Where were you on 9/11?

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M

Manhattan Buckeye

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7,566 posts
Jul 19, 2010 9:51 PM
Midtown, 46th and 6th (NOT the Avenue of Americas).
Jul 19, 2010 9:51pm
I

I Wear Pants

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16,223 posts
Jul 19, 2010 10:13 PM
I was in 6th grade and they wouldn't let the teachers turn on the news so I had to wait until I got home to actually find out what happened.
Jul 19, 2010 10:13pm
bcubed's avatar

bcubed

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410 posts
Jul 19, 2010 10:14 PM
Working in an endoscopy unit at a hospital in Cincy. After we heard about the first one we all started watching a little tv in a back area overflow patient room that wasn't being used. The scariest thing was one of the Dr's we we're working with that day had a brother that worked in the 2nd tower and we we're all standing around him when the 2nd plane hit and saw the horror on his face. He frantically started calling his brother and luckily got through to him and found out that he was late after dropping off his kids at school and never made it to work.
Jul 19, 2010 10:14pm
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DeyDurkie5

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11,324 posts
Jul 19, 2010 10:16 PM
in 8th grade science...I took a bet that the towers could collapse and they did..won the bet
Jul 19, 2010 10:16pm
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darbypitcher22

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Jul 19, 2010 10:46 PM
Manhattan Buckeye;427522 wrote:Midtown, 46th and 6th (NOT the Avenue of Americas).

How did you make it out of that area?
Jul 19, 2010 10:46pm
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Laley23

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29,506 posts
Jul 19, 2010 10:50 PM
9th grade Art.
Jul 19, 2010 10:50pm
S

sjmvsfscs08

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2,963 posts
Jul 19, 2010 10:50 PM
6th grade social studies. We were just diving into free trade/NAFTA, etc and how Marcy Kaptur (our Rep.) opposed it on Monday. The next day it happened and I, being the resident class jackass, blamed it on Marcy Kaptur. I guess I just thought "FREE TRADE = NAFTA = INTERNATIONAL TRADE = WORLD TRADE CENTER."

Anywho our teacher's sister was on the beltway in DC when it happened to the Pentago and she called her sister on her cell to tell us (they had cell phones in 2001?!) and once our teacher found out she went ballistic. She was dumber than a box of rocks so of course it'd happen.

We just watched TV for the rest of the day. I remember asking if it was an army or just some terrorists doing it. I figured it might be Russia or somebody invading, as our attention was mostly on the Pentagon.
Jul 19, 2010 10:50pm
S

slinger73

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1 posts
Jul 19, 2010 11:16 PM
Working in the front yard. A lady walked by pushing a child in a stroller. I said hello and she then told me about a plane hitting the WTC. I assumed she meant a Cessna and went on working. When I went inside I turned on the TV and was stunned as the rest of the country was. After the towers collapsed my wife and I considered pulling our kids out of school but decided not to. One mother in my son's class walked into the classroom, grabbed her daughter by the arm and led her out without saying a word.
Jul 19, 2010 11:16pm
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Ironman92

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Jul 19, 2010 11:19 PM
I was in my 4th year of teaching....later that day a 4 year old with mother to pickup siblings pulled the fire alarm....much panic
Jul 19, 2010 11:19pm
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GOONx19

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7,147 posts
Jul 19, 2010 11:20 PM
Mrs. Barzak's fifth grade math class. Problem number four of a quiz when Ms. Vitko came in with tears in her eyes and told us what was going on.
Jul 19, 2010 11:20pm
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Red_Skin_Pride

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1,226 posts
Jul 19, 2010 11:30 PM
I was in 4th period Algebra I as a freshman in HS. Our music teacher's class was just down the hall, and she had her "free" period at the time and was in the teacher's lounge when the news broke and all the channels switched to live coverage. She came around to our classroom and told us to turn on the TV. As the OP said, it was shortly after the first plane hit and like him, we all just thought it was a freak accident. Then they (the news channel we were watching) came on and said that they had just got word that a second and third plane were missing from their routes, and that they were worried that it might not be an accident. That got everybody pretty freaked out, and shortly after that, the second plane hit the other tower. I saw it live and it's an image I'll never get out of my head. People in our class were crying, sitting there in shock and the whole room was dead silent. It's ironic looking back now, because growing up I had always heard my parents and grandparents talk about where they were when JFK was assassinated and how they remembered it so vividly. I never understood how that was possible. I did after 9/11. It's one of those things that you just can't comprehend until something like that actually happens. One of those days I would love to forget and never will forget at the same time.
Jul 19, 2010 11:30pm
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CenterBHSFan

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Jul 19, 2010 11:32 PM
That day I, and friends, were going to sail down San Pablo Bay and to Pacifica (Ca.) to have dinner there. About an hour before we all woke up the phone started ringing. I tried to ignore it but when the answering machine would kick on the caller would just hang up, wait a minute and call back. On the third time I answered the phone: "WHAT!!??"

It was my mother saying that we were under attack. Still trying to wake up - I couldn't understand what she was saying. Finally she told me to just turn on the tv right now. So, while still on the phone with her, I turned it on and watched a replay of the 2nd plane hitting the tower.

I couldn't believe what I was seeing and what all the newscasters were conjecturing. I probably sat on the phone with my mom for an hour or so, even when I was waking the others up to show them what was going on.
We didn't go sailing that day. Instead, we all sat glued to the tv.

I remember, while still on the phone with my mom, watching people fall/jumping from windows, horrified at what those people inside those floors must have been going through.
When I hung up the phone, I just went to my bedroom, hit my knees and prayed for all of those folks.
Jul 19, 2010 11:32pm
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killdeer

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Jul 19, 2010 11:41 PM
was off work that day....had just turned on GMA like i often did...and saw the coverage of the first plane hit.
at that time, the media was still approaching it from the standpoint of a terrible accident.
I clearly remember, as they were speculating on how a plane could get off course that far...watching live as the second plane came in and hit.

By then, clearly the fact that this was no accident hit everyone at the exact same time. I cannot reinforce enough how numbing and shocking that realization was.

I sincerely believed we were on the brink on a nuclear situation, so i went out shortly thereafter and picked up cash, gasoline, bottled water, batteries and food. I kid you not.
I immediately left and pulled my son out of preschool.

Not to get too political, but when I remember that day, the fact that we were all able to not only rebuild, rebound, and return to some semblance of security in the US without any large scale foreign terror attack on US soil in all these intervening years, is a legacy that we probably all owe a great deal of gratitude to GWBush, although you will never hear that in the media.

just my opinion.
Jul 19, 2010 11:41pm
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End of Line

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Jul 20, 2010 1:36 AM
I was in 5th grade, duirng recess and they sent everybody inside and I had no idea why. My mom then picked me up from school not too long after, and I was confused during the ordeal. When I got home she turned on the TV and I started crying just seeing what was going on, and the replays of the towers falling. The saddest day in American History.
Jul 20, 2010 1:36am
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ts1227

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12,319 posts
Jul 20, 2010 1:44 AM
I arrived at my 3rd period English class my sophomore year of HS and she had it on TV. At that point the second tower had just been hit. By the time class was over they had both fallen.
Jul 20, 2010 1:44am
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swamisez

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1,990 posts
Jul 20, 2010 2:03 AM
Frosh year of college, got up early that morning for my freshman experience class and my gf called and told me turn on the TV
Went to class, and we sat and watched the second plane hit and the towers fall. After that they cancelled classes for the rest of the day.

My roommate's mother worked in the Century 21 building just across from WTC plaza. We spent the next 6 or 7 hours trying to get word whether she was ok. Thankfully she was. We had fall ball that night, but coach cancelled all the games. I went home and with my family we went to a prayer vigil in town. Spent quite a few nights glued to the TV watching cleanup and damage assessment.

I wish our country could stand together like we did in those days following 9/11. It made me very proud to be an American.
Jul 20, 2010 2:03am
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Curly J

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Jul 20, 2010 2:23 AM
I had just started up my van heading to work. I heard that a plane hit the WTC. I called The Wife to have her turn on one of the news stations, we were watching the History or Discovery Channel that morning. She turned it on just in time to see plane 2 hit the other tower.

I was at Mercy Hospital when both the towers fell. They actually said a prayer over the PA system when the 1st tower went down.
Jul 20, 2010 2:23am
B

bwcomet89

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633 posts
Jul 20, 2010 2:58 AM
9th grade Algebra class. Our teacher didn't turn on the tv thinking it wasn't true or nothing special. I had study hall the next period and we all just watched tv from there. There was an assembly later on that day to determine if we were to have school the next day. We did of course, but it was clear nobody knew what to do or what was going to happen next.
Jul 20, 2010 2:58am
believer's avatar

believer

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8,153 posts
Jul 20, 2010 4:46 AM
I'm obviously a tad older than some of you who were in 4th, 5th, or6th grade at the time. lol

I was sitting at my desk putting together my daily report for our weekly sales meeting when our company's IT guru emailed me with a message, "go to USA Today On-line right now" which I thought was a bit strange because he was very anal about anyone using our new T-1 connection for anything but company business.

So I pulled the site up and it showed smoke out of one of the towers with a headline reading something like, "Plane Hits WT Center...Story Developing."

I then told some folks what was going on so we went to the TV set in our company cafeteria and were soon joined by about 40 people. We all saw the second plane hit and both towers collapse.

I knew things were never going to be the same.
Jul 20, 2010 4:46am
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GOONx19

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Jul 20, 2010 6:55 AM
Just reading all these things gives me chills.
Jul 20, 2010 6:55am
S

Swamp Fox

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2,218 posts
Jul 20, 2010 7:18 AM
I was walking into the teaching Lounge and there seemed to be an unusual number of people in the room staring at the blaring TY when I asked,"What's going on?". The rest, as they say, is history. A day that definitely changed us forever.
Jul 20, 2010 7:18am
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THE4RINGZ

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Jul 20, 2010 7:40 AM
I was working from my home office that morning when I got an Instant Message, "what the hell is going on in this world?" Oblivious to what it was referring to I turned on the television and heard about the first plane crash. At that time they were talking about it being an airline disaster. Then the second plane hit.

As the events of the day unfolded I sat mesmerized by the television . The boys got home from school around noon because Al Qaeda's list if potential targets must have read 1. World Trade Center. 2. Pentagon. 3. Layton Elementary School Wooster, Ohio.

Like everyone else I stayed glued to my television for the next several days. It was an unforgettable week. We all shed tears of frustration, anger, sympathy, joy, and pride in the American Spirit.
Jul 20, 2010 7:40am
P

pinstriper

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Jul 20, 2010 8:03 AM
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c9PwWkV4HQ4&feature=related

I was in Grad School and out working a part time morning job washing cars. We heard Stern on the radio transform from a slobbering idiot to a real journalist in a matter of 30 minutes. They closed work, we went home and cancelled practice for the guys - it was a surreal day in American History.
A few months later when Alan Jackson sang this song on primetime network television it really hit home that the event forever changed America.
A couple years later I visited NYC for work and got to walk around down there while the cross was still standing, the notes were still hung and they hadn't began the tear down phase yet...my friends and I just looked at the destruction and had no words for it, we stood in silence - there was still an eary feeling about the place.
Jul 20, 2010 8:03am
V

vball10set

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24,795 posts
Jul 20, 2010 8:29 AM
in my office,when a family friend called and screamed at me to turn on my TV--my stomach still turns when I think back on it...
Jul 20, 2010 8:29am
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thePITman

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Jul 20, 2010 8:43 AM
THE4RINGZ;427734 wrote:As the events of the day unfolded I sat mesmerized by the television.

I remember staying up late that night taping anything and everything on all the different news stations. Too bad we didn't have DVR yet. But some day maybe I'll get that VHS tape onto DVD. That tape is something we'll never want to lose.
Jul 20, 2010 8:43am