story980.xml

story980.xml

born-digital

story

yes

no

2002-08-07

The 10.30pm news was coming to an end when, suddenly, the news reader announced that we would be crossing to live images from the States as the station's news service had just received reports that a plane had crashed into the World Trade Center. As the images were broadcast, I saw that dark smoke was billowing out of one of the towers. I ran to tell my Dad about what had happened and then got onto the internet to see if I could find any more information about what had happened. Internet connection was really slow, so we both went back to watching the tv. I think the pictures were coming from "Good Morning America" or some other show similar to that, when suddenly, the second plane came into view. It was a dark colour, so I thought it might have been a military plane circling around the area, making sure everything was alright, but then it just crashed into the second tower. I thought, "Oh no! The military plane has just accidently crashed into the building! How strange!" but then I realised that it wasn't a military plane at all. My Dad and I were absolutely stunned at what we had just witnessed. We were dumbfounded. I then got very excited and ran to get my brother, who was asleep in his room. My Mum, who was down the road at my Grandma's house, phoned us and asked us if we were watching what was going on. I was so keen to get back to the 'action' that I hurriedly answered her with a "Yes, yes!" and hung up. So there we were, my Dad, my Brother and myself, all crammed around the TV in my room, watching the absolute chaos that was unfolding, watching as the footage of the plane crashing into the second tower was repeated over and over and over again, watching when the towers collapsed, watching people running from giant clouds of dust, hearing comments from broadcasters that would normally be 'bleeped' out, hearing about and seeing pictures of a second suspected attack at the Pentagon. It was so surreal. I remember staying up all night, flicking channels, watching what was going on. I was also quite scared of going to sleep. I knew nothing was going to happen to me, but absorbing the confusion and mayhem of the events really bowled me over.
It was an extremely strange experience.