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

[TheCatsHaveEyes]

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.

We had a big tv screen in reception tuned into Sky news, sound turned off. I was having a chat to the receptionist about having the heating on at home at that time of year as it was so cold (so odd I can remember the convo!). Then out of the corner of my eye, I saw the first plane fly into the WTC and shouted at her to look. I didn’t think it was real at first, then thought it was a terrible accident and trying to figure why the plane would be so low in a built up area, until we saw the 2nd plane hit in real time

As a slight aside, significant events like this lead to some interesting research around memory. For example, there was no footage of the first plane actually hitting the tower aired on the day, it only aired later. Yet in research carried out, people will insist they saw it. There was footage of the second plane, because news crews were then filming.

By a pool in Croatia (mid afternoon). Everyone started disappearing until it was half empty. I then heard some people talking and went to my hotel room to see the aftermath of the pentagon being hit.
I had to fly home early 3 days later as I worked in travel and we had thousands of customers ‘stranded’ in the USA and Canada who couldn’t fly anywhere. It took days and days to sort everyone out. I recall speaking to some customers who finally got back to the UK a week later than they should have, they’d booked the Windows on the World restaurant for breakfast on 9/11 but were massively hungover so didn’t go. I’ll never forget hearing her voice shake on the phone.
I remember a lot about that day, I still shake my head in disbelief almost when I see the footage even now.

I remember the guy who sat next to me in the office who had worked in the world trade centre until June was phoning the parents of 3 of the girls who had been in the world trade centre on the higher floors who he had been at university with. When they had not heard for 3 days they knew their daughters were dead.

I was at home. My mother rang me and said have you seen the news.i hadn't, so I turned the TV on and saw the second plane as it hit.
It was horrific.

I was in my house in a Midwestern US city, having a lie in with little DD4 who was three weeks old that day while my mum was watching children's programmes with DD3.

Mum came to tell me that a plane had hit one of the World Trade Center towers in NYC and that the programme she was watching with DD3 had been interrupted.

I got out of bed and found some paints and paper for DD3 to play with, then watched the coverage. I saw the second plane hit, and then the school phone tree called for all three of the older DCs to say school would close shortly and please make arrangements to take your children home/ to friends or relatives or neighbours.

Local news showed the city beginning to evacuate, with people crammed into trains and buses, and the expressways and all other routes out jammed with traffic. Mum went walking to collect the DCs from school. She had correctly surmised that the routes from Boston to the west coast were chosen by the hijackers to maximize the amount of fuel aboard.

The sky became completely silent. We spotted some bombers high above but there were no commercial aircraft aloft. As the day wore on the nearby expressway emptied and the lack of a background hum of traffic was eerie.

We watched president Bush's surprise at the news, and saw more fighter jets flying way above. We watched coverage of the plane hitting the Pentagon and the search for the flight eventually taken down in a field en route to Washington.

The DCs took advantage of the beautiful sunny weather and played outside. Little DD4 slept and fed and burped her way through the day. The parish church held a jam packed prayer service that evening. Standing room only...

Mum had been scheduled to leave on 9/12. Her flight was cancelled of course. She spent an extra week with us and had to get to the airport hours ahead of her flight because of enhanced security checks. She had carefully checked her belongings and taken out her tweezers and a comb with a long, pointy handle. The airport atmosphere was tense.

When she finally got back to Dublin and unpacked, she found that airport security had failed to spot a packaging tape dispenser with a wicked two inch blade, which had fallen off her bed into her hand luggage.

We had the day off work and had been to visit DHs new nephew who was about 2/4 days old. So hasn't had the TV on. When we got home my brother called and told us to switch on the TV.

For 7/7 I was in parliament and we didn't realise until about lunchtime when the committee called a break. I remember no mobiles were working due to the system overload.

I was in Jersey City, NJ. Was supposed to be at work but had to take my car for service that morning. There was a TV in the waiting room so we saw the first plane hit live, and then the second. I started to panic and needed some air so I stepped outside - only then did I realise that I could see the towers from the car park. It's all burned in my memory like it was yesterday.

DH used to work a few blocks from the towers but was running late so was still at home thank heavens.

I wax a student and was at home with my mum, we I saw it on tv and thought it was an afternoon movie and went past it. A friend texted me to watch the news. I worked evening in a government department and we were issued with ‘terrorism guidance’.

I was at school and I remember the staff being really upset. I think it was during after school club then my dad picked me up and we watched it on sky news for hours

I had outpatient sinus surgery-walked in to find all staff gathered round the TV in the waiting room. My surgery was delayed by about 90 minutes but I should've postponed cause I woke up in recovery and requested pain medicine and the anesthesiologist ordered ten milligrams of morphine IV-they pushed it into my IV and then pulled my line out and put me in my car and sent me home! I have the constitution of a war horse (can tolerate Rx painkillers and don't get me started on college drinking dares)

A colleague picked me up for work in Australia and told me. I thought he was joking. Our boss told us we could go home if we needed to, but ended up staying and watching the news at our desks all day.

I remember my mother was in Vietnam when it happened as she wrote a really shitty message about it

Years later I made friends with someone whose parent died in a tower. The ramifications for them and their siblings (both physical and emotional) was awful, they’ve never recovered fully and I wonder what their lives would be like if it hadn’t happened

We remembered (brains working slowly thanks to sleepless nights with DD4, and shock) that a cousin of mine was living in NYC at the time, and tried to phone him but all phone service in NYC was down. He lived close to the WTC complex and we feared the worst. Mum called her brother in the UK, father of my cousin, to see if he had heard any news - to our immense relief cousin was vacationing and out of NYC that week. He couldn't return home for a long time though.

In 7.7 I was in a train station when the police were warning people there has been a terror attack and I arrived at work and warned people but no one believed me as it wasn't on the BBC by then. Then it came on and they were all how did you know before the BBC.

We then got told to stand back from the building windows in case of an explosion by the police. This led to all the women standing back and all the men walking over to the window saying I wonder what they expect to explode. Fortunately nothing did and got taxis home.

I was working as a disability support officer for the boss from hell, holed up
In the office all afternoon. I dashed to the loo at one point, and heard a couple of people in the main office talking about planes, but didn't stop as boss from hell would kick off if I "spent too long" at the toilet.
I left quite late, about 6.15, and called in at the local shop on the way home, and saw the front page of the newspapers. I went home and hugged my daughter, who was 3 at the time, and husband so tight, and phoned my dad as we watched the news.
The following day I realised with utter certainty that I needed to find a new job when boss from hell stated coldly that she thought America deserved it. I could no longer bear to be around someone so lacking in basic humanity.

I was teaching in primary school. We found out when the caretaker came on duty at 3.30 and told us. We (the staff) rolled out the TV in the library and watched it unfold. So horrific.

I was in Koh Samui, Thailand on the way back from a working holiday in Australia. We saw lots of people on the street huddled round a window with a TV. We had to go to a bar to find out what was happening as no TV in our room. Spent the next few nights listening to BBC world service radio to get the ongoing news.

@elp30

I am American but on 9/11, I lived in Greater Manchester (my husband is from there). I had just put my eight-month-old daughter for a nap before I had to collect her older brothers from school. I put on the television and walked into the kitchen to make a cup of tea, when I returned, I saw that the news showed the World Trade Center on fire. My heart went into my throat.

My aunt worked in the WTC. I had no idea which one she worked in but I just hoped and prayed she was okay. I was just about to call my sister in Texas when I, and the world, saw the second plane hit the other tower. I was suddenly plagued with confusion, fear, dread and helplessness.

I called my sister and couldn't get through to her or anyone at all. I had to stop what I was doing, wake the baby and had to go to the school and collect my sons. I barely remember doing it. It was a strange reality I was feeling because in my head, my aunt and her family were affected, my country was under attack and no one had a clue what was happening at the school gates because they were preoccupied with other things because they were not as connected to phones as we are now and the news hadn't reached them yet. I was in so much panic.

By the time I got home the children back home, I turned on the tv and heard about the Pentagon. I simply couldn't get through to any relatives of mine, the lines just kept dropping. I was simply frantic but trying to keep things together for my children. I just remember me just sort of throwing food at them for snacks and just pacing the floor.

Then I witnessed the south tower collapse. My son, who was nine-years-old at the time, said I collapsed into sobs and fell to the floor and that I stayed like that for a while. The bad news just kept coming when it was announced that a plane had crashed and it was suggested that it had been hijacked and then the news of the Pentagon's collapse and finally the collapse of the north tower. I just sobbed and sobbed and held my phone hoping for someone in my family to call me. I simply knew I had lost my aunt. My husband was working in Europe so I had to keep myself calm (it didn't work) for my kids but I was so scared and dumbfounded and deeply sad and I wished to be back "home".

After three days, I finally got a call from my sister. Our aunt was in the south tower and just heard the explosion at the north tower but didn't know what it was and proceeded to do have her breakfast at her desk and do her work. She wasn't concerned because they had a spate of fire drills before and she had a lot of work to do and didn't want to evacuate the building. Finally, her boss told her to go down and was the last on her floor to leave and she made it to the ground floor by the time her tower was hit. Had she stayed, she would have been directly affected and killed.

I met with her two years ago, in 2019, and asked her what she witnessed. Her tale was harrowing and she was deeply scarred and still emotionally wounded by what she saw on the day. It took her 16 years, to go back to lower Manhattan (she lives in mid-town) and go to the site. I know she lost friends, acquaintances and extended family members on the day. I totally understand her not ever wanting to to be there ever again.

God elp that's tough to read. Your poor aunt. And how terrible for you, not knowing for so many days about your family 💐

@Geamhradh

I was in my flat in Italy. The evening before I'd bought a video recorder and had gone to do a lesson, just after midday, leaving it recording a random channel to check I'd done it properly. I did my class, got back, and turned my recorder on. I was momentarily so intent on checking the recording had worked (looking down at the lights etc rather than at the screen) that it took a few minutes to realise that the recording wasn't of a film. It was an Italian newsflash with the CNN footage showing "America under attack" on the red ticker tape at the bottom. I don't think I moved from the TV for the next 4-5 days. I remember the Uefa(?) or something similar football matches going ahead, and the players afterwards saying they shouldn't have. And I remember the Friday- there was a two minute silence pretty much worldwide if I remember correctly. Upstairs the flat above me was having building work done and it was constant banging and drilling for months. That day, the one and only time ever, they stopped for the two minutes.

I was also overseas and it was that ticker on CNN that shocked me to the core. We thought it was a film for the first moments until we realised it was on the news. Being overseas, the news channels were really the only English speaking ones available at the time so that's why it was on. We were scared that London would be next.

I recall being terrified to fly home soon afterwards.

I remember dh and I had agreed to go on holiday for 2 weeks in September 2011 to New York and Boston, I had a friend who had just started working for a year in Boston. It was one time I was very grateful DH had dithered so much on which hotel to book we never got as far as booking as it would have been a miserable time to be in US. In the end we went to Venice later in October, first time I have felt nervous on a plane, and whilst we were abroad the news was still showing 9.11 constantly.

Yes, I was at uni and walking home from a lecture. A classmate text me, making some glib joke as we didn't know what had actually happened. I was the first of my housemates to get in and I put the tv on. Slowly, it unfolded, housemates came home and we were watching the live news report when the 2nd plane hitting was captured in the background. It was like watching a Hollywood movie. Will never forget it.

I got home from uni after morning lectures and put on the lunchtime news. The first tower had just been hit and then saw the second plane hit a short while later. Can remember it vividly - the only other similar news event I recall was Diana’s death.

At middle school. Seeing the footage in the evening. Scary.

I read recently Only Plane In the Sky..some of the accounts were heart breaking. People waiting for news and nothing.. the phone calls from people on the planes...

And know at the time no one knew it was terrorism and that another plane was coming and at the moment it seemed a good idea to have less people crowding out both towers..but the fact so many people returned to their desks after being told to and then not making it out of South Tower after the 2nd plane..horrible.

Working at a little chef and was walking past the break room and saw these planes fly into a building...

Now this will probably upset some people but at the time I didnt know what it was I was seeing and thought oh cool what movie trailer is that. Obviously when I realised what it was it definitely wasn't cool.

Frankfurt, watching it all on BBC World. We’d just moved there for a year’s placement.

I was off work and in bed ill with tonsillitis when my friend rang me to put the news on. I literally just watched the events unfolding all day. The day that changed the world