story1166.xml

story1166.xml

born-digital

story

yes

no

2002-08-19

I was in school, in the college bookstore, when I heard about the attack. This was at 10 in the morning and i had been in classes since 8:30 so I knew nothing about what was going on. I went in to the bookstore and there was a group of girls standing around a radio and they were crying. I asked them what was happening and they told me that planes had crashed in to the World Trade Centre towers, the Pentagon had been destroyed and there was another plane somewhere.

The next five minutes are a blur because I was in a state of shock. I somehow made it downstairs to the pub where there were multiple televisions. Everyone was standing and watching CNN. To employ a well-known phrase, it was so quiet you could hear a pin drop. I sat down on the comfiest couch in the room, looked at the biggest TV screen in the place, and watched as the North Tower collapsed.

I looked through the smoke, trying to make out the South Tower, and then realized that it too had collapsed. The TV then cut to a picture of the Pentagon ablaze, and I realized I had to get home. I returned to my house, embraced my near-hysterical mother, and watched CNN for the next 13 hours non-stop.