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story5150.xml

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2002-09-11

Students in my debate class at Comstock HS on the east side of Kalamazoo, Michigan, were studying and discussing that year's national topic, weapons of mass destruction. Suddenly word spread like wildfire that there had been a terrorist attack in New York. We tuned in to the television coverage and were left awestruck and speechless at the video images of the attacks. We had never significantly considered what came to be known as weapons of mass effect before, but now the real world had invaded our little corner and given us a horrifying slap in the face. My own thoughts turned to my uncle in New York, who only a year or so earlier would have been working in one of the twin towers. We shared grief at the lives of innocent people senselessly and callously struck down, with no warning what was coming, mixed with a strange sense of wonder at the stories of bravery -- the public safety personnel who fought to save lives in NYC, and the passengers who fought to stop the terrorists aboard the last plane to go down. The only event in the past two decades that I can think might have carried the same impact for schoolchildren is the explosion of the Challenger shuttle. I do not doubt that it will stay with them all their lives. I hope it will not be with bitterness, but instead with a strong desire to make the world a better place.

Dan Coyne