When the towers fell: Remembering 9/11

It was a day that began like any other.

I woke up early and decided to dress for my water aerobics class. I looked out the window and saw a clear blue sky, a paler blue because it was fall. The sun was shining brightly, signaling it would be another beautiful and warm Indian summer day.

It was early, so I turned on the TV to catch the latest news as I brushed my teeth and got dressed, putting on my swimsuit, and my dress over the top of it.

There was an image of the World Trade Center. Smoke was billowing from near the top of one of the Twin Towers.

The network kept showing footage of a plane flying past the tower. No, rather, the plane had hit the tower and caused the fire.

Was something wrong with the pilot? How could he miss the tallest building in New York City?

I was half listening as I got my swim bag together and looked for my keys. I still had plenty of time.

Why weren’t they showing other news? Surely there was other news. Why did they keep repeating a plane had hit one of the towers?

I remembered hearing a plane had hit the Empire State Building several decades ago and the building survived.

As I was going out the door, the announcer’s voice became excited as he talked about a second plane hitting the other tower. I watched dumfounded as a huge ball of fire exploded about two thirds of the way up the building.

The TV commentator said one plane could be an accident, but two had to be a terrorist act. That was difficult to comprehend.

I joined my classmates at swimnastics at American Legion Post 62. Nobody was talking much about it, but the incident I had seen on TV stuck in my mind.

Had terrorists actually come to America?

Little did I know what impact 9/11, 2001, would have on our country.

After swimnastics, I hurried home and turned on the TV. The network was running the same footage over and over. Suddenly, images of the Pentagon on fire flashed on the screen, followed by footage showing a plane hitting the Pentagon.

The Pentagon?

It was a sobering realization. Someone had deliberately flown a plane into the Pentagon.

Who had done this terrible thing, and was this the beginning of war?

Suddenly, the beautiful sunny day, with its cloudless sky, took on a sinister feel as if smoke from the Twin Towers and the Pentagon had reached us all the way in Colorado.

The network was announcing that all planes across the country were being grounded and the White House was being evacuated. We were shown a picture of President George W. Bush as he was interrupted in his reading of a story to a class of Florida second-graders.

You could not read anything from the look on his face. The country and world suddenly became clouded by uncertainty and anxiety.

Both my mother and father were gone, but I called my husband who was at work at Walmart in Steamboat Springs. He said he heard something vague about the Twin Towers, but hadn’t heard about the Pentagon being hit. Stunned, he asked me, “Are you sure the Pentagon was hit?”

I told him I was.

Although Mike was 50 miles away, it felt good to talk to him and share what had I seen.

The newscaster announced that Congress was well as the White House was being evacuated. In an act of defiance, we were shown members of Congress singing “God Bless America.”

President Bush was on Air Force One and no one knew where he was going. The TV announcers said a plane had circled back toward the east coast and had gone down in Pennsylvania.

There was speculation that passengers had stopped the plane from heading for its intended target in Washington, D.C., and no one knew if the target was the White House or Congress.

The network showed images of fires so big they could be seen from outer space, and we were even shown what looked to be a huge, grinning devilish face in the smoke and fire of the Twin Towers.

Even more disconcerting and sickening was watching people looking out from the Twin Towers and then jumping, by themselves, or in groups of two or three. One group of five jumped together.

The fire was so hot it was burning people alive. People above the fire had been trapped and had no way down — they jumped rather than be burned alive.

We were shown New York firefighters as they assembled on the ground floor of the towers, developing their strategy and hearing the sickening thump of bodies as they hit the ground. The firefighters climbed the stairs as far as they could go and tried to get people out.

We watched long lines of workers walking single file down the stairs as firemen climbed up, and then walking through streets full of debris and over a bridge to escape the inferno. In some streets, we could see people running from the huge black cloud of debris after the towers fell, looking for shelter.

Some 350 New York firefighters died when the towers fell.

Scenes on television were divided between the towers and the Pentagon.

It was obvious the U.S., the seat of world power, was under attack. It was almost incomprehensible that we should see such destruction in our country.

As announcers relayed stories and news, there was a sudden roar, and one of the towers sunk down and disappeared.

Some 1,300 feet and more than 100 floors pancaked out of sight, raising an eerie cloud that enveloped Manhattan Island, temporarily obliterating all buildings from sight.

Within a few minutes, the second tower followed, with the building going down in a matter of seconds.

The Twin Towers were no more, just a huge pile of rubble where they once stood.

In the days that followed, the streets of New York City were plastered with pictures and posters of people looking for their loved ones.

Nobody knew how many had died — the estimates were as high as 10,000. We saw firefighters and volunteers sifting through the rubble. We saw gigantic I-beams standing in the shape of a cross.

We heard many stories of chance and bravery.

We heard recordings of stewardesses as they tried to give out information they had been hijacked by men with box cutters and how some had their throats slashed.

We heard tapes and testimony that people on the fourth plane that went down in Pennsylvania had brought the plane down in an act of defiance so the terrorists couldn’t hit their target.

I walked around stunned. I was moved by the picture of three firefighters who hoisted an American flag in the rubble of the Twin Towers, evoking memories of the men raising the flag at Iwo Jima.

We saw how subway trains had been crushed in the debris and we were grateful people had been warned and were gone.

No matter how many times we heard stories of bravery, I couldn’t get over the shock of it all, as if I were seeing it for the first time.

The stories and scenes of 9/11 are forever imprinted in my mind. After seeing the pictures and images, who could ever forget the terrible attack on our country?

It made it clear, superpower or not, America is vulnerable like anyone, and freedom many of us take for granted can suddenly be threatened by dark, unknown forces.

Even today, 10 years after the attack, the aftershock remains. Every time we get on a plane or enter a federal or state building we are frisked by police or security officers and have to go through metal detectors.

We have to take off our shoes.

We have to get to airplane terminals a lot earlier to go through security. We’ve learned we have to be ever vigilant if we want to keep our freedom.

But, that also means losing some of our freedoms to the Patriot Act. Freedoms we once took for granted are in danger because of the Patriot Act.

But, 9/11 made it clear a new era has been ushered in; we’ll have to fight in a different way to keep our freedoms and to keep America safe.

Because of 9/11, we can no longer afford to be naïve. We have to face fact — the world is a dangerous place and even Americans are not safe here at home.

But, at long last, some measure of justice, though not enough, has been done.

Osama bin Laden, architect of the attacks, has been captured and killed.

Thank Seal Team Six for that.

Americans may never forget 9/11, but the spirit of our nation must remain strong.