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9/11 – Thirteen Years of Remembrance, Perseverance, and Preparation
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Photo Courtesy of Stacy Howell
As news correspondent, Dan Rather, stated later in the afternoon that fateful day, the 11th
of September, 2001 started out as a “crisp September morning, under
clear blue skies… then terror struck”. 9/11 would become the proper
nomenclature to identify the both the day and the event, that every
American spanning four generations would recognize.
It would symbolize many things to many people from every corner of the world. Both sides of the conflict would declare a victory, neither of them an absolute. The events of that day taught us things that had long been forgotten. It taught us that we could stand together in difficult times and honor the line from The Pledge of Allegiance, “One nation, under God, indivisible”. Tireless years later, thanks to the brave men of SEAL Team Six, and our intelligence communities, they declared with the statement “For God and Country…Geronimo” that the most wanted man in the world since Adolf Hitler had been killed.
We all watched in horror that day, not wanting to believe that any part of it was real. To this day, it is arguably known as the most widely watched event in human history, thanks to technology and mass media. Nearly every American over the age of 18 can remember exactly where they were and what they were doing when they watched the fire burn from the impact of Flight 11 that hit the north Tower, and most watched live footage as Flight 175 disappeared into a fireball into Tower 2. We struggled with the ugly reality that evil was going to test us this day.
We continued to watch the tragedy unfold as images of our nation’s military headquarters burned, our capitol evacuated for fear of attack, and news of a plane crash into a small unnamed field if rural Pennsylvania. The news reports poured in, of numerous other hijackings and federal buildings having been struck. As we all tried to make sense of it, we watched as two gleaming and proud icons of Western society’s commerce, collapse and reduced to rubble.
The attack that day stands to teach us another lesson. That we can be vulnerable.
That
day marked the end of our ignorance, and our lack of preparedness. The
statements of “It can’t happen here” were replaced by resolute
statements of “Never again.” And yet, with the rise of ISIS and other
conflicts that rage globally we may be at more risk today than we were
before 11 Sept. 2001.
In the days that followed, the attribute of self sacrifice would come to mean several things those days, weeks and months that followed. I know because I was there, witnessing it all first-hand.
Though I was on duty that day, two days later I was standing at the foot of where the north tower had once stood. The scene was, and in many ways still is, impossible for me to put into words. I was asked once by a close personal friend about that experience, and I told him that I couldn’t really verbalize it. He thought that it was just too traumatic for me to discuss. I told him that it wasn’t just the bad, but the good, as well. Standing in the center of that chaos, trying to get my bearing in an unfamiliar city, in the midst of the worst attack on civilians in our nation’s history, I witnessed the results of absolute and pure evil and hatred. It could be argued from that point of view as an extreme end of self sacrifice.
On
the other end of that extreme, I witnessed thousands of rescuers from
all over the country, and the world, clawing at the dirt and steel with
hand tools, heavy equipment and even bare hands, all in the attempts to
save even one life. I cannot begin to describe to you the level of
danger that people were in working at that site over the next few days.
Fires raged in underground voids for weeks, burning so hot that it
continued to melt steel, and the boots of men walking over it. They not
only fought the fires, but dealt with hazardous materials release,
biohazards from the tens of thousands of remains of the victims, and the
dust which turned to mud after the torrential downpour of rain on the
13th. Voids 30 feet deep would open up, spontaneously and
without warning, creating dangerous pitfalls with impalement and
entanglement hazards, if an unfortunate worker happened to be there.
Dangerous pieces of debris from the towers themselves dangled temporarily lodged in surrounding high rises. These were referred to as “widow-makers” threatening to suddenly dislodge and crush an unsuspecting person. Even the surrounding buildings themselves were in jeopardy of collapse, from extensive external damage.
At
the Pentagon, more stories of self-sacrifice, and determination,
occurred. Federal civilian employees working at their desks, uniformed
members of the military and federal agents were all thrust into the
chaos. Many of these people survived the initial attack of Flight 77,
but then went back into the inferno to save lives. The military credo of
“Never leave a fallen comrade behind” went into practical application,
without any thought of hesitance. It was widely reported that the
Secretary of Defense, at the time, Donald Rumsfeld, was at the Pentagon
at the time of the attack, and witnessed the heroics of our uniformed
service members go back into the crumbling and burning building not
once, but several times to save their countrymen. We were, after all,
under attack in a time of war. Again…self sacrifice and heroism was
displayed when it was needed most. It too, like the Twin Towers, would
suffer a collapse of the impact area. If not for the selfless actions of
the few, many more would have died there.
In the skies over Ohio, and finally Pennsylvania the passengers and crew of Flight 93, were in a fight for their lives. They had been informed of the attacks at the Pentagon and in New York. It was clear that the hijackers had no intent of using them for ransom. The group came up with a plan to try to re-take the plane. They knew that it had a low chance of success. Even if the plane was re-taken from the hijackers, no one on board was flight qualified. It was a long shot, and they all knew it. The other thing that they knew was that without this attempt, there were only two other possible outcomes, a military intervention leading to the aircraft’s downing, or that their plane would be flown into another target, and yet more people would perish. They knew that they must act, not only for a chance of their own survival, but for the survival of countless others, wherever that plane’s intended target was. Once more, self-sacrifice was of the noblest attributes.
Indeed, the first responders truly battled evil that day. And yet, it was the courage of the first responders that gripped the entire country and demonstrated to the nation and the world that we can and will recover. Americans will do what is necessary in the face of evil and danger. We will respond with super-human acts of valor, courage and selflessness.
Thousands of patriotic Americans responded, to enlist or re-enlist on our nation’s military to defend our country from further attacks. Thousands more would respond to become firefighters, medics, law enforcement officers, emergency planners, and hazmat and weapons of mass destruction subject matter experts.
Many of these individuals are family members of those who died that day. I spoke with a firefighter in NYC some years back, about his desire to follow in his father’s footsteps as a fireman. He said, “I always knew I wanted to be like my Dad. This is how I can honor him. He was in those towers, on the front lines, fighting to save people’s lives, and to save his own. Now, I can honor that legacy of fighting for peoples’ lives right where my Dad did every day. “
Indeed, many lessons learned that day have brought about both remarkable and unremarkable changes in our nation and our way of life. We, as a nation, have started our healing process, and have made it more difficult for an attack like this to occur on American soil again. The bad guys out there though work just as tirelessly to try to exploit any advantage that they can to hurt us yet again. Next week, on the thirteenth anniversary, we honor the 2,966 victims of that day (I refuse to count the 19 hijackers as “victims”). They were citizens from more than 90 countries, and they were many things to us all. Business people, air crews, bankers, travelers, window washers, soldiers and officers, cooks and restaurant staff, firefighters, and police officers. But they were much more than that to us. They were our mothers, and sisters, our brothers and our fathers. They were our friends. And whether you choose to say “Never Forget” or “Always Remember”, continue to honor them.
Honor
them by preparing for the future. Honor the fire service by preparing
for the inexorable. There are still many people out there who doubt that
an attack of that magnitude will never happen again, but we in the
emergency services should not invest in this foolish belief.
Ever.
Prepare yourselves and your families, and never again dismiss the lessons or stories of that day. We should not forget that more than 2000 first responders were injured and more than 1,400 who worked at Ground Zero have died from injury and illnesses from their time spent at the Pile or the Pit. We should never forget their sacrifices either.
In closing, I would like to paraphrase the Gettysburg address, given by former President Abraham Lincoln nearly 151 years ago,
“The brave men (and women), living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated (This land), far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us — that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion — that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain — that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom — and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.”
Post Script: Reminder of significant numbers of 9/11
It would symbolize many things to many people from every corner of the world. Both sides of the conflict would declare a victory, neither of them an absolute. The events of that day taught us things that had long been forgotten. It taught us that we could stand together in difficult times and honor the line from The Pledge of Allegiance, “One nation, under God, indivisible”. Tireless years later, thanks to the brave men of SEAL Team Six, and our intelligence communities, they declared with the statement “For God and Country…Geronimo” that the most wanted man in the world since Adolf Hitler had been killed.
We all watched in horror that day, not wanting to believe that any part of it was real. To this day, it is arguably known as the most widely watched event in human history, thanks to technology and mass media. Nearly every American over the age of 18 can remember exactly where they were and what they were doing when they watched the fire burn from the impact of Flight 11 that hit the north Tower, and most watched live footage as Flight 175 disappeared into a fireball into Tower 2. We struggled with the ugly reality that evil was going to test us this day.
We continued to watch the tragedy unfold as images of our nation’s military headquarters burned, our capitol evacuated for fear of attack, and news of a plane crash into a small unnamed field if rural Pennsylvania. The news reports poured in, of numerous other hijackings and federal buildings having been struck. As we all tried to make sense of it, we watched as two gleaming and proud icons of Western society’s commerce, collapse and reduced to rubble.
The attack that day stands to teach us another lesson. That we can be vulnerable.
Photo Courtesy of Stacy Howell
In the days that followed, the attribute of self sacrifice would come to mean several things those days, weeks and months that followed. I know because I was there, witnessing it all first-hand.
Though I was on duty that day, two days later I was standing at the foot of where the north tower had once stood. The scene was, and in many ways still is, impossible for me to put into words. I was asked once by a close personal friend about that experience, and I told him that I couldn’t really verbalize it. He thought that it was just too traumatic for me to discuss. I told him that it wasn’t just the bad, but the good, as well. Standing in the center of that chaos, trying to get my bearing in an unfamiliar city, in the midst of the worst attack on civilians in our nation’s history, I witnessed the results of absolute and pure evil and hatred. It could be argued from that point of view as an extreme end of self sacrifice.
Photo Courtesy of Stacy Howell
Dangerous pieces of debris from the towers themselves dangled temporarily lodged in surrounding high rises. These were referred to as “widow-makers” threatening to suddenly dislodge and crush an unsuspecting person. Even the surrounding buildings themselves were in jeopardy of collapse, from extensive external damage.
Photo Courtesy of Stacy Howell
In the skies over Ohio, and finally Pennsylvania the passengers and crew of Flight 93, were in a fight for their lives. They had been informed of the attacks at the Pentagon and in New York. It was clear that the hijackers had no intent of using them for ransom. The group came up with a plan to try to re-take the plane. They knew that it had a low chance of success. Even if the plane was re-taken from the hijackers, no one on board was flight qualified. It was a long shot, and they all knew it. The other thing that they knew was that without this attempt, there were only two other possible outcomes, a military intervention leading to the aircraft’s downing, or that their plane would be flown into another target, and yet more people would perish. They knew that they must act, not only for a chance of their own survival, but for the survival of countless others, wherever that plane’s intended target was. Once more, self-sacrifice was of the noblest attributes.
Indeed, the first responders truly battled evil that day. And yet, it was the courage of the first responders that gripped the entire country and demonstrated to the nation and the world that we can and will recover. Americans will do what is necessary in the face of evil and danger. We will respond with super-human acts of valor, courage and selflessness.
Thousands of patriotic Americans responded, to enlist or re-enlist on our nation’s military to defend our country from further attacks. Thousands more would respond to become firefighters, medics, law enforcement officers, emergency planners, and hazmat and weapons of mass destruction subject matter experts.
Many of these individuals are family members of those who died that day. I spoke with a firefighter in NYC some years back, about his desire to follow in his father’s footsteps as a fireman. He said, “I always knew I wanted to be like my Dad. This is how I can honor him. He was in those towers, on the front lines, fighting to save people’s lives, and to save his own. Now, I can honor that legacy of fighting for peoples’ lives right where my Dad did every day. “
Indeed, many lessons learned that day have brought about both remarkable and unremarkable changes in our nation and our way of life. We, as a nation, have started our healing process, and have made it more difficult for an attack like this to occur on American soil again. The bad guys out there though work just as tirelessly to try to exploit any advantage that they can to hurt us yet again. Next week, on the thirteenth anniversary, we honor the 2,966 victims of that day (I refuse to count the 19 hijackers as “victims”). They were citizens from more than 90 countries, and they were many things to us all. Business people, air crews, bankers, travelers, window washers, soldiers and officers, cooks and restaurant staff, firefighters, and police officers. But they were much more than that to us. They were our mothers, and sisters, our brothers and our fathers. They were our friends. And whether you choose to say “Never Forget” or “Always Remember”, continue to honor them.
Photo Courtesy of Stacy Howell
Ever.
Prepare yourselves and your families, and never again dismiss the lessons or stories of that day. We should not forget that more than 2000 first responders were injured and more than 1,400 who worked at Ground Zero have died from injury and illnesses from their time spent at the Pile or the Pit. We should never forget their sacrifices either.
In closing, I would like to paraphrase the Gettysburg address, given by former President Abraham Lincoln nearly 151 years ago,
“The brave men (and women), living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated (This land), far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us — that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion — that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain — that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom — and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.”
Post Script: Reminder of significant numbers of 9/11
- There were ZERO survivors in WTC 1, above the point of impact from AA Flight 11.
- The youngest living victim that day was two years old, and aboard UA Flight 175.
- There were 11 unborn babies that were killed, along with their mothers.
- Only 16 people survived above the point of impact from UA175 in WTC 2.
- 24 victims are still listed as missing from the WTC attacks.
- 55 Military personnel were killed at the Pentagon, along with 70 civilians.
- Of the 2,966 victims, 246 were passengers or crew on the four aircraft.
- Only 289 bodies were recovered “intact”
- 614 victims died in WTC 2.
- Over 1400 volunteers and responders to Ground Zero have died since 9/11.
- 1402 victims died in WTC 1.
- Over 1700 families never received any remains of their loved ones.
- 3000 children lost at least one parent in the attacks.
- As of 8:46am, there were over 19,000 people on the WTC complex property.
- Of the 2,974 original victims of 9/11, there were 19,858 body parts recovered at the site of the World Trade Center.
- On 9/11/2001, Wal-Mart alone sold 116,000+ American Flags.
- Number of American Flags flying in my neighborhood as I write this.- 2
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