Where were you when...

MamaBee

MamaBee

Sweet Shoppe SugarBabe
On the 8th anniversary of 9/11... I would like to take a moment to think about what had happened and the impact on the world.

On the radio this morning, the morning guy asked the question... where were you when it happened? For me, I won't forget... I was working at Kimberly-Clark (makers of Kleenex and Huggies) and was 800 miles from home in a plant outside of Augusta, GA. I remember sitting in just outside of the classroom getting annoyed that one of the mill folks was interrupting our training session... she finally told us what was happening. With the airports shut down, we weren't able to get home for a number of days after it happened. Many in our group decided to drive back in the rental cars... Jill and I stayed back because we still had to train the following week... it was a very long weekend and very nerve-wracking... a time that I will never forget. :crying:
 
I was at work in Japan, (in the Air Force) it was really bad weather out so all we had to do was stand around, one of our Supervisors came over and told us about them hitting the Trade Centers. Since we were intel there were so many weird reports going around through all of our channels at work.

We watched the second tower fall on TV. Then they basically locked us down on base, gave us a 7pm curfew. It stayed like that for a couple months.
 
I was at work like any other day and my husband called me to tell me about what was happening. I quickly went and got the TV out of the training room and got my bosses in there to see what was going on. It really wasn't until I got home that day though that I realized the magnitude of the situation.
 
I was at home. My dh was flying to LA that morning for work. I saw the first tower fall on tv and the reports about other planes not accounted for. I called him on his cell phone and he had no idea what was going on because the St. Louis airport went on media blackout so as not to alarm people. They actually called his flight to board while we were on the phone and I made him promise not to get on the flight no matter what - he thought I was crazy and didn't understand the magnitude of it until he got home and could see the news himself. My dad ended up going to get him and brought him and the other 2 guys he was traveling with home.
 
I was at work. A couple of friends and I were heading over to the cafeteria to grab breakfast. When we got over there we saw a ton of people standing around the tv's which was strange since all they ever show on those tv's is stock market stuff. We couldn't help but stop and see what was going on. All we knew at that point was that a plane had crashed into one of the towers. After we got back to our departments we turned on the radios and that's when we heard the rest. I will never forget the shock of the day and how we felt every time there was breaking news about the other tragedies. I remember going home and watching the news and just being shocked at the magnitude of the devastation.
 
I was at the laundromat with my best friend. We had just put our clothes in the washers and walked down to a thrift store that was in the same strip as the laundromat and they had like ten tv's radios on in the store. That was sort of odd but I was not really paying attention to what it was saying until I saw the images on the tv and I could not believe what I was seeing. At first the news was saying a plane flew into the buildings like it was an accident. Then we saw the second one hit and we knew it was not an accident. We got our clothes done and went home and watched the news to see what it was exactly that had happened because there were so many reports that were not completely true. Then I got a call from my husband telling me what he had seen on the news and asking me if I wanted him to pick the kids up from school. He worked on rental cars so his job was basically shutdown for weeks afterwards with rental cars being highly in demand unless there was something wrong with the car that would keep it from being driven they were not sending the cars to the shop where my husband worked to be fixed. I told him no but if he wanted to leave to just come home.
 
I was at work, teaching in my 5th grade classroom. I was right in the middle of a lesson when my team-teacher came in and whispered to me that something was happening. It was a LONG scary 30 minutes that passed until I sent my kids off to music class and was able to get to a TV. It was 3 months before my wedding..seems like a lifetime ago.
 
I was at my mom's house doing laundry with my then 1 1/2 yr old daughter. I just watched the coverage all day and was just so sad that something like that could happen. I will never forget that day.
 
I was in bed...in my second year of grad school. My phone rang and I couldn't understand why someone would be calling to wake me up. It was my friend Sarah asking me if I had talked to Nick (one of my really close friends who had just left 2 weeks before to go to Juliard). Of course I hadn't...I was still in bed! She told me to turn on the news. I instantly started crying. I will always remember that ball of fear I had that day and the feeling of knowing that everything that had once been would never be the same.
That eerie feeling of not knowing how your loved ones are, if you'll be able to make it home to be with your family. Gah.
 
I was getting ready for work, watching the NBC morning show with Matt Lauer and Katie Couric when they broke away to live coverage of the plane and I saw the 2nd plane hit the tower as it happened. Once I got to work, they set up a TV in one of the conference rooms for people to watch. They tried to keep everyone on task, but it was pretty hard to stay focused that day.
 
I was testing students, and Joel showed up in the office and was so freaked out. Every day for the next two weeks, we watched it on TV; I remember waiting for them to find survivors and there were none. :(

I also remember how guilty I felt for watching normal TV programs for a while afterwards.
 
I was at work when a chemist from across the way came in and told us the news. I immediately called my mom and DH, who had pulled a U-turn on his way to work when the radio guys said the 2nd tower had been hit. I was on the phone with him when the plane hit the Pentagon (the Today Show was actually live with their Pentagon correspondent when it hit and he mentioned the boom/shake on TV). I remember the same guy coming in and telling us the first tower had fallen. We went up to break and they wheeled in TVs. We sat in complete silence and watched. I worked in a chemical plant that was surrounded by highise freeway bridges and police officers were stopped on the freeway where the road was feet away from the building, that scared me the most. I did no work that day, just kept listening for news. I watched the coverage for hours when I got home from work.
 
I have a terrible memory, but I remember details of this day so vividly. It was my second day of teaching music at an elementary school. Thankfully I was still team-teaching w/ the teacher who was leaving. We found out in the middle of our 3rd grade class; when the teacher came to get them, she whispered it to us and then the principal got on the intercom and told teachers to not turn their TVs on for any reason. Our kindergarten class was coming next and I could not even think straight. Right after that class was our lunch break. We quickly got our lunches then went into the computer lab with the other special area teachers (PE, computer, art, guidance, etc.) and watched the coverage and prayed together. It was such a blessing to work with people that would sit there and pray about it as we watched it unfold.
 
It was exactly 3 months and 1 day before I had Kaylie so I was very pregnant, I was subbing in our local school district but I hadn’t been called in that morning so I was staying home that day. Rob was getting ready for work since he had to be in at 10am so I was up with him. While he was getting dressed I turned on the TV and was flipping through the channels and every single one was reporting the same exact thing, that a plane had hit one of the WTC buildings. I remember yelling for Rob to hurry up and come in the living room and watch what was happening on the TV. We sat there in complete shock as they showed the first plane and then the 2nd hit and then awhile later when the buildings collapsed. There were so many different reports at first, as they were trying to figure out what exactly was going on. After he had to leave to go to work I sat on our couch the entire day watching all the news coverage as more and more information was coming out and I just cried. I remember lots of people calling to check on me that day, making sure I was okay.
 
I was on my way to work and I heard it on the radio. I remember just being stunned, I hadn't even gotten a mile from my house yet. A very sad day (and time) indeed.
 
I was teaching high school and had an office aide who was in my next period class come in and tell me that a plane had just flown into the 1st tower. I immediately emailed DH (who was DF at the time) and then the remainder of the day, my classes and I were glued to the TV watching the coverage.
 
I was getting ready to go to school and we heard a little snippet on the radio about some plane accident... we really didn't even have a clue what was going on. I went to school and learned more in my math class and my teacher let us watch the news all period. I was just a sophomore in high school. I remember feeling so incredibly scared and sad. It was the first time I didn't feel safe living in America and it was a frightening realization.
 
I was headed to my sil's house to help her paint her kitchen. I remember the radio dj coming on and saying that a plane had hit the world trade center. At that time, everyone still thought it was a horrible accident. By the time I got to her house, the 2nd plane had hit and her dad called to make sure we had the tv on. We sat on the couch and cried. We never did paint the kitchen that day. Jeff heard the news reports but was stunned when he came home that night and watched the news. Every year I cry and every year the images of those people jumping out the windows of the WTC are in my head. :(
 
I still get chills thinking about it. I don't think that will ever go away for me. I'm from NY originally and my parents live about an hour north of the city. My hometown is FULL of people commute into NYC everyday for work.

I had just started college at Penn State. I didn't have an early class that day, but I had woken up early. I was still lounging in bed when my roommate came back from her 8am class and turned on the tv. We watched the second plane hit and were locked to the tv in horror for pretty much the rest of the day. My dad was commuting into the city on random days during the week and I was absolutely panicked. I knew that he walked past the towers from his train/subway stop to get to his office. I spent a long time frantically calling home, but since NYC was in such a state of panic EVERYONE was on their cell phones and I couldn't get through (I had a NY cell number at the time, so it affected me even out in the middle of PA). I finally thought to send an email out, and by some stroke of my fate my dad had decided to work from home that day instead of going in. Several regulars on his train were injured or killed as the towers collapsed pretty much right as they were walking to their offices. I very easily could have lost my Dad that day, and that fear will never leave me I don't think. I remember going to several candle light vigils in the next few days. I remember the panic whenever a plane flew overheard (there's a nuclear reactor on the campus, and at that point there was no way of knowing where the next attack would occur, and a nuclear reactor was as good a guess as any). For a week or two I was constantly asked if I knew anyone who had passed, since most people knew I was from NY. It was very surreal.

Even 8 years later, the skyline just doesn't look right. :unsure: There's a certain road in NJ that we used to drive down, and at one spot on the road you crest a hill and you used to be able to see the towers. It still unnerves me to not see them when I'm on that road.
 
I was on my way to work & hear it unfold on the radio between 3 disc jockeys. I witnessed the second plane hit the tower live. (I'm tearing up thinking about it).

It is something that I will never forget and obviously really upsets me to this day. It was horrible act and horrific to witness.
 
We had just moved cross country. We were supposed to close on our house on the 11th, but had gotten a call that the papers were ready on the 10th, so we were unloading a uhaul. We had left the motel room right after the first plane hit. We had the tv on - weren't really watching it, we just heard about a plane crash and assumed it was a small plane.

One of the neighbors (a Mennonite - they only have radios, no tvs) stopped over to see if we needed any help, he said something to the effect of "that sure was something about the planes crashing" we just said "yeah" not yet understanding what all had really happened. We didn't realize what had happened until we went to pickup our daughter at school and had the radio on in the truck! We went back to the motel and watched TV the rest of the night rather than unpacking.
 
I was in college, on my way to meet my sister for breakfast in the big restaurant/student lounge on campus. Everyone was sitting in silence, crammed around the TV's in the lounge. It was so shocking. The rest of my classes that day canceled regular studies and we all went to class anyway to watch TV's and talk to our professors about what was going on. My Stats professor was from NYC and he was in shock.

The next night we had a candlelight vigil for the victims, and my best friend called me to tell me her fiance had been in a horrible combine accident and lost both of his legs and barely survived. It was a bad week.
 
I was working at my nieces bulk food store. I can still remember exactly how I felt. My husband finally had to make me stop watching it after a few days cause I was so upset about it.
 
I'm on the West Coast, so I didn't know much until after the fact. I was dropping off my son at school and we heard on the radio that a plane had crashed into the Penagon (didn't hear about the other planes). I must have turned down the radio because I didn't hear about the other planes until I was at work. I worked in a small medical office and was training a new girl. She filled me in and was all freaked out and said she needed to leave because her husband wanted to "escape to the mountains". So she left after just an hour and never ever came back. :blink:
 
I was stationed in Italy at the time it happened and with the time difference we were all getting ready to get off work {except for me I was on duty and was at the hospital for 24 hours anyway} and I happened to walk to the front desk and it was playingout on the TV in the patient waiting area...after that the base was locked down and it took people 3-4 hours to get off base and home....then for the next 2 days your name had to be on an ESSENTIAL list to get on and off base..it was terrible...
 
joelsgirl said:
I remember waiting for them to find survivors and there were none. :(
Click to expand...

That was horrible :( Even here on the west coast they had tons of Red Cross blood drives just hoping they would have enough blood for all the survivors. My husband got home from work on 9/11 and went right over to the nearest blood donation center.

And I was stuck on the news for weeks hearing the miracles of those that escaped the towers and the tragedy of those that did not. :crying:
 
Tony was off work that day, and we were just hanging out on the bed with Benjamin, who just turned 1 the week before. We had the radio on, and they said that a plane had hit the WTC. We went downstairs and turned on CNN, because we knew they'd have something on, and just a few minutes later, we saw the second plane hit. It was then we knew it was no accident the first time. I think we had CNN on for days following. I am in Canada, and I was still incredibly saddened.

However, my hometown, is just 40 minutes from Gander, NL, where many, many of the diverted planes landed. They housed and fed many of the stranded passengers, setting up places in schools, people took strangers into their homes to provide shelter and meals. I was not living home at the time, but I was so proud of my community for stepping up and providing for these people. Many of those passengers travel back every year, some have set up scholarships for my hometown schools, some set up a fully equpped computer lab for the middle school there. Delta Airlines also matched some of the scholarship funds as well.

To me 9/11 was the worst in humanity. But I also saw the best in it too. I found a link to one passengers story, there was a story on CNN but I can't find the video for it now. I can't believe it was so long ago.

http://www.geocities.com/floridachapters/lewisporte
 
I was still in high school (lol) and we were just starting in chorus. The band teacher came in and called our instructor out. They were out in the hall for a while and came back with a tv cart and the whole band! We all squeezed into the small chorus room and watched the news. It was unreal!

After about 1/2 an hour they started sending the students who take the bus home, then a little after that they sent everyone else home. It was crazy because there was a huge line in the office and at the payphones, students calling their parents... I walked home with my brother, cousins and neighbors (we all walked to school & back together anyway). We didn't really understand what was going on since no one really explained it to us, until our parents got home and we all were talking about it.
What a day! I'll never forget 9/11... really....
 
I was 8 months pregnant w/ the twins.... i turned on the tv and there it was... i literally watched on as the second plane came into view and slammed into the 2nd tower............ it was horrific.....

i grew up in NJ and spent so much time in NYC and had been to the twin towers a million times...... my father worked in the city and did lots of biz there..... we knew people in those buildings...... and my father watched the towers fall.....

it feels like it was just yesterday.... it's so surreal though........ my heart breaks for all those people and families.........

oxoxooxox
 
I was in the airport in Vancouver Canada, waiting for my plane home. It was so early there so I had just gotten a huge latte and saw a group of people around some TV monitors there in the airport. I assumed it was a disaster movie at first, but then realized the horrible truth. I grew up in New York and it was a very surreal moment for me standing there weeping among a group of complete strangers as I watched the towers fall and wondering if any of my friends were in them. I remember so vividly watching the flight information screens all switch to CANCELLED for every. single. flight. Then they locked down the airport and you couldn't get in OR out -- you had to be escorted out by security. It was such a bizarre situation. I got one of the very last rental cars in the place and remember flinching every time a plane flew in overhead as I drove out of the airport.

I was lucky though, that my in-laws live in Vancouver and I was able to stay with them because they diverted hundreds of flights that were coming in to the west coast of the US to Vancouver instead. The planes were parked wing-to-wing at the airport completely packed with people. People were going door-to-door trying to find places for people to stay because all the hotels were full. I remember someone knocking on the door of my in-laws tiny apartment and my father-in-law having to tell them that, sorry, they had already taken in one refugee. It remained so surreal, though, because business went on as usual in Canada and my in-laws went off to work while I sat glued to CNN and going through all that horrible "the world as we know it has changed" thing that I think most Americans felt at the time.

I didn't manage to get home for 6 days -- I had to wait until they finally opened the border days later, then drove across the border at 1:00 in the morning (to avoid the hours long waits that formed during the day), and caught a flight home from Seattle. That was the eeriest flight I have ever been on. You could have heard a pin drop on that plane.
 
I was at work when my boss came back from lunch to tell me there had been a terrible accident in NY and a plane had crashed in to one of the towers. We logged onto the BBC news website and literally watched live feed of the second impact - there had been a BBC tv crew filming at the centre that morning. The whole office just went so silent, realising immediately that this was absolutely not an accident. I remember just getting home and watching the news as the buildings collapsed.

I read today that alot of the relatives of those who died are worried that the rememberance of that day and those who died will somehow become absorbed into a general 'Earth Day'. I really, really don't think anyone who saw the images of the towers on or after that day will ever let that happen - how could we after what we watched and witnssed?
 
I was in school...hmm...2001...I guess that would've been 10th grade for me. I went to a really small Christian school & I didn't have a first period class, so I always hung out in the secretaries office helping her out. We always had the news on in the morning & we heard about the first plane. The principal was also in there. He gathered all 8th-12th graders & had us sit in the cafeteria w/a tv the rest of the day, watching it. We all sat in shock as we watched the 2nd place fly through.
We lived very close to a large marine corps base that was noted could be a possible target. They were put on lock down! Several of the students' parents worked on base & they were scared they'd never see their parents again! I was so thankful my parents didn't work on base!
It seems like yesterday, but at the same time, it feels like forever ago! But, it's something I'll never forget!
 
We are pretty close to the airport and are under the flight path. I remember how planes did not fly for days and we'd just look at the empty sky with that horrible sadness. And then suddenly we'd see a plane and I swear I would jump out of my skin... and it would be an Air National Guard jet patrolling the sky.
 
I was at home....saw it on the news and witnessed the second plane hit....my brain couldn't even wrap around what I had just seen....
 
I was at work. My boss' Dh called her about how he heard some guy accidentally flew a plane into a building in NYC. I had internet on my computer so she had me look it up. We got the initial story when it was still "was it an accident" then CNN was overloaded. So I called DH who was home supervising our a/c installation. He turned on the TV and for the next hour relayed info to me & I passed it on, managing to get some stuff off the net as well. We are only a couple hours from DC, there were coworkers with family at the Pentagon. We had staff in NYC that day for training. I had flown home from there only 3 days earlier. Our office in NYC called a couple times but then the lines were overloaded.
Around noon they put a tv on the desk across from me so people could come over during their breaks and get news. I had to watch it over and over and over for 6 hours. When I came home & found friends in the living room watching it with DH I just couldn't face it.
I went in the bedroom and watch Star Trek on scifi for 2 solid hours before I could talk to anyone about it.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Community platform by XenForo® © 2010-2026 XenForo Ltd.
Back
Top