What did you do on 9/11, 2001?

[Wilber]

Nor would I expect you to. To be clear, I wasn't asking about security measures that were taken (that was all over the news). Your comments just brought back my feelings the first time I flew after 9-11 so I wondered how it affected you. Totally cool that you don't want to respond.

I didn't think you were but some things would be difficult to explain without doing so.

[guyser]

Kind of a double whammy for me.

Sitting in OR room at St Josephs Hospital w my dad on heart and lung bypass to fix an anuerysm.

I told my family prior that he would never be the same and he never was, died a while later at Christmas. Of course sitting in that OR room I was watching the news and the horrible images but the day already had been ruined (on a peronal level of course) and then this.

Not a good day every year.

[jbg]

This may be a bit off-topic but it relates to "What did you do on 9/11, 20011?"

Yesterday morning I went for a jog and a swim. The sky was still the same deep blue that is was on 9/11/2001 and the temperature at that hour of the morning was about the same. Then I took the children to due community service at a "Chesed" or charitable event at the JCC of Mid-Westchester. At the same time me and my wife donated blood.

Then, the highest duty of all, I helped my elderly parents with tasks they are no longer capable of.

[Oleg Bach]

That day I was working with my boss the decorator - painting birds on the walls of a Victorian parlor - a very nice house over looking a valley - there were goats wandering about...the sky was blue _ The people that owned this horse ranch were the same ones that owned Park and Fly - there were other workers in the house - suddenly the news came through ...that something was amiss in New York....we left early - as we listened to radio reports in the car - David looked over to me and said prophetically..."This is the begining of world war three" -

then I got home and watched CNN - astounded but to this day I still wonder - why did building 7 fall down...? At first I thought that it must have been the earth shaking from the impact of the tower collapse - It still does not make sense to this day.....my theory is that Americans are were inept in their duties and may as well have been facilators...IF America were truely a Christian nation they would have forgiven then an let the world know - you attack again and wel will destroy you - but instead off they went in a rage that cost billions of dollars and did not make anything more secure - They only created an intergenerational spite fight...America's monument to 9 11 looks like a deep black pit leading to hell - the whole thing was a disgrace for all concerned..the villians v - and the so called heros................The pleasant part was that day - the sky was blue with not one artifical flying machine to be seen - that part was wonderful..

[GostHacked]

I was in a hostel in Hong Kong; I'd just come out of the shower, getting prepared for my last night out before heading back to Toronto, after a year in Australia. There was a small TV in the four-bunk room I was in; the other guys were already watching when I came in. Like a few others here, my initial thought was: an accident had just happened, similar to when a B-25 bomber struck - and went right through - the Empire State Building in 1945. Once the second plane hit - which we saw happen live - that theory pretty much went out the window.

I won't recount the ordeal of getting home. It's petty in comparison to what happened to other people that day and in the days after.

False, the B-25 did not go right through the Empire State Building. Not that it really matters to the thread though.

[g_bambino]

False, the B-25 did not go right through the Empire State Building.

A good chunk of it did.

[GostHacked]

A good chunk of it did.

Looks like one engine did go through the whole building .. that was it.

http://www.damninteresting.com/the-b-25-that-crashed-into-the-empire-state-building/

[jbg]

False, the B-25 did not go right through the Empire State Building. Not that it really matters to the thread though.

This is a link to a New York Times article about the Empire State crash. I'll try to edit and clean up typos from a very bad scan later.

Published: July 29, 1945

Copyright © The New York Times

B-25 CRASHES IN FOG Hole 18 by 20 Feet Torn Through North Wall by Terrific Impact \ BLAZING 'GAS' SCATTERED Flames Put Out in 40·Minute Fight-2 Women Survive Fall in Elevator'

FRANK ADAMS A lwin-cngincd B-25 Al'my bom bel', lost in a blinding fog, crashed into the F.mpire Stale Building at a point 915 feet above the street level at g: 49 A. M. yesterday. Thirteen pCI'~ons, Including the three occupants of the plane and ten persons at work within the bUilding, were ltilled in the catastrophe, and twenly-six were injured.

Although the crash and the fire that followed wrccl{Cd most of the seventy-eighth and seventy-ninth floors of the strllcture, causing damage estimated at $500,000, Lieut. Gen. Hugh A. D}'ul11, president of the Empire Stale, Inc .. Corporation. said last night that an inspection by the city'~ building department and by other ellgincers and archilects showed that the structural soundness of the building had not bcen impaired. Landing Advice J)isregarde!1 The plane, en route from Bedford, Mass., to Ncwark on a crosscountry mission, hacl fIo\vll ove/' La. Guardia FicIci a few minutes bcfore lhe crash, and ils pilot, Lie-ut. 'col. William F. Smilh Jr., dc!puty commander of the 457th Bomber Group and reccnlly decorated for his service overseas, was advised by the control tower to • land. Instead he asked tor the weather at Newark Airport and headed in that direction. Horl'Ol'-stl'icl{en occupA.nts of thl' building, alarmed by the roar o( engines, rail to the windows just in time to see the plane loom out of lhe gray mists that swathed the upper flool's of the world's tallest office building. The plane was banl{ed a t an angle of about fifteen degrees as Colonel Smith swung it in a curve out of the nOl·theRI'lt. It crashed with a terrifying impact midway along the north or Thirty-fourth Street wall of the building. Its wings were sheared off by the impact, but the motors and fuselage ripped It hole eighteen feet wide and twenty fect high in the outer wall of the seventyeighth and seventy-ninth floors of the structure. Brilliant orange fla Illes shot al' high as the obscrvatory on the cigh ty-sixth floor of the building, 1,050 feet above Fifth Avcnue, as the gasoline tanl{s of lhe plane exploded. For a moment watcher:.; in the street below saw the towel' clearly illumined by the glare. Then it disappeared again 1n gray murk and the smoke of the burning plane. Motor Hits Atlother Building • One of the plane's two motors hurtled clear across the seventyeighth floor, tore a hole in the south wa II of the building, and plummeted to the roof of the twelve-story office building at 10 West Thirty-third Street, where it started a fire that demolished the penthouse of Henry Hering, noLed SCUlptor, with resulting damage estimated at :>75,000. A propeller was imbedded in th~ wall of the Empire State Building; the other motor ancl pa.rt of the landing gear crashed into an clevator shaft, where they fell to Ole sub-cellar 1,000 feet below, and other sections of the fuselage were blown as high as the eighty-sixlh floor obsel'va tory. The llteel girder at the seventy-ninth floor level wa:! bent inward eightccn inches by tho shock. Cascading torrents of flaming gasoline poured through Ule seventy- eighth and seventy. ninth floors. setting fire to evcrything that was combustible. The burning fucl ran down stair wells into hallways as far as the seventyfifth floor, while choking fume~ Continued on Page 25, Column 1

[Sir Bandelot]

This may be a bit off-topic but it relates to "What did you do on 9/11, 20011?"

I enjoyed a quiet day around the house.

Fortunately my day was not at all like her day.

Seems like a bit of an over-reaction.

[Argus]

I enjoyed a quiet day around the house.

Fortunately my day was not at all like her day.

Seems like a bit of an over-reaction.

A bit?!

[bloodyminded]

I remember I felt sad and depressed about the whole thing. Maybe that's why my interest in political matters generally were born that day.

[Sir Bandelot]

A bit?!

Yes, I did not want to say anything too harsh that might offend some of our more sensitive members. Since they haven't commented about it (what can you say?) I will.

On 9/11 2011 I watched TV in amazement. My thoughts were, it would be better if they got over it somehow, put it in their past and moved on. Not that it should ever be forgotten, no, but the pain and fear of it are still so apparent, it's like a wound that hasn't healed. We must all grieve for what we lose in life, but ultimately we have to let it go and move on. And there are better ways to do that, which psychologists use to help their patients. The kind of media that was put out, reliving every detail over and over, providing new details, interviews about the experiences of survivors, showing the grief of those who lost their loved ones again, continuous footage of the towers burning and falling all day, articles in every section of the media whether it was news, politics, business, sports etc. It already started weeks before 9/11/2011, so I could tell they were going to do this before the day even came.

Small wonder that there would be such an over-reaction to a couple of Indians who felt sick on a plane. Likely that some other passenger, whose mind was in great turmoil having been over-stimulated saw them, felt fear and suspicion and watched their every move. The report of a "credible but unconfirmed" threat specified that two or three terrorists might working together. And here were three people. They were reported when the two men got up to use the bathroom at the same time. Well, that had to be it!

Hell, the woman didn't even get up. She just happened to be sitting beside them, and happened to be an Indian as well. But when the swat team entered the plane with machine guns ready, they grabbed her anyway.

It's clear to me that whether intentional or not, the whole media apparatus which benefits from showing that attracts viewers, for the purpose of profit created an unhealthy environment that added to the psychosis of people concerning 9/11. Like watching a horror movie you can't tear your eyes away from, even though it is disturbing. It became "9/11 porn".

[bush_cheney2004]

....It's clear to me that whether intentional or not, the whole media apparatus which benefits from showing that attracts viewers, for the purpose of profit created an unhealthy environment that added to the psychosis of people concerning 9/11. Like watching a horror movie you can't tear your eyes away from, even though it is disturbing. It became "9/11 porn".

Apparently.....American porn sells very well in Canada too.

[Sir Bandelot]

I suppose some Canadians watch US news as a form of entertainment. We don't hype up our own news the way American news does. Our news is boring and bland... representative of the Canadian persona

[GostHacked]

I remember I felt sad and depressed about the whole thing. Maybe that's why my interest in political matters generally were born that day.

My interest in political matters generally started that day as well.

[Argus]

Yes, I did not want to say anything too harsh that might offend some of our more sensitive members. Since they haven't commented about it (what can you say?) I will.

On 9/11 2011 I watched TV in amazement. My thoughts were, it would be better if they got over it somehow, put it in their past and moved on. Not that it should ever be forgotten, no, but the pain and fear of it are still so apparent, it's like a wound that hasn't healed. We must all grieve for what we lose in life, but ultimately we have to let it go and move on. And there are better ways to do that, which psychologists use to help their patients. The kind of media that was put out, reliving every detail over and over, providing new details, interviews about the experiences of survivors, showing the grief of those who lost their loved ones again, continuous footage of the towers burning and falling all day, articles in every section of the media whether it was news, politics, business, sports etc. It already started weeks before 9/11/2011, so I could tell they were going to do this before the day even came.

I'm sure people got wound up by that. But that doesn't excuse the authorities, those in positions of responsibility, like the pilot, from going overboard against people where there was no evidence of wrongdoing.

If it will make you feel any better, though, the 10th anniversary is always the big one, and the wrap-up. Aside from some footage when the new world trade center is finally finished, there'll be far, far less said about 9/11 henceforth. After ten years, things like this begin to pass into history, like the JFK assassination, the Vietnam war, the Korean war, and hell, WW2. Sure, nobody forgets, and there are occasional movies or whatnot, but the emotion dies away as more and more of the population comes to see it as nothing more than a chapter in their history textbooks.