story544.xml

story544.xml

born-digital

story

yes

no

2002-05-07

Following is a copy of an email I sent to friends and family during the early morning of September 12, 2001:

I couldn't sleep much tonight, so I thought I would write and tell everyone that R. and B. and I are OK, and tell what I saw yesterday. I've told my story so many times, I can't remember who I've told and who I haven't. Most of my email addresses are in my office, so I can only write this to those of you whose addresses I know by heart or that are in my filofax.

I left for work yesterday at about 8:50am, only about 5 minutes after the first plane hit the WTC. There was nothing on National Public Radio when I left my apartment, but as I passed a doorman on the way to the subway I heard him say the words "World Trade Center". My only thought was that I hoped the subways weren't delayed, because I was already running behind on the day that our new design director was starting work, and I knew it would be a busy day. I take an express subway train to Chambers Street, which is about 6 blocks north of the WTC. My train became very sluggish, and it eventually switched to the local track. Then the conductor made announcements that the train would not be able to stop at the World Trade Center, which, on the local train, is the stop after mine. Train delays aren't unusual, but by the time the train pulled into Chambers Street it was about 9:30, and I was definitely late and annoyed.

The exit by which I always leave the subway is 6 blocks (about a quarter of a mile) north of the WTC, and it faces the towers. As the crowd came up the stairs, someone said "Oh my God" and I saw the smoke streaming sideways from the towers. A building was blocking my view, so I walked out into the crowd on West Broadway and Hudson Streets, and immediately saw both towers with their upper sections on fire, and simply couldn't believe my eyes. The northern tower had a huge hole in the middle of the north side, with two straight, ragged lines running out from the hole, which I later realized must have been caused by the impact of the airplane wings. The hole itself wasn't burning, but the floors around it were. I couldn't see the impact hole on the southern tower, but it was also ringed by fire and smoke. I was far enough away, and the fires were high enough that only the faintest crackling sounds could be heard. Silvery papers were fluttering out of the burning floors, and bigger pieces of debris were falling as well. So sharply was the whole scene set against the clear blue sky, it seemed unreal, as if against a special effects blue screen, and I half expected the towers to flicker and revert to normal. My eyes just couldn?t take it all in.

Several people told me that planes had deliberately hit the towers. Although I wanted to stay and watch, I ran the two blocks to my office, passing an FBI agent already running the other direction. Four co-workers were in my office, looking grim. One assistant was crying. Our studio manager told me my brother had called, so I immediately called him, and he told me that he had seen the second plane hit, from his midtown office building. I don't remember what I said but hung up and then called B. at my apartment. He hadn't heard the news, and I had to repeat myself several times, as I could barely talk. When I hung up I turned up the radio, and milled around, unsure of what to do. I think I called my parents in North Carolina...I can't remember when I did that. Then the live radio announcer watching the fires started to yell that one tower was going down, and we simultaneously heard and felt the muffled crash. Someone said not to go outside but an assistant and I ran down the stairs and out to the avenue, and looked down Hudson. We could see a huge cloud of dust going up, and some of it was rolling up West Broadway, about 5 blocks away. We ran back to the office, knowing we had to leave. If the second tower fell north from its base, the top of it would come within a block or two or our building. Only one other person was in the office when we got back, and we turned off printers and computers, locked the door, and went back outside. There we saw my boss and studio manager on the other corner of Jay Street, looking down Greenwich Street. We went to join them watch the dust cloud dissipate, and the other tower burning. As we were watching the second tower, the crowd around us started to scream and yell, and we saw a handful of people tumble out of the second tower and fall like little dolls. At first I didn?t realize what they were, but then said aloud ?Those are people!? It was horrible. People looked away, covered their eyes, and some started to cry, including our two young assistants, who were very upset. The studio manager yelled at them to go home, and they left, joining the people running and walking north, away from the collapsed tower. The remaining three of us walked back to Hudson Street, where an FBI agent told us to leave. As we were standing there a jet fighter flew over us heading south, and turned over the trade towers. I only felt fear, uncertain whose plane it was. My boss, who is English, was being very cool, but I told him that I wanted to leave, as did the studio manager. We went back to the office. I called my brother again and he told me to walk to his office, about 2.5 miles away. Then D. and I left our office, and started walking up Hudson with crowds of people. Everyone was trying to use their cell phones, which were either overloaded or not functioning because the WTC antennae were out, I'm not sure which, but few were working. There were long lines at pay phones, and very little traffic. When were about three blocks north of Canal Street, the crowd started to scream, and we turned around to see the second tower collapse in on itself like a big cake, pouring debris as it fell. People around us, men and women, were yelling and crying.

We kept going to a friend's apartment in the West Village, where I was going to stop and make phone calls. While we were there, the building superindentent called the apartment and told us to leave the building because there was a gas leak moving north. My brother said his building was being evacuated, so I began the long walk north to my apartment on 99th Street. There was very little traffic, and the sidewalks were thronged with people. Groups were gathered around televisions in bars, store windows, and even TVs that had been pulled out on the sidewalks. Cars were pulled over with all their doors open and had their radios blaring. At St. Vincent's Hospital the front of the hospital had been roped off, and ambulances were coming in to drop off the injured. I saw one person get out of an ambulance in a wheelchair, bandages wrapped around his head. People holding large signs with O- and O+ written on them headed long lines of blood donors that wrapped around the sides of the hospital. The number of people who were trying to help was heartwarming; one woman was walking through the crowd with a bag of cookies, offering them to strangers. I wanted to donate blood, but they were only taking O-, and I didn't know my type, so I kept going. The buildings in Midtown were emptying out by then, and as I got further north I ran into the crowds that were heading toward the train and bus stations at 34th Street and 40th Street. There was a large crowd outside of Penn station, and frustrated commuters were calmly eating lunch on the sidewalk.

Since Times Square could be another target, I headed east to avoid the area. As I was walking along Port Authority bus terminal an empty bus opened its doors and I got on, with no charge. The bus quickly filled up and then slowly headed up Eighth Avenue. Crowds tried to push on at some stops, nearly causing fights. All morning long strangers had been talking to each other, which is very unusual for New York; it takes a lot for New Yorkers to break out of their self-protectiveness, but the disaster did the trick. On the bus one insolent teenager who was standing in the crowd asked a man who was sitting if he had a girlfriend on the bus, and when he said no she sat down in his lap. He looked stunned, but didn't push her off!

My neighborhood seemed too quiet and peaceful when I finally got to 99th Street. At home during the afternoon I talked to neighbors and made phone calls, and then B. and I met my brother for dinner at a friend's apartment. My brother and friends had tried to donate blood during the afternoon, but had to put their names on lists because the hospital couldn't handle them at the moment. I told my brother that the day had surpassed a couple of our days in India as The Strangest Day of My Life. My office is in the area that is evacuated, so I don't know when I'll be able to get back to work. At the very end of the day we had the good news that my brother?s next-door neighbor, who works on the top floor of the south tower, was going to a meeting near the towers, and didn't have time to get up to her office before the planes hit. Somehow she made it to her parents' home in New Jersey. She left her cell phone near the towers when the FBI told her to run from the first collapse, so we had not been able to contact her all day.