As the fateful 9:00 a.m. hour ticked by, the New York Fire Department launched the biggest response in its history, drawing resources from across its five boroughs. Thousands of other first responders and government officials arrived on the scene as well, from local, state, and federal agencies.
Thomas Von Essen, commissioner, FDNY: Inside the [North Tower ground-floor] lobby, I think we knew less of what was going on than people outside or in the street, or the people watching TV.
Chief Joseph Pfeifer, Battalion 1, FDNY: We tried every possible means of communication that day. But even cell phones weren’t working. Each of the systems we tried failed. I felt very frustrated. It was almost like the closer you were, the less you knew. The helicopters were up, but we had no means to communicate with them. We tried a number of times. We were the least informed.
Steven Bienkowski, Aviation Unit, NYPD: People saw the helicopter, and I’m sure many of them were thinking that we were going to be able to save them. In fact, we weren’t able to do anything. We were as close as you could possibly be, and still we were helpless, totally helpless.
Chief Joseph Pfeifer, inside the ground-floor lobby of the World Trade Center: Groups of firefighters were coming in. We would brief them, tell them the plan, and send them up. One of the engine companies that came in was Engine 33, which was my brother Kevin’s. I told him we thought the lowest level of fire was at floor 78. I told him we didn’t have any elevators available. Then we spent a couple seconds looking at each other, with a real feeling of concern for each other. Then he knew what he had to do. I watched him walk away, and that was the last time I saw him.
William Jimeno, officer, PAPD: Sergeant [John] McLoughlin ran up to us and said, “I need volunteers to go in with us, and I need people who know how to use Scott Air-Packs,” the breathing apparatuses that the firefighters use. Port Authority police officers are cross-trained not only for law enforcement but firefighting. I don’t know which of us said it first—either Dominick Pezzulo, Antonio Rodrigues, or me—but one of us said, “We just graduated. We know how to use it.” Sergeant McLoughlin said, “That’s good, that’s four of us, we’re going to go.” We started running toward the building. I remember thinking to myself, Wow, this is bad.
James Luongo, inspector, NYPD: As I hit Vesey between Church and Broadway, the first thing that struck me was the amount of women’s shoes. I couldn’t understand it. Then I realized women had run out of their shoes—the high heels and what have you. There were women’s shoes all over.
Sgt. Anthony Lisi, Emergency Service Unit, Truck 6, NYPD: Sergeant [Tom] Sullivan stopped us and said, “We have hundreds of firemen and cops in the building already, doing rescue work. I want you to stop, take off that gear, and put on your heavy vest and helmet, and grab weapons, because we’re getting word that they’re shooting civilians as they’re running out of the building.” We were, over our radio, getting reports of shots fired at the Trade Center. It winds up it was police officers who were shooting out the windows so more people could run out faster. There were shots fired—but by good guys, not bad guys.
Sharon Miller, officer, PAPD: Before we got out of the car—me, Richie Rodriguez, Jimmy Nelson, and Jimmy Parham—we all held hands and we said, “We’re going in together, we’re gonna come out together.”
Lt. Mickey Kross, Engine 16, FDNY: I huddled the guys together because I knew this was going to be a tough day. I got into a little huddle, like football players do. I says, “Come here.” I says, “Just treat this like a fire. We’ll stick together. Watch each other’s back.”
Capt. Jay Jonas, Ladder 6, FDNY: I walked over to my crew, and I says, “Okay, guys. Here’s the deal. It’s a raw deal, but this is what we have to do.” I said, “We have to go upstairs in this building for search and rescue.” Then I said—and I forgot I made this one statement, but all my guys swear that I said it—they said I said, “They’re trying to kill us, boys. So let’s go.” And they did, to their credit. I don’t think anybody would have looked down on them if they ran up West Street. As we were about to hit the stairway, Sal D’Agostino said to me, “Hey, Cap, I wonder where the air force is?” I says, “Yeah, I wonder how many thousands of fires I’ve been to in my career and I’ve never hit a stairway wondering where the air force was.” We were hoping they had our backs.
William Jimeno, officer, PAPD: In the midst of all this chaos, all this disaster, inside that World Trade Center, there were people helping each other. I remember seeing a black gentleman with a white gentleman, carrying this blond woman who had a severe cut on her leg. I remember thinking to myself, Will, if these normal civilians can be this brave, we as rescue workers, we need to be three steps above them, because they’re counting on us.
James Luongo, inspector, NYPD: There were a bunch of people who came out of the building on Vesey Street. They were a little disoriented about which way to go. I started yelling to them to come to me. They were looking around. Finally, a woman heard my voice. She touched the people next to her, she pointed to where me and Dennis and Sergeant Boodle were—and with that, debris came down and killed all of them. With all the things I saw that day, that, to me, was the worst because those people were so close, but yet they didn’t make it.
William Jimeno: As we walked into the Port Authority police desk [at the base of the Towers], I remember being stunned by a piece of the fuselage that our detectives had brought in. Your mind is trying to register—even though you know that a plane had hit—why is there a piece of the plane here?
James Luongo: Quite a few people came to the site looking to go in because their loved ones were there. I remember one woman standing on the corner by Vesey and West, and I told her that she had to leave. She said, “I’m not leaving.” We were back-and-forth like this for a second or two. I said, “I hope he’s worth your life because you’re not going to be able to get to him.” She said, “He is worth my life.” She looked to walk past me. I stopped her, and she pushed me. I grabbed her and picked her up to walk with her. She was hitting me as I was walking away. “Let me in! Let me go! I gotta go there!”
William Jimeno: Christopher Amoroso, someone that we had worked with and really liked—good, good cop—said, “Sarge, can I hook up with you guys?” Sarge said, “Yeah, Chris, you can.” Christopher had an injury over his left eye, and we asked him what happened. “Something hit my eye, probably a piece of concrete. We’ve got to keep working.” Sergeant McLoughlin had asked another officer, Anthony Rodrigues, to meet us up at Tower Two. Unfortunately for Anthony, one of the victims that fell from the building hit too close to him—he had human remains on his body. He said, “Sarge, I can’t work in this.” Sarge told him, “Go change your uniform and meet us up by Tower Two.” At that point, we became five.
* * *
Inside both towers—each now fatally stricken, their seemingly impregnable structures burning, melting, and weakening under temperatures that reached 1,800 degrees Fahrenheit—thousands of evacuating office workers rushed to exit their building, even as firefighters and police officers worked their way inside to provide aid.
Richard Eichen, consultant, Pass Consulting Group, North Tower, 90th floor: I got to a neighboring office and met Charlie Egan—their systems administrator—and he was annoyed because the explosion knocked off his servers. He was going to stay until midnight, bringing his servers all back up. I remember going with Charlie into the server room and saying, “Look, if it means anything I’ll stay with you, and together we’ll get these things back up.” He was really annoyed. Then he said, “I better call the building.” He called down there and goes, “Hi this is so-and-so, Clearstream Banking.” I think he gave his name. “There are five of us here, we’re on the 90th floor.” The office building said, “Stay there, we know where you are.” Meanwhile, we’re looking out the window, and we can see large chunks of the building falling. Huge chunks of the building—the size of like trucks falling—and it’s like, Well, I really don’t think that’s a viable option.
Herb Ouida, World Trade Centers Association, North Tower, 77th floor, and father of Todd Ouida, Cantor Fitzgerald, North Tower, 105th floor: I thought my son Todd was on the stairs. Todd called his mother immediately when the plane hit. He said to her, “Mommy, don’t worry. You’re going to hear there was an explosion at the World Trade Center. I’m going to the stairs.” She said, “What about Daddy?” Todd said, “I just spoke to him. He’s all right.” Todd had not spoken to me. Here was a kid who had suffered as a child from anxiety disorder, panic attacks, and at the moment of greatest danger, he’s protecting his mother. He was 25 years old.
Judith Wein, senior vice president, Aon Corporation, South Tower, 103rd floor: I was literally walking over bodies. So many people died at that moment of impact—the way they landed maybe, they broke their necks or something. Some other guy came up—we later found out his name was Welles Crowther, and he had been a volunteer fireman upstate—and he asked where there was a fire extinguisher. I pointed to where it was, and he went to get it. He was running different places and trying to put out fires. He had a red bandana on his face. He was calm and commanding: “This is what we have to do. This is what needs to be done.” He directed people to the only open working staircase—the only one that went all the way down. He stayed up there and helped and didn’t make it out.
Bruno Dellinger, principal, Quint Amasis North America, North Tower, 47th floor: Suddenly I felt the urge to go, and I dropped everything and left.
Stanley Praimnath, Fuji Bank, South Tower, 81st floor: I crawled the entire length of the loans department, the lounge, the computer room, the communication room. That’s as far as I can go. I can’t go any further because one lousy sheetrock wall stood firm.
Brian Clark, executive vice president, EuroBrokers, South Tower: Our offices occupied the entire 84th floor. Everything was destroyed. I started down with this group of six people following me with my flashlight. We only went three floors, down to the 81st floor, [when] I was distracted by this banging noise. I heard, “Help, I’m buried. I can’t breathe.”
Stanley Praimnath: This man behind the wall was saying, “I can hear your voice! Bang on the wall, I’ll know where you are.” He said, “Climb over the sheetrock wall.” I said, “I can’t.” He said, “You’ve got to think of your family. If you want to live, you must do it.”
Brian Clark: Suddenly he said, “Can you see my hand?” He was waving his hand down by the floor. I shined my flashlight on it and followed it up the arm to see his two eyes through this hole in the wall. He scrambled up, I missed him the first time, but the second time he jumped I caught him and heaved him up and over the wall. We fell back down on the ground, him on top of me. He gave me this big kiss. And I said, “I’m Brian.” He said, “I’m Stanley.”
Stanley Praimnath: He said, “Come on, buddy, let’s go home.”
* * *
More than 1,100 people were trapped above the impact zones across both the North and South Towers. As conditions worsened and smoke and fire permeated the upper floors, they dialed 911, emergency services, and the Port Authority’s World Trade Center command post, hoping to speed rescuers to their aid, not realizing how dire their situation actually was. For 24 minutes, 32-year-old Melissa Doi—trapped on the 83rd floor of the South Tower—spoke to a 911 operator, waiting for a rescue that would never come.
Melissa Doi, financial manager, IQ Financials: It’s very hot, everywhere on the floor.
911 operator: Okay, I know you don’t see it and all, but I’m, I’m . . . [stumbles over words] I’m gonna, I’m documenting everything you say, okay? And it’s very hot, you see no fire, but you see smoke, right?
Melissa Doi: It’s very hot, I see . . . I don’t see, I don’t see any air anymore!
911 operator: Okay . . .
Melissa Doi: All I see is smoke.
911 operator: Okay, dear, I’m so sorry, hold on for a sec, stay calm with me, stay calm, listen, listen, the call is in, I’m documenting, hold on one second please . . .
Melissa Doi: I’m going to die, aren’t I?
911 operator: No, no, no, no, no, no, no, say your—ma’am, say your prayers.
Melissa Doi: I’m going to die.
911 operator: You gotta think positive, because you gotta help each other get off the floor.
Melissa Doi: I’m going to die.
911 operator: Now look, stay calm, stay calm, stay calm, stay calm.
Melissa Doi: Please God . . .
911 operator: You’re doing a good job ma’am, you’re doing a good job.
Melissa Doi: No, it’s so hot I’m burning up.
* * *
Christine Olender, assistant general manager of Windows on the World, in a phone call to the Port Authority Command Center: We’re getting no direction up here. We’re having a smoke condition. We have most people on the 106th floor—the 107th floor is way too smoky. We need direction as to where we need to direct our guests and our employees, as soon as possible.
Officer Steve Maggett, PAPD: Okay. We’re doing our best. We’ve got the fire department, everybody, we’re trying to get up to you, dear. All right, call back in about two or three minutes, and I’ll find out what direction you should try to get down. Are the stairways, A, B, and C all blocked off and smoky?
Christine Olender: The stairways are full of smoke—A, B, and C. And my . . . and my electric . . . my fire phones are out.
Officer Steve Maggett: Oh, yeah, they’re . . . all the lines are blown out right now. But everybody is on their way, the fire department . . .
Christine Olender: The condition up on 106 is getting worse.
Officer Steve Maggett: Okay, dear. All right, we are doing our best to get up to you right now. All right, dear?
Christine Olender: But where . . . where do you want to [inaudible] can you at least . . . can you at least direct us to a certain tower in the building. Like what tower . . . like what area . . . what quadrant of the building can we go into, where we are not going to get all this smoke?
Officer Steve Maggett: Unless we find out what exactly . . . area is the smoke . . . where most . . . most of the smoke is coming up there, and we can kind of direct that. As I said, call back in about two minutes, dear.
Christine Olender: Call back in two minutes. Great.
* * *
Back inside the stairwells of the North and South Towers, civilians and rescuers mixed in single-file lines, each group tired and sweaty from the exertions behind and ahead. As one group descended to evacuate, the others continued to climb, determined to help anyone still trapped.
Richard Eichen, consultant, Pass Consulting Group, North Tower, 90th floor: The five of us went out. My coworker Lucy sat down and said, “I’m not going anywhere.” I said, “Lucy, we’re not leaving anybody behind. We’ve got to get out of here. We’re starting to burn.” I put her hands on my shoulders. She stood behind me, I put her hands on my shoulders, and held her hands so she wouldn’t let go. I said, “Come on.” I said, “I’m hurt. I need help. I don’t want to die by myself. I need help.” I did that to get her to go. Then together we went out. We actually caught stairwell A, which it turned out was the only viable staircase up there.
Lt. Mickey Kross, Engine 16, FDNY: We were ordered to the 23rd floor [in the North Tower] to report in to some other command post. We entered Stairway B, which was the core stairway in the building. As we were going up, the people in the building were coming down and, actually, it was very smooth.
Stephen Blihar, officer, Emergency Service Unit, Truck 10, NYPD: We made it to the ninth floor [of the North Tower], and I remember filling a coffee pot with water and grabbing some plastic cups for everybody, because by that time, we were hot and sweaty, and I knew we were going up at least another 70 floors.
David Norman, officer, Emergency Service Unit, Truck 1, NYPD: There were people waiting on floors on the way up. We were informing them, “You need to leave. You need to continue flowing down the staircase. Don’t obstruct the staircase flow. Continue to move.”
Capt. Jay Jonas, Ladder 6, FDNY: You had a row of firemen going up the stairs, and you had a row of civilians coming down the stairs.
Lt. Mickey Kross: We carry a lot of equipment. We carry 60, 70 pounds of equipment with us, on average. It’s a little slow going up the stairs, and it was hot that day. We stopped about every five floors and took a little breather.
Peter Bitwinski, assistant manager, Accounts Payable, Port Authority, North Tower, 69th floor: We encountered maybe 20 to 25 firemen. It’s one of the sadder memories I have of that day. They were walking up with full equipment, these big metal picks, and they were sweating like crazy.
Cathy Pavelec, administrator, Port Authority, North Tower, 67th floor: As they walked past us—both of my brothers are firemen in New Jersey—I was very careful to say “Hello, thank you, God bless you” to every single one of them. They were huffing and puffing, and these were big strong guys.
Herb Ouida, World Trade Centers Association, North Tower, 77th floor, and father of Todd Ouida, Cantor Fitzgerald, North Tower, 105th floor: The stairways were much better lit this time than in the ’93 bombing, and unlike ’93, there was no smoke coming up because the explosion was above us. New Yorkers were very brave that day—people helped each other. We were saying “Déjà vu.” We were trying to encourage each other and say, “Oh we’ve been through this before.” We didn’t realize this was different. None of us realized the building was going to collapse.
David Norman: When we got to floor 31, we found probably about a half dozen or more firefighters, one or two civilians on that floor dealing with chest pains, exhaustion, and stuff like that. We looked at each other and said, “We already have a triage set up here for us. This was our mission. Why don’t we stay here?”
Sharon Miller, officer, PAPD: We stopped on the 27th floor. That’s when I said to my supervisor, PAPD Captain Kathy Mazza, “Hey, Kat, I really love my job but this is getting bad.” I said, “I’m really not ready to die yet.” She goes, “Oh, don’t worry about it. We’ll be fine.” I said, “Well, how about a hug?” And we hugged! Then she goes, “All right, that’s enough of that!”
Judith Wein, senior vice president, Aon Corporation, South Tower, 103rd floor: I walked down with another man. He actually had a severed arm, which we didn’t know about because he was wearing a suit. It kept his arm in. He was holding onto the lower part of his arm, but I didn’t think anything of that.
Bruno Dellinger, principal, Quint Amasis North America, North Tower, 47th floor: The heat was quite intense in the stairwell. There were some people who took their shirts off. The intensity of the warning signs—the fire alarms were in full force—like stroboscopic lamps and the fire alarm’s sound was pounding you all the time.
Judith Wein: We’re walking down the stairs, and around [floor] 40, some rescue workers came in, and they said we should sit and rest. The two others went to sit on the stairs, and I went to sit down. I had my tush sticking out, getting ready to sit, and something inside me said, Don’t sit. It almost felt like somebody had an arm or a hand on my back, pushing me up. It was a weird feeling, just Don’t sit. I said, “Look. If you guys are tired, you sit, but I can’t sit.” Because I didn’t sit, they got up and we walked. The rescue workers walked us through somebody’s office to an internal elevator which was working, and so we went from about 40 down to the lobby. I was told, later, that we were the last group of people to go down in that elevator.
Elia Zedeño, financial analyst, Port Authority, North Tower, 73rd floor: Most of my journey down the stairs was in this complete state of non-emotion. I saw people injured, but I had no reaction. I remember moving to the side and letting them walk in front of us. I remember a woman who was screaming and screaming and screaming. I couldn’t really completely understand what she was saying, but there was a man helping her, and he had blood on his forehead, and all he kept saying to her was “We were the lucky ones, we were the lucky ones.” He kept repeating that. I was thinking, What in the world did this woman see?
Peter Bitwinski, assistant manager, Accounts Payable, Port Authority, North Tower, 69th floor: We started to make our way down the staircase with John Abruzzo in the evacuchair. We had to get a routine going, so we decided two people on the bottom would hold the evacuchair, with two people at the top. We had eight people who were actively taking him down, four people at a time.
John Abruzzo, staff accountant, Port Authority, North Tower, 69th floor: We wanted to make time, but they were not absolutely sure how the chair worked or how it would handle. I don’t think the manufacturer even thought about the chair going down 69 flights.
Peter Bitwinski: We kept switching our team. The two guys holding the handles on top of the evacuchair would move to the bottom of the evacuchair after five flights. Then after you were on the bottom, you would move off the chair, and two other guys would take your place. You’d be free of chair duty for five or 10 floors.
John Abruzzo: The firemen cheered us on, encouraging us. “Keep on going,” they said. “You’re doing a good job, keep going.”
Marcel Claes, firefighter, Engine 24, FDNY: I just kept climbing. I knew it was going to be a hard day, but I kept thinking about putting water on the fire.
Bruno Dellinger: While I was walking down, they were going up to their deaths. And I was walking down to live. I will never forget this.
Lila Speciner, paralegal, Port Authority, North Tower, 88th floor: That will stay with me forever. They were going where we were running from.
Despite the fact that an incident had occurred within the buildings, not many companies formally evacuated their staff; many of the early evacuees had made the decision on their own to leave. In the South Tower, however, Morgan Stanley’s efforts likely saved scores or even hundreds of lives. The company, which occupied floors 59 to 74, as well as a few other, scattered lower floors, had invested heavily in evacuation equipment and training following the 1993 bombing, and its vice president of security, a former British paratrooper–turned–Vietnam veteran named Rick Rescorla, ignored the Port Authority’s initial announcement that those in the South Tower could remain at their desks. Instead, the retired colonel immediately began working to ensure everyone escaped.
Rick Rescorla, vice president of security, Morgan Stanley, in a phone call to his best friend, Dan Hill: The dumb sons of bitches told me not to evacuate. They said it’s just Building One. I told them I’m getting my people the fuck out of here.
Jeannine Ali, controller, Morgan Stanley, South Tower, 45th floor: On September 11th, our Security Department were the ones that got all of the Morgan Stanley employees out of the offices. With bullhorns, our security was saying, “Evacuate the building now.” I remember them saying, specifically, “You have to evacuate the building now.”
Robert Small, office manager, Morgan Stanley, South Tower, 72nd floor: As we’re going down, we get down to the 40s and we run into Rick Rescorla—I knew him through the fire safety training. He was always a jovial Scottish guy—always fun, had the brogue. He wasn’t fun that day. I tried to be humorous passing him, saying, “Hey, I’m the last man off 72. You don’t have to go check it. Everyone’s gone.” He goes, “Just get out. Just go. Just get out.” His tone was dead-on serious. I’d never seen him that serious before.
Barbara Fiorillo, manager, Mercer Consulting, South Tower, 54th floor: We heard voices of people directing the flow of traffic—there were very strong male voices: “Speed up, slow down, speed up, slow down.” It turns out that we were in the same elevator bank as Morgan Stanley, and they had worked at the tower in the first bombing. They had enormous training and experience. The voice directing the traffic was such a calming effect.
Robert Small: We came across a man, a big man—I hate to use the word “fat,” but he was. He was huge, and he was struggling on the stairs and he was holding on to the banister with both hands. I offered him some water. He said, “I can’t take your bottle of water.” I dropped my bag, opened it up, and he saw that I had dozens of bottles. He took a couple. We sat there with him and were talking. He didn’t say who he was or what floor he had started on. He didn’t have it in him. I said, “When you’re ready we’ll go together, and James and I will get you down.” He said, “No, no, no, do me a favor. If you see anybody—rescue or firemen—let them know where I am.” I felt bad leaving him. We left him three, four bottles of water, and we said good-bye.
Rick Rescorla, in a phone call to his wife, Susan: I don’t want you to cry. I have to evacuate my people now. If something happens to me, I want you to know that you made my life.
Ultimately, eleven Morgan Stanley staff—out of more than 2,700 in the South Tower—died on September 11th. Rescorla and two of his fellow security personnel were among those eleven.
* * *
Richard Eichen, consultant, Pass Consulting Group, North Tower: As you got lower and lower you got into more and more people. I was afraid that it was getting congested—I wasn’t afraid of the buildings falling. I was afraid of panic.
Vanessa Lawrence, artist, North Tower: If the flow stopped for too long, people shouted out, “Don’t worry! People congestion!”
Bruno Dellinger, principal, Quint Amasis North America, North Tower: It taught me something about human beings in distress. We were receiving from everywhere around us warning signs that this was a very, very dangerous situation. The moment we got those messages something inside—a defense mechanism—kicked in and stopped us from panicking.
Robert Small, office manager, Morgan Stanley, South Tower: As we’re into maybe the 20s we came across two women—one helping the other. The one doing all the help was also burdened with bags. She was helping a woman who she said was four months pregnant. “Okay. Let us help you. Let us carry the bags.” She let us carry the bags, but now the pregnant woman wanted to stop. We gave her some water. She says she’s hot. I took some water out, I made a little rag, sponging her back and her neck, making her feel a little bit better. She was finally ready to go. No sooner did we get a couple of floors down than she wanted to stop. Like football coaching—when you tell a kid to do a push-up, you always try to get one more out of them—I told her, “Give me one more floor, then we’ll stop. I’ll give you water. Give me one more floor.” And we did.
Constance Labetti, accountant, Aon Corporation, South Tower, 99th floor: I would start to cry, and I’d start to tremble, and I heard my father’s voice. My father had been dead since 1985—and I heard his voice, clear as day, telling me that I was not going to die in this building. I straightened up and kept walking down the steps. A few minutes later, I heard my uncle—who kind of took over being my dad when my dad passed away. My uncle passed away in ’99, and he used to call me “Kiddo.” I heard my uncle’s voice in my left ear telling me, “Kiddo, just take one step at a time.” And I did.
Richard Eichen, consultant, Pass Consulting Group, North Tower, 90th floor: When we finally got down to the 20s, we saw our first firefighter coming up. At this point Lucy was lying on a landing. She pretty much passed out. The firefighter said, “We’ve set up a station a couple of floors down.” We carried her spread-eagle. I carried her legs. He carried her under her armpits. The two of us carried her down the stairwell maybe two floors. When we got to the aid station, they asked me if I was okay and I said, “Yeah, I’m fine.” I met Lt. Glenn Wilkerson—who unfortunately didn’t make it out. We were about three feet from each other, and he said, “What’s it like up there?” I told them what it was like.
Robert Small: We got down to the fifth floor. Everything’s fine. The ladies are fine. All of a sudden we heard, “New York City Police. Anybody here?” So we called out. It was a female officer and—I’m assuming—a male detective, because he was in a suit. She and the detective wanted to help us out. I was very adamant, saying, “Don’t need your help.” I said, “I’ve been coming down since 72. I got this far—five more flights.” We told them about the gentleman upstairs and Rick on the 44th floor and they headed up. You could hear them floor by floor—opening doors, screaming out if anyone needed assistance, and then slamming the doors and going up to the next level. I know she didn’t make it. It always bothered me that she didn’t make it, because if she did help us, would that have kept her out?
Richard Eichen: They had given Lucy some oxygen. She was coming around and she was feeling better and at some point she said, “All right, I’m ready.” “Lucy, are you sure?” “Yeah. I’m ready.” “Okay.” So we got up, I took her hand. We go back in the stairwell. We continued going down.
Lt. Mickey Kross, Engine 16, FDNY: We encountered a group of people who were nonambulatory. We started to assist these people, trying to get them down. Me and Andy [from Engine 1] had somebody between us—a woman—and she was going very slowly, one step at a time. I wanted to get out of that building. It was like time was standing still.
Frank Lombardi, chief engineer, Port Authority, North Tower: Water was starting to run into the stairwells—the sprinkler systems must have been turned on—and we had to watch our footing to make sure that we wouldn’t slip.
Richard Eichen: It was pretty deep water—mid-calf to below the knee. All the water had gone down and collected there. It’s like, Wow, this is like a sinking ship. What the hell? Finally, a few more stairs, and we got into the lobby.
Linda Krouner, senior vice president, Fiduciary Trust, South Tower: We got to the ground level. We got out of the elevator and looked out at the plaza area. My first thought was, This is Britain during the Blitz, because that’s really what it looked like.
Robert Small: We got down to the main level. We were being escorted. It was like Hansel and Gretel with the breadcrumbs—a human line of police and rescue and you name it. They said, “Come this way. Exit to the north.”
Constance Labetti, accountant, Aon Corporation, South Tower, 99th floor: We got to the lobby and my coworker Jules and I had to rest for a moment because we were perspiring terribly. We had walked down 100 flights of steps. People were coming up to me, hugging me, and telling me, “Thank you, thank you,” and hugging me as they walked by me, and I said to Jules, “What? Why? What are they doing that for?” She said, “Connie, you don’t know what you were saying? You were saying, ‘We’re not going to die in this building. Just take it one step at a time.’ ” I was repeating what my father and my uncle were telling me, and I didn’t even know it.
* * *
At the High School for Leadership and Public Service—a block south of the South Tower—students and teachers tried to figure out an evacuation plan. Eventually, the occupants of the school and its neighbor, the High School of Economics and Finance, fled four blocks south, along with thousands of other people in Lower Manhattan, to Battery Park, at the tip of Manhattan.
Robert Rosado, student, HSLPS: Ms. Ordover asked us to write about what we thought had happened while she went online.
Heather Ordover, English teacher, HSLPS: The lead photo on CNN’s web page was what we couldn’t see from my classroom: the north side of the North Tower with an enormous gaping hole.
Ada Dolch, principal, HSLPS: Panic was beginning to set in. People were streaming into our lobby. Parents started coming in, “I want my child.” I stood up on the table in the lobby and said, “Ladies and gentlemen, I am the principal of the school.” I said, “No one is allowed to go upstairs.” There was this sense of, I got to take care of my chickadees, and all my kitties were upstairs safe.
Razvan Hotaranu, student, HSLPS: I knew that whatever happened I needed to get home fast. I knew my mom must’ve been very worried for me.
Ada Dolch: When the second tower was hit, our building really shook—a piece of the plane fell in front of our school building. Debris was falling on our rooftop. We could see flying paper on fire.
Keturah Bostick, student, HSLPS: I knew I was going to die. It seemed like there was no hope in the world. I found some friends, we all prayed and told each other that we loved each other. Next I pulled out a paper and started to write a letter to my family members telling them how much I loved them.
Ada Dolch: Where would we go? Where can you congregate with a lot of children? I said, “Oh, I know where we’re going. We’re going to Battery Park.” We initiated an evacuation plan. I had my assistant principals go floor by floor and evacuate all the students. I stood at the outside door and simply said to them, “Hold each other’s hands. Stay together.” I would say to them, “You should pray. This is a good time to be praying, and to ask God for mercy that we will be safe.”
Rosmaris Fernandez, student, HSLPS: I led the group to Battery Park.
Keturah Bostick: We ran, thinking that the worst was over, and after that nothing else could go wrong.
Tim Seto, student, HSLPS: We walked toward Battery Park. There was all this debris on the ground—newspapers, ashes, and burned stuff. The Towers looked like two smoldering cigarettes, pointed upward.
Heather Ordover: A student and I picked up pieces of honeycomb insulation. I picked up someone’s insurance policy, burnt in half and charred around the edges.
Ada Dolch: The kids were in total shock. They were very scared. They were catatonic.
Heather Ordover: We hustled them down to the edge of Battery Park. I stood, on a bench, with Liz Collins, a math teacher. The kids rallied around us.
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Dan Potter, firefighter, Ladder 10, FDNY: As I get off the Verrazzano Bridge, there was a bus lane and police vehicles were shooting through it. I got right behind them. A cop was standing right in front of me, so I held my badge out the window, and he flagged me through. We were in a convoy of police vehicles, doing about 70 miles an hour, between two barriers all the way through.
Jean Potter, Bank of America, North Tower: We were going down, but, again, there was smoke. Everything was lit. The staircase was lit. Smoke in the air, the smell of jet fuel. We were making our way down pretty quickly, and then it started to bottleneck a little bit. We started seeing firemen come up in the 20s. That’s when I saw [FDNY Capt.] Vinnie Giammona. I grabbed his arm and said, “Vinnie, be safe.” I knew that he was not going to make it out.
Dan Potter: I didn’t think that these towers were going to collapse. This was the massive, biggest fire I’ve ever seen, but as you’re calculating, you don’t really know the extent of the damage. I was convinced that we’ll get up there and put it out.
Jean Potter: We’re getting down to like 11, 10, and on like 8, I started yelling at people to move. I don’t ordinarily yell—I’m a very soft-spoken individual—but I started screaming at people, “Move it! Move it! We’re almost out of here! Move it! Move it!” The lobby was completely devastated. There was glass all over.
Dan Potter: When I got up West Street, just about Rector Street, I noticed police starting to put some barriers out. I noticed body parts in the street. There were big pieces and smaller pieces. I looked up at the Trade Center and I could see the flames, see the firemen. I wondered, Where is she? Where could she possibly be? I thought, She’s got to be up on the roof. I was convinced at this point that she’s up on the roof. I was going to do the best I could to get a team together and get up there.
Jean Potter: They took us down into the Concourse. I’m so grateful I kept my shoes on because the water was ankle deep and there was broken glass all over. There was a human chain of emergency workers yelling at us, “Run! Run! Ruuuun!” When do they tell you to run in an emergency? It was so horrifying.
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Richard Eichen: When we got into the lobby it was really scary. It looked like someone dumped a barbecue on it—it was covered in ash. I remember hearing the water dripping, dripping, dripping.
Jeannine Ali, controller, Morgan Stanley, South Tower: They were directing people out, up through Borders and out toward Five World Trade. There was a fireman—he couldn’t have been more than 19 years old—with a hose on his shoulder. I remember looking at him and saying to him, “There is nothing you can do. Don’t go in there.” He said, “Lady, it’s my job. I have to do it.”
Linda Krouner, senior vice president, Fiduciary Trust, South Tower: I got out and crossed the street. The first thing that hit me was the sounds. There were so many sounds. There were sirens and people screaming. It was like you were in the middle of one of those action movies with everything coming apart at the same time—fire engines, the ambulances, the police, and people shouting.
Richard Eichen: As we got closer to the door, there were security guards helping guide people out. I think they were some of the bravest people—unsung heroes of 9/11—because they could have run away. This was way beyond their pay grade. But they stayed.
Ralph Blasi, director of security, Brookfield Properties, owner of the World Financial Center and 1 Liberty Plaza: I have the greatest admiration for the private security officers, guys who are only making about $25,000 a year. We had often asked security guards, prior to 9/11, what they would do if a bomb went off and they saw a couple dead bodies. The consensus was always that they would run. But on September 11th, I had 60 guards working with me and not one ran. With the two towers burning, standing with bullhorns, keeping people moving out of the Towers, they never blinked.