Nine years ago today, you were where?

[dem425]

About 8:30 in the morning I was leaving my house. I was doing some part-time work for Tim "Make them Pay" Misny.

I flipped on the TV for a second to catch sports when they were reporting the first plane. A few minutes and they were showing live footage of the second plane.

My wife was at work and my middle/youngest daughters were working. My oldest was in Madrid, Spain teaching/studying. My only thought was to contact her. I had this feeling that she may have been in more danger than we were here. Because I was quick on the phone, I got through with virtually no problem. Spain is six hours ahead of us. When she answered, I told her to turn on a TV as soon as possible. She thought I was joking and as she turned the TV on, I could hear her begin crying. The Spanish family she was living with stopped what they were doing, came into the living room, held hands and said a prayer for America.

I have never felt so helpless.

Never Forget..........

[Erie Warrior]

Eagle's Point Apartments, Kent State University

Watched the second tower fall. Every hair on my body stood on end. I'll never forget that feeling.

[British_Pharaoh]

In Physics class

[peeker643]

I was at work. It wrote in another thread on this subject but it was the bluest day I've ever seen here. Sharp blue. Like caribbean island waters.

Driving home with no air traffic whatsoever, empty skies, just shaken after seeing it.

Anyway, John Hnat wrote this piece. Diminishing Skills here on the boards. It blew me away when I read it first and it still does.

http://john-hnat.blogspot.com/2010/09/c ... -came.html

[FUDU]

I too remember the skies that morning being incredibly blue & cloud free, very clean breathing that day as well. Never saw live footage of any of it b/c I was at work, however that evening around 5 or 6pm I decided to go for a drive to observe society if you will, I video taped my drive and it was surreal at the time and eery when I view the tape now. Nobody on the road (nobody on the beach) but the gas stations I passed were packed, one was out of gas, another selling at $2 plus.....it was as if the world was ending to some people. Parking lots at malls were empty and mini malls looked as if they hadn't been open in years. Still one of the weirdest days I can remember if not the weirdest.

[Rat_Tail]

I was in 6th grade. Had no clue what was going on. They announced that practices we're cancelled and some teammates and I cheered and my teacher got really mad at us.

They never really told us what happened so I didn't know what was going on until I got home.

I remember the day after my teacher talked about it the entire first period. When we changed classes everyone in the hallway was pretty much silent.

Pretty crazy to experience something like that as a kid. I can't really imagine what it would've been like to be a kid living in NY.

[papacass]

One of my college roomies told me to turn on the TV as soon as I got up. By the time I was up, both towers had already been hit.

I think the point where my bewilderment turned to fear was when the Pentagon was hit. At that point, it wasn't a site-specific incident anymore. The whole country was under attack. I was expecting to see breaking news that the Sears Tower was hit in Chicago, the Transamerica building in San Francisco .... I mean, who really knew at that point?

That entire fall, right through October, I remember clear, deep blue skies. Very surreal. The feeling lasted for months.

[waborat]

Was building a waterfall in Willoughby and went to my truck to grab something. Had 1100 playing in the bed and heard that a plane hit the first tower and then Bill Wills said "I don't think this was an accident?". Told my guys what happened and then our client came outside and asked us if we wanted to come inside her home and watch what was happening? We stayed inside and watched the rest unfold on the Today Show and then left and drove home somber later that morning.

(and yes, the skies were clear blue)

[leadpipe]

I was at work. It wrote in another thread on this subject but it was the bluest day I've ever seen here. Sharp blue. Like caribbean island waters.

Driving home with no air traffic whatsoever, empty skies, just shaken after seeing it.

Anyway, John Hnat wrote this piece. Diminishing Skills here on the boards. It blew me away when I read it first and it still does.

http://john-hnat.blogspot.com/2010/09/c ... -came.html

That's a great friggin' piece by Hnat.

Great.

[swerb]

The piece by Hnat is excellent.

Remember that morning like it was yesterday.

Was working the trading desk at the old Metropolitan Bank and Trust, offices in that big building at the corner of Harvard and Green. Market went in the tank, saw the news come over the wire, switched my attention to the TV.

Like most people, simply thought the first plane was a bad accident. Second plane hits, all the markets shut down. That's when you know some shit is going on.

I remember, had a very important lunch meeting that day. We still went. Were the only ones in Giovanni's on Chagrin, which was a really weird feeling. Hasn't been one time I've walked in that restaurant since that I am not reminded of that day, that lunch.

Remember driving home that day, looking up in the sky half expecting to see planes heading for downtown Cleveland. Remember spending like 3 hours on the phone with my future wife, watching the news channels together and worrying about what might be coming next.

[Cerebral_DownTime]

Wake and Bake driving around on country roads outside Hilliard, listening to Howard Stern. He stayed on air till 2:30 that day.

[Larvell Blanks]

Wake and Bake driving around on country roads outside Hilliard, listening to Howard Stern. He stayed on air till 2:30 that day.

The Stern show was my eyes and ears that entire morning as I as running errands for work. I remember he was one of the first to utter Bin Ladin's name as the mastermind behind it. Driving back into downtown after the evacuation was called was surreal. Seeing workers outside their buildings, all looking up expecting something to happen.

That evening the things I most remember was drinving around just to get away from the tv and see candles burning in front lawns in home after home.

[rebelwithoutaclue]

When it happened it was near the end of my 2nd period AP chemistry class and then we spent pretty much the rest of the day watching the news. My calculus teacher attempted to get us to focus on our homework but he realized it was a futile effort. It was impossible to focus on anything other than what was on CNN. Everyone was in a state of shock. I had never even heard of Bin-Laden before one of my friends mentioned his name and it turned out he was exactly right.

[mswerb]

Like most of us, I too was at work. A co-worker had just came from the break room and told us that some asshole crashed his plane into the WTC. We all thought it was a private plane and not much of a deal. As some time had passed we realized the shop had gone extremely quiet. I walked into the customer lounge only to see that EVERY employee was glued to the TV, watching in disgust. It seemed as if everything had shut down. I later got a call from my wife telling me that she was being sent home. they dealt with social security in her building and everyone was sent home as a precaution. I remember it like yesterday, and have not taken my flag down since.

[mistero]

My mom and my aunt were flying to Washington that morning. I was at work. Very busy...but I only wanted to watch the TV. I didn't know where she was. Total helplessness. My mom later told me they made everyone wait on the runway. Then they de-boarded right there on the runway. They made everyone walk to Brookpark road. They had to walk down Brookpark to some waiting area.

Rumor is some Arab doctor (he's actually described more like an Indian) cheered when the Towers were struck. He was escorted out of the Cleveland Clinic by security. I think they must have been false.

I remember the blue empty sky too. Standing on top of the 8 story parking deck.

[Spin]

I was driving an ambulance on a non-emergency transport from Millersburg to Wooster. We came into range of KNR, and I started listening. Greg Brinda was on.

He was talking about one tower being down, the Air Force being launched, all air traffic being grounded. I thought it was a stupid hoax and almost changed the channel, it was the day everyone expected Michael Jordan to come out of retirement. Then he said the second tower was collapsing, and there was sketchy news about the Pentagon, that's when I realized this was real shit.

My partner was in the back and was about to go on vacation. He was pissed because he thought this might mess up his flight to Florida. I wanted so bad to pull over and punch him right in the mouth. What an ass hole. I never worked with him again.

I was on a 24 hour shift but wanted to go there. I called the FD but they said NY was telling everyone to stay out unless they requested help. Some guys from other departments went anyway and freelanced.

God what a helpless feeling. Then the crash near Pittsburgh, we had no idea when it was going to end. I worried about the economy falling apart because they hit such a financial center. I thought about all the firemen in NYC. We knew some had to be inside.

I'll never forget that feeling of being helpless. Or of losing that many brothers at once...

[RickNashEquilibrium]

I was at my folks house in Concord,OH 1 week before I left for my 1st year at Ohio State. Woke up just after 9:00 am, right at the moment flight 175 hit the south tower. I walked into the living room and my mom was sitting there with a deathgaze at the TV (pops was at work). Like most, I was simply in shock. Having 2 brothers and a number of guys I graduated with in the military, I called them first. Don't remember a whole lot about the rest of the day, but my first week at OSU was grim to say the least. I lived at the south campus dorms and there were a lot of kids from NYC who had seen the destruction in person. This guy Stu who I met saw the entire thing from his rooftop (he and his family lived on 6th Avenue north of Greenwich Village).