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Original poster

Where were you on 9/11?

265 replies

JorisBonson · 10/09/2021 12:40

I was 16 and at college, having a rip roaring time in the student union bar with my fake ID.

Noticed a few people gathered round a small TV after the first plane hit. The union ended up pulling down the projector screen usually reserved for football, just as the second plane hit. We sat there for hours and hours just watching and not believing what we were seeing.

Can't believe it's been 20 years.

OP posts:
DoesHePlayTheFiddle · 11/09/2021 14:25

I was at work. I didn't know anything about it until the next day.

colouringindoors · 11/09/2021 14:28

In a plane, coming home from holiday on Crete. We went to baggage retrieval and there was a tv screen showing the tragedy. Everyone was utterly shocked and horrified. I felt sick to my stomach. People stood and stared, many like me finding it hard to walk away from the news updates. To this day I have very few memories of that holiday, it's like they were erased by my very strong nemory of that baggage reclaim space, the tv, the pictures and people's shock.

Such a terrible, terrible tragedy. And I've learnt this week that thousands more are seriously ill or have died as a result of being rescuers/working at the site and being exposed to signifucant toxic dust etc. I think I heard that the total death toll will be well over double the lives lost that day.

RIP all 💐

Boredsillyathome · 11/09/2021 14:37

I was 26 at work in an office job when word started to spread about what happened, as internet wasn't great back then it was when I got home the true horror of what happened became clear watching the news

rugbychick1 · 11/09/2021 20:51

I was living in Sydney at the time, due to the time difference it was the morning of the 22nd when I found out. I'd got up and put the TV on for the morning news (the equivalent of BBC Breakfast) and thought I'd put the wrong channel on. So tried another, and another. It then dawned on me this was real. I felt far away from home at that point. Oddly I'd done the Sydney harbour bridge climb on 11th September, so I'd never forget that date. But again, it would have been 10th September in America with the time difference.

I flew back to the UK in December 2001, and always liked to put the flight map on to see where we're flying over. It was really obvious we were deliberately avoiding flying over countries like Afghanistan

KingofQueens · 11/09/2021 20:56

It was the day before I started my PGCE. I was mid-way through dying my hair when a friend called to ask if I had the TV on.
My hairdye went horribly orange and I had to rush out in a hat to Sainsburys at Swiss Cottage to buy a brown dye to redo it. Everywhere was silent - the shop assistants weren't talking to eachother or customers and the aisles were empty. I felt like a right idiot buying hairdye as the world seemed to be in pieces.

Bigbouncingbaby · 11/09/2021 20:57

I was in a clinic about to have an abortion. I was only 21 totally unplanned . Just before I went in the tower came down we all sat there in the waiting room in disbelief. I day I don’t forget for two reasons 😭

Teaandakitkat · 11/09/2021 21:04

I dont really remember when I found out, I was at work I guess, but that evening I was at home by myself stripping wallpaper and my usual radio station was playing an American news station that was giving people info on how to get home, which subway lines were running, giving real time info to New Yorkers. It was dark outside and I was by myself and listening to the radio was so eerie. Weird brown wallpaper with roses on it, I'd not long moved in. Funny the things you remember.

JumpLeadsForTwo · 11/09/2021 22:00

Working in a hospital in a children's ward - spent ages in the teenagers meeting sitting room watching their tv with confused teens watching on and off. Really subdued

DeadButDelicious · 11/09/2021 22:12

I was at home in my flat. I turned on the TV and thought it was a disaster movie. I distinctly remember watching the second plane hit and just being shocked to the core.

hullaballoo19 · 11/09/2021 22:25

I was 11 and remember seeing it on the news on the tv in the school library

Queenie6655 · 11/09/2021 22:26

Resting at home
From jet lag

Arrived back from NYc few days before
We had been on the towers at the top In the eye in the world observatory

I just kept thinking of all the lovely staff we had met up there

CornishPastyDownUnder · 11/09/2021 22:34

on part of a r-t-w ticket in Sri Lanka...fortunately in the days before people travelled with mobiles so saw it on the front page of newspaper before anything else..

Cookie79 · 11/09/2021 22:46

@Pinotpleasure

Thank you for sharing your memories, that can’t have been easy.

I was 22 and working in a private hospital in NW England (admin). The tv was next to my office as it was in the Dr’s lounge. I know I watched a lot of it live but I don’t remember it. The hospital needed to run and we all did our duties to ensure that happened.

I remember franking the post then going back to watch the telly and saying “that’s a lot of smoke you can’t see the towers” then someone said one’s fell down.

I remember the daily mirror showing the picture of the firefighter going up and then a few days later finding and reporting that the chap survived. Mike Kehoe I think he was called.

I had no comprehension of what the WTC was until that day. I wasn’t well travelled.

I think we all lost a bit of innocence that day.

hartof · 11/09/2021 23:01

I was 15. I had walked home from school and met my mum at my siblings primary school. Heard her chatting to friends about what had happened but I didn't even know what WTC were. We walked through the door from school to my dad sitting watching the news as the second tower was hit. Dad had been there up at the top not long before and he was so shaken. Since then I had a fascination and I did visit 5 years ago to pay my respects. There are no words appropriate for the loss of life that day.

Timeisavirtue · 11/09/2021 23:26

I was at school, just started year 9 and was in science class, we only knew something was up because our science teacher who was an actual nutter and never shut up was rendered speechless after receiving a message from someone.

Queenie6655 · 11/09/2021 23:30

I couldn't compute any of it for weeks

It sounds crazy but I just kept thinking of the telescopes they had on top for looking out and what if it hit someone when it fell

Just insane really

CovidCorvid · 14/09/2021 09:32

I was in the shower and dh came and got me. I remember standing dripping wet in the front room watching the TV.

A friend of mine, her mum worked high up in the 2nd tower which got hit. She started to leave after the other tower was hit and tannoy announcements came on telling people to remain in the building as they were safer inside due to falling debis, etc. She ignored the advice and left, colleagues of hers stayed at their desks and died as their floor was above the level of the impact.

Animum2 · 14/09/2021 10:01

I worked in an open plan office at the time and someone on their lunch break had their radio on at the desk and the news came on, he told us, we all day there listening to updates and when I got home I just remembere watching it all on tv in horror

Animum2 · 14/09/2021 10:02

All day meant all afternoon *

Pikamoo · 14/09/2021 10:40

I thought I'd been watching kids TV when it happened and it then changed to news broadcast but looking at the timings that can't have been the case as school didn't finish until 3pm if I remember correctly (I was 10) and the first plane crashed at about 2pm. I vividly remember watching it on the TV though and my dad coming into the room wearing his gym stuff and with his gym bag. I didn't really understand what was happening.

LaBobkin · 14/09/2021 14:20

I had just moved to a new team working for an American investment bank in the City. We were on a conference call with our users in Jersey City, 2 blocks back from the ferry station directly opposite the WTC. Plans were in place for me to go and visit the US team in NYC / Jersey City within the next few weeks.

A few minutes into the call there was a stunned silence on the Jersey City end and one of the team there said 'we have to go, something has happened'. We went online and saw that plane had hit the WTC. Like PP have said, we all thought it was a small plane and that it was an accident - then the pictures started coming through.

We sat around in the office for an hour or two watching it all unfold until the company sent us home - there was a feeling that we didn't know what could happen next, maybe London and the City would be attacked. I walked home - no trains - and only then saw the footage (no TV in the office).

I later learned that my colleagues in Jersey City (who became dear and beloved friends over time) watched the whole thing - the second plane hitting, the jumpers, the emergency services flooding in, the collapses. I don't think they have ever really got over it.

I ended up moving to NY and living here for 2.5 years from 2006. I remember a police choir singing by ground zero on the 5th anniversary. My landlady in NY always said that without the towers, the Manhattan skyline looked like a smile with the two front teeth missing.

LaBobkin · 14/09/2021 14:24

Living there I meant

Sheerheight · 16/09/2021 13:37

At work, I was working in a lab at the time and someone put the radio on. I remember saying that I had been up the towers on holiday in NY the year before

tinyperson · 19/02/2022 10:51

At home with a head cold.

dazzlingdeborahrose · 19/02/2022 11:04

I was at home on maternity leave watching on Sky news. I was also on maternity leave on 7/7. I stopped having babies after that...

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