9/11 - where were you?

I was getting Tristan ready for Kindergarten.. Dawson was a baby then, so toting him around and chasing tristan to get him fed and dressed, when David called from work and told me a plane had crashed into a building in new york, and that I needed to turn on the news. So I did and then the second crashed as well, and they were talking about a third and fourth that might crash as well.. It was completely unreal. I took Tristan to school and came back

Back then I frequented a chatroom.. just your basic chat room, cause i didnt have friends or neighbors and david was gone all the time, I wanted people to talk to. So I went and logged on the chat room and it was just streaming with chatter.. After the plane in Pensylvania crashed most of the people left chat, all running to watch tv I guss, but there was one other guy there.. he had some dumb ass name implying something about cyborz, but he was falling apart. He tells me his mother is a flight attendant on flight 54 and he knows shes on it and hes away at college and doesnt know what to do.

I asked him about his dad.. he doesnt have one, never knew him, I asked about aunts or uncles.. There are some across country, but they dont really talk to his mom anymore.. I asked about grandparents.. and theyve passed away as well. I told him he had to tell his professor or councellor what happened, and he was worried that he would get in trouble, he had a test that day. I finally convinced him to go tell a school official and ask them to help him contact his aunt and he left, I waited around to see if he came back but he didnt, So I hope that he found somewhere to go, I felt so bad for him.

I was actually watching ESPN and it was interrupted with a worldwide event when it first took place.

I was at work in a cubicle filled office, and the manager walked around and quietly told people they should turn on their radios. The office has never, ever been that quiet. The only sounds, other than the radios (which thankfully were all tuned to the same station) were a few people crying. I will never forget the sense of shock that I felt. I was just completely numb, and the tears just fell for all of these people that I didn't know and yet I felt the loss of them.

This morning one of my co-workers here emailed everyone a slideshow of arial shots of the Twin Towers from that day. I've seen a ton of pics from the disaster but some of these were new to me, and it still fills me with such a feeling of disbelief and sadness.

I was working in downtown DC at the FDA/CFSAN building that has since closed down. I took a smoke break early that morning and came back inside, and about fifteen people were just standing there in the hall, looking up at the television screens that were always tuned to CNN. The early reports were confused - no one really understood what was happening. They thought it was an accident at first. I took the elevator to my floor and told everyone to keep their eye on CNN, then got back to work while accountings and rumors flew over my head. Some people panicked and started spreading crazy stories - the Capitol building is on fire, they hit the Department of Treasury. It was easy enough to check out this stuff. We just had to look outside.

Then the pentagon was hit, and everyone had to evacuate. I had talked to my husband earlier but now I couldn't find him and that made me anxious. I locked up my office and left the building with the others. Matt came out a few minutes later, an intern practically wrapped around each leg. They were scared - they had come to the US just that week. I thought the urge to punch the one who seemed to be helping herself to a generous feel of my man was a little ungracious, given the circumstances. Fortunately, one of the network admins must have seen a wicked gleam in my eye - he threw his arms around me and wailed for comfort, a move that both restrained me and cooled me off a little.

We had nowhere to go. They shut down the metro and no one's cell phone worked. There were helicopters everywhere. Those who brought their cars left with as many as they could, but there were still hundreds of sitting ducks in the street.

I was pretty sure my dad wasn't in the Pentagon that day.

We hung out, made tasteless jokes. Told our Korean coworker to call off his buddies. Watched the capital. The interns clung to Matt or flailed about or both. Our metro got back online three hours later, and we made our way back to Maryland. Soon we were able to make calls - my dad, my father in law, the kid's daycare, then everyone else. We were stranded again at our connecting train - it hadn't come back online yet. My father in law picked us up, and then we got the kid and went home, hours late. I answered emails and posted on message boards, checking in, I'm fine, no, my dad wasn't at the Pentagon, is everyone fine, who hasn't checked in? I got on AIM, television in the background, kid coloring next to me. I don't think we slept. I went out, I think to get cigarettes, we smoked so many while we waited for trains. I remember hearing part of a concert in the car - Dave Matthews, I remember the tune but not the words. At some point Bush made a statement. I remember thinking he hadn't fucked anything up too badly, but Homeland Security what? We started looking for anything but that image, over and over, of the plane crashing, the tower collapsing. I called people, and wrote and wrote. I keenly felt the distance from my online friends - I just wanted to get my arms around all of them.

Yeah, I was pretty much a gigantic pansy.

I was in Chicago. I was downtown at Art Institute. I had gone to the school store to buy supplies and my friend told me that the WTC had been hit by a plane. I didn't believe him at first, then he turned up the radio. We listened to the radio in class while the second plane hit.

They then thought that the Sears Tower could be a target, and it was only a few blocks away. They evac'd all of downtown Chicago. The subway was so packed, it was freaky. We lived near O'Hare, and there was a super erie silence with no planes taking off.

We were in Florida at the time, at Eglin AFB. I was at home getting ready for work and my mom called all hysterical. I turned on the news and at that point only the first plane had hit and no one was quite sure if it was an accident or an attack. The second plane hit and the sound outside was pretty deafening from the F15's on base scrambling to get into the air. The man was asleep all this time btw. I packed a bag with a change of clothes and my toothbrush just in case they wouldn't let me back on base to come home after work (my aunt lived almost literally behind where I worked) I went to work and after being there about 30 mins we were all told that they were going to just close the store for the day (you could hear crickets just about it was so quiet) and we should go home. I did make it back through the gate to go home, but not after my ID and driver's license were run, and my car completely searched, engine compartment and all.

My parents were due to come visit in a couple weeks. They flew down on the first day that the airlines were allowed to fly again. They got to the airport about 3 hours early expecting it to take that long to get through security and they said it took 15 mins. The airport was like a ghost town...no one wanted to fly.

I had just woken up and the TV was already on. walked by it to get to the kitchen. saw a building collapse so i took a sec to watch.

then i started screaming and called my mom and was hysterical about it.

I dont remember moving from the couch all day long.

I was walking into my philosophy class my first year of college. i walked into class and our professor came in and told us about the first plane hitting the WTC and that school was closing down. I made it back to my apartment and in time to turn CNN on to watch the second plane hit. A week later i was enlisting in the Marine Corps.

Okinawa, Japan on the computer when I hit aol it was up on the frount page so turned on the TV, Jeff called to tell me and I ran over to my neighbors house at 2AM (or so insane time in the early ass morning) since that is the area she if from and her family works >(

I worked the 11a to 7p shift at the time, if I recall.
I had gotten out of the shower when Mom called from work to say the first tower had been hit.

I headed into work. I vaguely recall cars being stopped on the side of the road.

When I got in, the phones were dead - keep in mind this was a sales/support call center with over 100 sales reps and over 20 techs - and the office internet was SOOOO SLOOOW from people streaming the CNN/etc video.

Around 1 our manager got our attention quietly and said we were all going home for a number of reasons - safety being one - and I followed one of the guys home because one of our major highways was closed and it was the easiest way home, but all the back streets were clogged.

We watched the late afternoon aftermath while I called the girl I was dating at the time. Her mom had been due in to a meeting that morning at the AMEX building around the corner from WTC... but had gotten stuck in traffic.

I don't remember the rest of the day after getting home.

I was at work when the first plane hit. At the time everyone just assumed it was an accident. It was a different world that morning, nobody thought of it being a terrorist attack...until the 2nd plane hit on live TV. At that point all hell broke loose. People were making their way down to the break area where they could watch what was going on. I remember standing beside our CFO, his daughter worked in the towers and he kept trying to call her (turned out she was not there at the time, she was running late that morning thankfully for her). For me, the real feeling of fear hit when they showed the Pentagon burning. We were all thinking "Fuck, what's next?". Nobody at that point knew there would be only one more plane and that one never reached its target. All we knew was Harrisburg is in between NY and DC, and we can look outside and see the stacks at Three Mile Island only a few miles away. I know they are designed to withstand a plane crash but hell, TMI almost melted down all by itself when I was a kid. All Commonwealth of PA agencies were sent home, and being that we handle the medical benefits for said employees and are considered "quasi-state", we followed suit.

I remember going home, my girlfriend at the time worked 3rd shift at the hospital and was asleep. I woke her up and told her to get dressed right away and started explaining what was going on while she got ready. We then went to the schools and picked up her two kids and brought them home. Part of me really wanted to get the fuck out of Dodge in case they tried to hit TMI but I didnt want to panick the kids so we explained what was going on and that everything would be ok and we sat there watchin g the news waiting for more info. Eventually when they announced all air traffic was grounded and we had F15's patrolling the skies I breathed easier. God Bless the Armed Forces. I never felt more strongly about our military than when I knew they were actually defending our home turf and our lives.

It may be a cliche but everything really did change that day. You never hear about a plane crash or catastrophe anymore without immediately thinking "Oh shit, terrorists!".