Some thoughts on 9/11

Sep 11, 2021, 9:38 AM

There was a roar and a mighty wind, and then silence filled the void.

Most people don't remember that the North Tower was hit first, but it was the South Tower that fell first. If you were there that day, you know that firefighter Daniel Suhr was the first NYFD casualty. Around 9:40 or so, people on the top floors of the North Tower had two choices - stay and burn or jump to their deaths. One of the first jumpers hit Suhr and Suhr was killed. The sounds - you could hear the flames, you could hear the sirens, you could hear the screams, and you could hear what sounded like bags of sand hitting concrete - will stay with you.

People were exiting the North Tower, coming down the not moving escalators from the plaza area and coming out of the crowded stairwells, as smoke filled the lobby. There was an urgency to get everybody out, and if you were outside, you heard all of this and saw the lines of people making their way out of that inferno. And if you were in that line of people around 9:55 AM and you turned towards the North Tower, you still didn't survive. If you turned in the other direction, you lived. Fate. Chance. Call it what you will.

But the South Tower fell after less than an hour, and when it came down it was if the entire earth shook from its foundation. There was a rumbling and then a roar, and what followed was a hot wind, straight out of the ovens of hell, followed by choking dust and debris that blotted out all of the sunlight. If you found shelter, the first you noticed was the lack of sound - you could see things after a few seconds, and the falling dust and ash looked like snow falling in a quiet wood on Christmas morning. Silence filled the void as your mind endeavored to process what was happening. The silence was deafening.

But reality quickly set it, this hellish landscape wasn't peaceful, and it wasn't Christmas. Not even Dante could imagine the firescape.

The first sounds to reach you were a piece of paper floating from the sky, and then the alarms from individual firefighters started to beep, followed the sounds of car alarms all over several city blocks, and then the screams and the yelling. Silence no longer filled the void and a Port Authority police officer (who had rushed from his post miles away to help) - recognizable as a human only by the eyes that peered out of his ash-covered costume, beckoned people to leave the area. "That other tower is gonna fall. You don't wanna be here!!! Get out!!"

So you left. You walked with other people, just as much in shock as you, and then the ground began to tremble and you turned, and the North Tower collapsed. You cried. A great evil had been visited upon us, and you wondered how someone could hate so deeply that they would do something so heinous. You walked, and you wept.

Never forget. Don't forget the carnage. Don't forget the weeping. Don't forget those we lost. And to the brave men and women who rushed into harm's way that morning, thank you. Thank you for being the kind of Americans that step into the breach when others need help. And to all of our first responders, thank you for doing that same job today. Thank you for filling that void, that deafening void, when someone cries out for help. You are true American heroes.

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Some thoughts on 9/11

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