards purposefully took innocent lives and forever changed everyone else's.

I saw it from afar (a mile or so uptown) on the street.

It sucked.

Two memories stand out, the old man with grey hair and glasses muttering “well, they really got us good this time,” and the middle eastern guy with curly hair about my age crying with his fists buried in his hair yelling “this isn’t Islam. This isn’t islam.”

The 20th anniversary has zero increased significance to me vs. the 18th or 14th or 12th and a half. It’s always kind of there.

Happy Labor Day! It’s a gorgeous day out and I’m headed to a bbq.

You’re categorizing extremists into the same bucket. The Taliban and al Qaeda are very different. Same with ISIS.

I was in high school in a small town at the time - the sense of human loss was overwhelming, and most of the day was spent watching events unfold on TV either in our classrooms or in common areas.

Small town Wisconsin was an odd place to be, people panic buying at grocery stores, lines at gas stations. But what stuck with me was the amount of xenophobia brought to the surface. I was friends with a kid from Pakistan, and he was taunted/accused of being a terrorist, kids would say really disturbing and racist things, and a lot of that sentiment remained in town for years after.

I was at the first nationally televised football game after 9/11, at Lambeau Field. Of you recall, lots of large events were canceled. They handed out flags to everyone. I remember some drunk guy getting upset because I wasn't waving the flag enough while loudspeakers were blaring "Proud to be an American". It was an odd time.

That's the problem...ISIS, al Qaeda, ISIS-k, ISIS R2D2, Taliban, ARE all the same for all it matters. Differentiating between them only serves to sow the possibility that some might be OK, after all.

Asps, cobras, black mambas, rattlesnakes are all very different snakes. But when you stick your hand in a basket of them, they're all the same.

Now that is just not true, cobras, asps and Mambas have a neurotoxin, rattlesnakes have a cytotoxin. One shuts down your nervous system, one kills your cells.
(Unless you're talking about the Mojave green rattlesnake, then it gets complicated.)
I'd take a buzzy worm bite over a mamba any day.

Just saying.

9-11 sucked, I stopped watching tv for several years after that, watched it non stop for weeks.
B

Too many thoughts and feelings to detail here, but my first trip to NYC was early December after the attacks. I can’t put into words how I felt walking around ground zero with all the devastation, ruins still smoldering, and makeshift memorials & missing persons flyers along the perimeter fencing.

Here are a few of the photos I took that day.

I watched a documentary yesterday of the firefighters. Even more horrifying than the visual was the sound. With command central being at ground level in tower one the firefighters kept hearing loud thud crashing sounds outside (the audio was caught on camera too). They soon realized that was the sound of jumpers hitting the ground feet away from them just outside the shattered windows. In the video, all of the fireman turned their backs to the windows so they didn’t have to see it, but you saw the effect on their faces.

Thank you!!

I wrote this a few years ago, I think for the 15 year anniversary. 9/11 changed my life, as it did for countless others.

My thoughts: sure miss the way we all pulled together as one unified country vs today. I almost can't believe it is the same country. Judging by today's news and headlines, you'd never know.

The day after this darker skinned kid (20 yo or so) comes into my shop selling calendars. Each month the plane got closer on Tower 2. I says to him, ‘Kid, you’d better go home before folks get riled up.’

He responds, ‘Is it because I’m a Muslim?’

‘No. It’s because your trying to market off of a fresh tragedy, and doing it in the same country it just happened to.’

He yelled I was anti-Muslim and left. I just shook my head and wondered wtf just happened. Talk about actively seeking a whoopin’.

I’m not anti anyone, except anti-asshole. I hope someone knocked that asshole out. The whole day was surreal, but seeing tower two fall live on TV might have been the most soul crushing thing ever.

There's a new 9/11 series on National Geographic called "9/11 One Day in America" that is 6 episodes and is told only by the survivors. It was very interesting ... and sad. Watch it from episode 1 in order. It is on demand and streaming on Hulu. I recommend it if you want to know what was happening from their perspective. Very well put together.

I lost four very good friends that day, including my best friend from grammar school who worked for Cantor.

I still watch the televised ceremony each year where they ring the bell twice and read all of the names of the folks who lost their lives at the WTC. However, I rarely engage in conversation about that day and I refuse to watch any of the documentaries.

I was working in the north tower back in 1993 when they first tried to take it down. Everyone knew they would try again, as more than one plan had been foiled by NYPD investigators, but few thought they would ever succeed.

A day I will never forget. I worked that day as a NYC Policer Officer since retired. A day of chaos, horror and confusion. I’m not going to talk about that day but I will say days after the attacks humanity came together, American flags flying everywhere. People from all over the world wanted to help. Donations and supplies were pouring into Lower Manhattan. The generosity was unreal. No defunding the police that day. Emergency personal including Police Officers were hero’s and people were thankful that we were there. Police Station Houses and Fire Houses within NYC were receiving food from restaurants from all over. It was incredible how AMERICA came together and my thoughts and prayers will always be with lives that were lost and there families.

Crazy watching all 3 of the trade towers collapse in free fall. So sad! The lives lost and the effect this day had is so painful.

I was working in a cubicle in the program management area of a Tier 1 supplier in the auto industry. My wife called and said a plane had run into a skyscraper in NYC. In my mind I pictured a piper cub that lost its way and killed a couple passengers aboard, with the plane still sticking out the side of a building. When I left my cube and saw what everyone was watching on a TV, I saw just how wrong I was. I never would have imagined that happening in this country!

I also worked as a police officer that day, I was in OCCB and was just a few blocks away when the first plane came in and we responded within minutes. many of us was there before the second jet hit then we were showered with debris, glass etc from the second impact. I totally agree about the out pour of support that day, there was no thoughts of de-funding what so ever. It's was a great unity from all over the country to fellow MOS to civilians, even during those rough times I still had to stop and laugh when later that night I seen a Chicago RMP there and was like WTF??? I had to ask and they told me they jetted for NYC just after the second plane hit. There was some great bonding back on that day from all over and yes we were treated like heroes, however in my mind I was just doing my job to serve and protect life. The real heroes were all those people who were trapped and called their loved ones knowing we couldn't reach them nor were we able to put aviation on the roofs for an EVAC so they were saying their goodbyes. Those are Americas Heroes....

Just about 6 weeks after the 9-11 incident Commissioner Dunne had tasked me and a few other to put forth a power-point presentation called Lessons Learned which he presented to Police Chiefs from all over the world in Canada. I can tell you there wasn't a dry eye that room of well over 1500 MOS's and staff from all over the world when he was presenting especially when we played audio clips of the 911 calls in the presentation. I still have that presentation on my computer in a directory called WTC along with a million photos I had taken those first few days in search and rescue efforts before it become a recovery mission. Still as of today I have not reopened that directory and looked at photos or played any of the audio again.

I can tell you that 9/11 changed my life in a big way. I was 2,000 miles away in Texas and didn’t lose anyone I knew, but as a high schooler watching this all happen live on T.V. it… pissed… me… off… Those bastards pissed me off just enough to join Marines in the hopes that I could help prevent something like this from happening again. A lot of innocent people died on 9/11… and a lot of heroes died on 9/11 saving many more lives.

So.....20 years later, where did all of this end up? It seems the people who attacked us are stronger in number and certainly far better armed. We've sent them gobs of money, too. Seems like the dust is still settling....

I started watching the 5 episode series on Netflix that just came out. Haven’t formed an opinion on it yet but it’s definitely detailed.

Massive flag hanging over main street here in town.

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