story8964.xml

story8964.xml

born-digital

story

yes

no

2003-01-16

It's been over a year and it still feels like yesterday.
I emerged from Penn Station onto 7th Avenue roughly around 8:35am and I began my walk to the office which is on 5th Avenue and 17th street.
As I passed beneath the scaffolds on the corner of 7th Avenue and 31st, I heard the unusually loud roar of an airplane and stopped to look up. Unable to see anything, I quickly paid it no mind and proceeded on my walk.
When I finally crossed over to 5th Avenue, I noticed people on the east side of the street looking up and pointing downtown. I quickly ran across the street and to my horror, noticed the North Tower with a smoking gaping hole in it. Not having put two and two together, I quickly called home to find out what the news was reporting and then realized it was the plane I heard just a few minutes earlier.
On the corner of 17th and 5th, I was joined by a co-worker as we stared in utter disbelief. Then we shouted in horror as a ball of fire exploded in the South Tower. Of course, from our perspective we hadn't seen the second jet ramming itself into Tower Two and at first we thought it was a bomb, but it didn't make sense. Soon enough, people on the street connected to cell phones were shouting that we were being attacked.
I left my co-worker and quickly ran into the deli to buy a disposable camera. I ran back out and started to shoot whatever I could with this dinky little camera. After about 20 minutes of watching both Towers on fire, I was hungry for information so I ran into my office to hear the radio and joined many of my associates as we all tried to figure out was was going on.
It was then that we heard a large uniform scream coming from the people outside on the street below. I stuck my head out the window and realized that Tower Two had disappeared. Who would ever think that it would completely collapse? We all ran back out to the street again and in moments we would witness the collapse of the North Tower. Still, I continued to take pictures as I captured the collapse in 4 frames...not bad for a disposable. The range of emotions in the street was incredible...people crying, screaming, nervous laughter, silent disbelief, cursing whomever did this to us.
It must have been the surreal shock of what I witnessed, but the whole time I didn't even think about the people inside the Towers or the people on the planes. Maybe I assumed everyone got out, or I was just looking at these two giant structures ripped from our skyline as void of life within.
The Long Island RR ride home was packed but silent as we could see the smoke rising from the ruins of downtown as our train headed east.
The true shock and guilt set in when I finally got home to discover that one of my best friends, John Katsimatides, was on the 104th floor of the North Tower. Here I was taking pictures, and my friend was dying a horrific death.... and he just disappeared with hundreds of others, yet to be identified, and maybe never.
Everyday I take that walk to my office. Everyday I re-live that morning. Everyday I think of my friend, John Katsimatides, and as long as I live, not a day will go by that I won't think of him and how he was taken from us.