Sept 11...9/11

Today is one of those anniversaries that one can remember exactly where they were and the recall is so vivid each year.

I was sitting in the home office seated at my desk top computer and chatting with a woman in Massachusetts when she commented "a plane just flew into the World Trade Center!" Thinking it was a small private plane, I left the office and seated myself in the living room on a sofa and switched on the television.

I, like so many others assumed this was an accident. Later talking to seasoned pilots, they immediately knew this was not an airplane that was lost; too many safety measures for a plane to be that lost.

I sat and watched as the smoke billowed up and confused news reporters were as stunned and clueless as the rest of the nation. In a few minutes the husband walked down the hall and entered the living room just as the second plane hit the south tower of the Trade Center. 

I can remember the chills that ran over my body. It was then I realized along with the everybody else that we were under attack. Soon the Pentagon was hit, planes were being grounded.   I watched as the fire trucks and firemen gathered to put out the fire at the towers and that is what I thought would happen. When the first tower fell, I was stunned and sickened. In the weeks that followed  I was one of those people that didn't want to leave the house.
I can still remember when the planes were allowed to fly once again and I was in my car driving to work that morning. As the sound of a jet overhead broke the silence, I peered toward the sky and marveled at how any passengers were able to board an aircraft.

Approaching the anniversary of this date, I again sat and watched the videos captured on that day. The broadcasts were broken up into categories and one of them was the recordings of the people on board those planes calling their families and the airline companies to alert them to what was happening on board.

The one broadcast I didn't hear was the airline hostess and what she said that day. I've talked to a few people that heard what she had to say but it was only broadcast a few times. It wasn't repeated on the shows I watched a few nights ago but I shall never forget what she said and when I looked up to the skies and saw the first jet to fly again after the planes were allowed back in the air her words came back to me.

 

She said and this is paraphrased: "we are flying along the Hudson and we are low. We are too low and  the buildings are ...oh my God.........." and that was the last words she uttered. I can just imagine her looking forward and seeing the World Trade Center and knowing in those last few seconds what was coming.

 

I know I heard her voice along with a few others that were watching their televisions  that day. I haven't heard that recording since but it's what I thought about when I had to board a flight after 9/11/2001.

And today was Carrie's first dance lesson. Carrie wasn't around when those planes hit the World Trade Center and she has no idea of a world pre 9/11. This was a memorable day for her as it was for me but for an entirely different reason. Keep on dancin Carrie..a little joy on this sad anniversary.....