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Original poster

9/11 20 years on where were you can you remember it happening

311 replies

TheCatsHaveEyes · 07/08/2021 09:57

Just read an article about 9/11 cannot believe it will be 20 years since it happened next month. Still remember it like yesterday.
It really was my generation's JFK moment I think.
I was working at Fenwicks part time student. My friend came over to relive me so I could go on break and told me about a plane flying into one of the twin towers. I assumed she meant a light air craft so as I wandered into the staff room I was shocked to see the type of plane crashing into building and gasped as did everyone else already watching in the room. Only then did someone say that was a second plane.
After work me and all my family watched sky news on a loop it was horrendous those poor souls what they went through. The world seemed so terrifying suddenly.

OP posts:
Mynameisthecatwhogotthecream · 07/08/2021 11:04

I was at home on the computer with the tv on in the background, it was suddenky anounnced that the bbc was going to a news flash and my first thought was"oh god who's done what to who now"(think there had been a lot of troublein the middle east). It was horrific watching a d when the second plane hit found dh who was a taxi driver at our local airport, he hadn't heard anything and came home straight away. We spent the next few hours glued to the newd

Becca19962014 · 07/08/2021 11:04

I'd not long begun my dream job. I'd been holed up all day in training with a woman who was the most strictest person I ever met outside of school. I went back to collect my stuff and found people frantically on phones, we had colleagues that worked not far from the pentagon and I knew someone who worked in one of the towers.

One of my new colleagues was walking around with a smile on his face and turned to me and said "at last! The Americans get to see what it's fucking like" eventually someone explained as the Internet was down.

My friend who worked in the towers went out the night before and got completely off her head on drink and drugs as she would occaisonally do. She woke up after the towers had collapsed; she went missing for two weeks. Years later she ended her life as she couldn't cope with living. Had she been in work she would have died instantly.

I remember, still have one actually, the papers began reporting on people who went to answer the fight for jihad. Someone from my workplace left. I remember he was incredibly torn up over whether it was a genuine call. Everyone tried to explain it wasn't. It was so sad. I've no idea what happened to him or his family.

I made the mistake one year of going down a 9/11 rabbit hole on YouTube. The recordings to 911 haunted me for days.

silverstrawberry · 07/08/2021 11:05

I was at college and leaving for the day my friends brother called me on my Motorola flip phone to tell me it happened didn't really believe him ..so didn't see the actual footage until I took the train ride home and saw the explosions and was gobsmacked

SurferRona · 07/08/2021 11:06

I was at Duxford Air Museum, heard it when we got back into the car to drive home, think first tower had just been hit. There was a coach full of US tourists there that day, we’d chatted to few of them. , I often thought how terrible their coach trip back to their hotel, and watching that news unfold from so far away from home would have been for them.

CookPassBabtridge · 07/08/2021 11:06

I was coming back from college. I can't believe it's been 20 years.. but then see the footage and it does look like the past. I remember them building the fountain for the 10 year anniversary which doesn't feel that long ago.

happinessischocolate · 07/08/2021 11:06

I worked in the accounts department at an airport, we had a small tv in the office and as soon as we heard about the first plane we had the tv on and were watching it when the second plane hit.

It was very surreal looking out the window to all the planes on the tarmac and thinking how big they are and imagining one hitting a building. I think all the planes were grounded for a while before the they were given clearance again.

Horrific day. We were all just stunned at the horror of it.

Becca19962014 · 07/08/2021 11:07

I also knew someone who survived the second tower because they told their boss to fuck off - they were all told to stay put and not evacuate or they'd lose their jobs!

BarryTheKestrel · 07/08/2021 11:07

I was in school, year 7, I was 11.
It all happened after our lunch break so it wasn't until our art lesson where the teacher always had the radio on did we know. He then wheeled out a TV for us to watch. By pick up time both planes had hit and we were all traumatised. I went to my mums friends house after school which I did every day and sat with her and her DC glued to the TV until my mum picked me up. I still remember sitting there, hugging her son, being really scared and sad. He has been my support for so many years now but that day and his comfort cemented our friendship and his place as honorary older brother in my life.

Heatherjayne1972 · 07/08/2021 11:11

I was at work. It came over the radio that a plane had crashed into the world trade centre and I assumed it was a little plane lost in the fog
Later when I got home my then husband and I watched the news convinced this was the start of WW3

A Very sad day.

Popetthetreehugger · 07/08/2021 11:13

I was at my daughters apprentice afternoon at the hairdressers, having a random apprentice do something with my hair . My youngest son was at my dear friends watching toy story…. She still can’t watch it . On Thursday night we went to the theatre to see come away home ( or something like that ) it’s about the planes landing at gandy as they couldn’t go home . ( brilliant show ) a few weeks before we had been to see sting at Hyde park, all walking home to tube tipsy and crowds singing , warm evening, perfect day … then , I truly thought the world had changed … and it has . I remember Canary Wharf being sent home as tall towers .

Needawayout · 07/08/2021 11:15

I was on a plane over Europe. One of those weird coincidences where we turned up really early at the airport because the trains were on time for a change and got offered a seat on an earlier flight. Landed and took a while to get luggage, find our car etc... turned on the radio driving home to hear it all unfold and spent the rest of the day in shock as I imagine everyone else did !

ancientgran · 07/08/2021 11:15

I'd just got back from my home city where my mother had died the day before, went home to see kids and sort out some time off school for them so we could go back and sort out funeral etc.

When JFK died I was on a bus with my family when I read the headlines on someone's late edition evening paper.

ancientgran · 07/08/2021 11:17

Part of my post disappeared. I'd just got back from my home city where my mother had died the day before, went home to see kids and sort out some time off school for them so we could go back and sort out funeral etc. Should have gone on to say I was sitting crying, tv was on but no sound. I just watched it, it felt unreal, I didn't feel upset, I was too consumed with my mother's death.

badatcrochet1996 · 07/08/2021 11:19

I was 4 years old and I remember being sat at the kitchen table eating hot dog sausages watching the grey smoke on the television. Definitely didn't understand the implications of what had happened.

ZealAndArdour · 07/08/2021 11:20

I believe I was being driven home from school by my grandad and he told me about it. I would have been 15.

HerRoyalRisesAgain · 07/08/2021 11:21

I was off school unwell with horrendous stomach pain. Then I started my periods. I was 10. I remember my older cousin came rushing round to tell us to put the news on and watching the second plane hit the tower. I was terrified. What if a war broke out? What if they attacked the UK? What about all those people trapped in the towers?

Chemenger · 07/08/2021 11:22

We were in the BA lounge in Heathrow when the second plane hit it was showing on all the TVs. There was total silence and disbelief.

havesomepatiencechild · 07/08/2021 11:24

I was on holiday, aged 17 with my family and family friends in Europe. The family friend was American Air Force.

We actually didn't see it we were at a beach bar but he was called and notified shortly after it happened and went back to the hotel after telling us and his family there had been a 'work incident'. The rest of us got back to the hotel later and he was packed up, we watched it on the Spanish news in horror. He flew back to the UK (called back to base) that night and we and his family followed on our scheduled flights 3 days later.

The world really did change that day.

DonttouchthatLarry · 07/08/2021 11:26

We were on holiday in Menorca - didn't have tv or radio on, first we knew was when we went to the local shops and saw the front page of all the newspapers! Then we put the tv on and watched the news in Spanish, before finding CNN or similar. Flew home on the following Saturday and of course all flights were delayed, additional security etc.

SirSamuelVimes · 07/08/2021 11:28

I was 18, working in the Lloyd's of London building. When the news of the first one hitting came through on the BBC news ticker we all assumed it was a small, light aircraft and wouldn't have done much damage. Then when we saw the footage it was utter, utter shock. We all knew there were people from the companies in Lloyd's working over in the WTC.

After the second one hit, and the pentagon, they evacuated the building as it had been identified as a potential target. We went across the street to our offices for a while and watched the news on the TV in the conference room, then that building was closing too so we were all told to go home. I remember so vividly walking to Liverpool Street station to get a train. Everyone kept looking up at the sky. London airspace had been closed by then so we were all looking for the same thing - a hijacked plane. It was awful and surreal.

Eaumyword · 07/08/2021 11:34

I'd just got in my car after a meeting and switched the radio on right at the start of it all.
I listened in silence all the way home as more horror unfolded-the second plane hit, the towers collapsed, the Pentagon was attacked and they were frantically scrambling to try and control air space.
I had stayed at the WTC Marriott 4 months earlier and visited the WTC.
Just awful and I think of the victims and their families every year.

MrsMop1964 · 07/08/2021 11:36

I was working in a shopping centre. The manager of the shop next door came in and said' have you heard what's going on with the World Trade Centre?' I hadn't , so we both went outside and saw a crowd gathering outisde a branch of Dixons that had TV sets in the window, all tuned into the news. Everyone was literally stunned-as if our brains couldn't believe it wasn't a film we were watching.

CovoidOfAllHumanity · 07/08/2021 11:38

I was at Kings Cross train station with my PhD supervisor coming home after a conference in London. We watched in shock and awe on a tiny high mounted TV screen in the waiting room. A bunch of strangers all huddled round staring up at this TV. It was a surreal moment. I really didn't understand the global significance at the time. I was totally confused initially thinking it was an accident until the 2nd one hit.

Scarby9 · 07/08/2021 11:39

I arrived at a hotel to join the last session of a conference and to have a meeting after.

Four of us went up in the lift together and as the doors opened one of our colleagues came to meet us saying 'Two planes crashed into the Twin Towers'. I thought it was the start of a joke (that colleague aleays had a fund of jokes), so I laughed and said 'And...?'

She said 'No, it's real'

We all decided to cancel the end of the conference and the meeting and go home. Noone could concentrate and we all just had this urge to be with our families.

I watched it on TV obsessively that night and for weeks after.

I also remember 7/7. I was running a conference and heading towards a break when suddenly loads of people's phones starting pinging with messages. It was obvious something big had happened. We had to stop to let people with relations in London check they were okay.

Bitofachinwag · 07/08/2021 11:41

@Dollywilde

I was 12, in Year 8. I remember the first I heard of it was when my mum picked me up from school and said ‘apparently there’s been a plane crash in America’ and I did a sort of disinterested ‘oh really?’ because it wasn’t especially unusual. I knew something was up when she said ‘no, I think it’s quite a bad one’.

It’s odd to think our teachers would have known what was going on that afternoon and were still teaching us without talking to us about it. Not sure how I would have done my job that day pretending everything was still normal.

They might not have known. This was in the early days of the internet, no smartphones etc. Did they have radio/TV on in the staff room?