I was at Ft Riley, half of my battalion was deployed to NTC so I was the S-3, S-2 and HHC Rear D commander. I forgot my boots and had to go back home after PT when I heard it on the radio, I drove about 80 MPH through Odgen (the local town just East of Riley) past 2 cops who just waved and gve me the high sign.
Of course everthing was just chaos, go to the ASP and draw some ammo, get C-wire around the barracks, start moving cars away from the buildings etc.
The highlight of the day was when one of the spouses who was a retired Brit Major came into my office with his gear asking to be put to work.
Where were you and what did you you that day?
Moderator: Site Admin
I had just got home from a long night shift. I was sitting on my couch watching the news when those coward bastards attacked. Although I was beat from working all night and dealing with scumbags, I stayed in front of the t.v. for hours. I was wishing that I had been on one of those planes so I could have met one those rag head cowards up close and personal. I was also wishing that I wish I was back in 2nd Batt. today.
C Co 2/75
1986 - 1992
RS Class 9-87
RLTW
" The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena............ "
1986 - 1992
RS Class 9-87
RLTW
" The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena............ "
It would have been around 1600 (Italy-time) and I was in a meeting with CIF regarding RFI issue for the battalion. OPS NCOIC walks in and says a plane hit the WTC. "No shit? What size plane?" No panic...no alarm...I'll see it on AFN later that night.
30 min later he interrupts again "Another plane just hit the other tower, you need to see this..." We go into the S3 shop and crowd around a desktop computer - saw the pic of the massive fireball, and the other tower pumping out thick black smoke...Reading the headlines about two passenger planes hitting the towers.
I remember thinking 'who the fuck had the godamn balls to do this? they're all going to be incinerated...'
Hour later or so I'm telling 150 Soldiers 'our country has been attacked; consider yourselves at war.'
Went home about 2 days later.
30 min later he interrupts again "Another plane just hit the other tower, you need to see this..." We go into the S3 shop and crowd around a desktop computer - saw the pic of the massive fireball, and the other tower pumping out thick black smoke...Reading the headlines about two passenger planes hitting the towers.
I remember thinking 'who the fuck had the godamn balls to do this? they're all going to be incinerated...'
Hour later or so I'm telling 150 Soldiers 'our country has been attacked; consider yourselves at war.'
Went home about 2 days later.
RS Class 7-92
Everyone remembers the pictures, but I think more and more about the sounds. I always ask people what they heard that day in New York. We've all seen the film and videotape, but the sound equipment of television crews didn't always catch what people have described as the deep metallic roar.
The other night on TV there was a documentary on the Ironworkers of New York's Local 40, whose members ran to the site when the towers fell. They pitched in on rescue, then stayed for eight months to deconstruct a skyscraper some of them had helped build 35 years before. An ironworker named Jim Gaffney said, "My partner kept telling me the buildings are coming down and I'm saying 'no way.' Then we heard that noise that I will never forget. It was like a creaking and then the next thing you felt the ground rumbling."
Rudy Giuliani said it was like an earthquake. The actor Jim Caviezel saw the second plane hit the towers on television and what he heard shook him: "A weird, guttural discordant sound," he called it, a sound exactly like lightning. He knew because earlier that year he'd been hit. My son, then a teenager in a high school across the river from the towers, heard the first plane go in at 8:45 a.m. It sounded, he said, like a heavy truck going hard over a big street grate.
I think too about the sounds that came from within the buildings and within the planes--the phone calls and messages left on answering machines, all the last things said to whoever was home and picked up the phone. They awe me, those messages.
Something terrible had happened. Life was reduced to its essentials. Time was short. People said what counted, what mattered. It has been noted that there is no record of anyone calling to say, "I never liked you," or, "You hurt my feelings." No one negotiated past grievances or said, "Vote for Smith." Amazingly --or not--there is no record of anyone damning the terrorists or saying "I hate them."
No one said anything unneeded, extraneous or small. Crisis is a great editor. When you read the transcripts that have been released over the years it's all so clear.
Flight 93 flight attendant Ceecee Lyles, 33 years old, in an answering-machine message to her husband: "Please tell my children that I love them very much. I'm sorry, baby. I wish I could see your face again."
Thirty-one-year-old Melissa Harrington, a California-based trade consultant at a meeting in the towers, called her father to say she loved him. Minutes later she left a message on the answering machine as her new husband slept in their San Francisco home. "Sean, it's me, she said. "I just wanted to let you know I love you."
Capt. Walter Hynes of the New York Fire Department's Ladder 13 dialed home that morning as his rig left the firehouse at 85th Street and Lexington Avenue. He was on his way downtown, he said in his message, and things were bad. "I don't know if we'll make it out. I want to tell you that I love you and I love the kids."
Firemen don't become firemen because they're pessimists. Imagine being a guy who feels in his gut he's going to his death, and he calls on the way to say goodbye and make things clear. His widow later told the Associated Press she'd played his message hundreds of times and made copies for their kids. "He was thinking about us in those final moments."
Elizabeth Rivas saw it that way too. When her husband left for the World Trade Center that morning, she went to a laundromat, where she heard the news. She couldn't reach him by cell and rushed home. He'd called at 9:02 and reached her daughter. The child reported, "He say, mommy, he say he love you no matter what happens, he loves you." He never called again. Mrs. Rivas later said, "He tried to call me. He called me."
There was the amazing acceptance. I spoke this week with a medical doctor who told me she'd seen many people die, and many "with grace and acceptance." The people on the planes didn't have time to accept, to reflect, to think through; and yet so many showed the kind of grace you see in a hospice.
Peter Hanson, a passenger on United Airlines Flight 175 called his father. "I think they intend to go to Chicago or someplace and fly into a building," he said. "Don't worry, Dad--if it happens, it will be very fast." On the same flight, Brian Sweeney called his wife, got the answering machine, and told her they'd been hijacked. "Hopefully I'll talk to you again, but if not, have a good life. I know I'll see you again some day."
There was Tom Burnett's famous call from United Flight 93. "We're all going to die, but three of us are going to do something," he told his wife, Deena. "I love you, honey."
These were people saying, essentially, In spite of my imminent death, my thoughts are on you, and on love. I asked a psychiatrist the other day for his thoughts, and he said the people on the planes and in the towers were "accepting the inevitable" and taking care of "unfinished business." "At death's door people pass on a responsibility--'Tell Billy I never stopped loving him and forgave him long ago.' 'Take care of Mom.' 'Pray for me, Father. Pray for me, I haven't been very good.' " They address what needs doing.
This reminded me of that moment when Todd Beamer of United 93 wound up praying on the phone with a woman he'd never met before, a Verizon Airfone supervisor named Lisa Jefferson. She said later that his tone was calm. It seemed as if they were "old friends," she later wrote. They said the Lord's Prayer together. Then he said "Let's roll."
This is what I get from the last messages. People are often stronger than they know, bigger, more gallant than they'd guess. And this: We're all lucky to be here today and able to say what deserves saying, and if you say it a lot, it won't make it common and so unheard, but known and absorbed.
I think the sound of the last messages, of what was said, will live as long in human history, and contain within it as much of human history, as any old metallic roar.
The other night on TV there was a documentary on the Ironworkers of New York's Local 40, whose members ran to the site when the towers fell. They pitched in on rescue, then stayed for eight months to deconstruct a skyscraper some of them had helped build 35 years before. An ironworker named Jim Gaffney said, "My partner kept telling me the buildings are coming down and I'm saying 'no way.' Then we heard that noise that I will never forget. It was like a creaking and then the next thing you felt the ground rumbling."
Rudy Giuliani said it was like an earthquake. The actor Jim Caviezel saw the second plane hit the towers on television and what he heard shook him: "A weird, guttural discordant sound," he called it, a sound exactly like lightning. He knew because earlier that year he'd been hit. My son, then a teenager in a high school across the river from the towers, heard the first plane go in at 8:45 a.m. It sounded, he said, like a heavy truck going hard over a big street grate.
I think too about the sounds that came from within the buildings and within the planes--the phone calls and messages left on answering machines, all the last things said to whoever was home and picked up the phone. They awe me, those messages.
Something terrible had happened. Life was reduced to its essentials. Time was short. People said what counted, what mattered. It has been noted that there is no record of anyone calling to say, "I never liked you," or, "You hurt my feelings." No one negotiated past grievances or said, "Vote for Smith." Amazingly --or not--there is no record of anyone damning the terrorists or saying "I hate them."
No one said anything unneeded, extraneous or small. Crisis is a great editor. When you read the transcripts that have been released over the years it's all so clear.
Flight 93 flight attendant Ceecee Lyles, 33 years old, in an answering-machine message to her husband: "Please tell my children that I love them very much. I'm sorry, baby. I wish I could see your face again."
Thirty-one-year-old Melissa Harrington, a California-based trade consultant at a meeting in the towers, called her father to say she loved him. Minutes later she left a message on the answering machine as her new husband slept in their San Francisco home. "Sean, it's me, she said. "I just wanted to let you know I love you."
Capt. Walter Hynes of the New York Fire Department's Ladder 13 dialed home that morning as his rig left the firehouse at 85th Street and Lexington Avenue. He was on his way downtown, he said in his message, and things were bad. "I don't know if we'll make it out. I want to tell you that I love you and I love the kids."
Firemen don't become firemen because they're pessimists. Imagine being a guy who feels in his gut he's going to his death, and he calls on the way to say goodbye and make things clear. His widow later told the Associated Press she'd played his message hundreds of times and made copies for their kids. "He was thinking about us in those final moments."
Elizabeth Rivas saw it that way too. When her husband left for the World Trade Center that morning, she went to a laundromat, where she heard the news. She couldn't reach him by cell and rushed home. He'd called at 9:02 and reached her daughter. The child reported, "He say, mommy, he say he love you no matter what happens, he loves you." He never called again. Mrs. Rivas later said, "He tried to call me. He called me."
There was the amazing acceptance. I spoke this week with a medical doctor who told me she'd seen many people die, and many "with grace and acceptance." The people on the planes didn't have time to accept, to reflect, to think through; and yet so many showed the kind of grace you see in a hospice.
Peter Hanson, a passenger on United Airlines Flight 175 called his father. "I think they intend to go to Chicago or someplace and fly into a building," he said. "Don't worry, Dad--if it happens, it will be very fast." On the same flight, Brian Sweeney called his wife, got the answering machine, and told her they'd been hijacked. "Hopefully I'll talk to you again, but if not, have a good life. I know I'll see you again some day."
There was Tom Burnett's famous call from United Flight 93. "We're all going to die, but three of us are going to do something," he told his wife, Deena. "I love you, honey."
These were people saying, essentially, In spite of my imminent death, my thoughts are on you, and on love. I asked a psychiatrist the other day for his thoughts, and he said the people on the planes and in the towers were "accepting the inevitable" and taking care of "unfinished business." "At death's door people pass on a responsibility--'Tell Billy I never stopped loving him and forgave him long ago.' 'Take care of Mom.' 'Pray for me, Father. Pray for me, I haven't been very good.' " They address what needs doing.
This reminded me of that moment when Todd Beamer of United 93 wound up praying on the phone with a woman he'd never met before, a Verizon Airfone supervisor named Lisa Jefferson. She said later that his tone was calm. It seemed as if they were "old friends," she later wrote. They said the Lord's Prayer together. Then he said "Let's roll."
This is what I get from the last messages. People are often stronger than they know, bigger, more gallant than they'd guess. And this: We're all lucky to be here today and able to say what deserves saying, and if you say it a lot, it won't make it common and so unheard, but known and absorbed.
I think the sound of the last messages, of what was said, will live as long in human history, and contain within it as much of human history, as any old metallic roar.
-
CatFish Driver
- Ranger
- Posts: 954
- Joined: June 2nd, 2006, 12:28 am
On 9/11, I was at Ft. Sill attending FAOBC. I was in Snow Hall during class and on break there was a crowd of 20 or so people around the staff duty desked watching a TV. It was before the 2nd plane hit the South Tower. I saw the second plane hit live and had that sick feeling that the worst was yet to come. We went back into the classroom and about 2 mins. into the second half of class, another instructor came in and said "it's fucking on". Right then I knew I was destined for the middle east. We were let out of class early and we all went home and stayed glued to the TV for the next few days whenever we weren't at class or PT.
I called home on the 11th to see if everyone was alright. I found out that my cousin who worked at Cantor Fitzgerald was in the North Tower and he hadn't been heard from. Later on I found out that he rode the 108th floor to sea level. His widow was 8.5 months pregnant. I think his family got to bury a finger, and that was 6 months later.
I fucking hate Muslims. Fuck the lot of them. They are fucking cowards. If they aren't active participants, then they are sympathizers or enablers. I think we should behead captured terrorists live on FOX News. There is no death that is too awful for any of them. I didn't feel bad for any one of those fucking criminals at Abu Ghraib or Guantanamo. As a matter of fact I pray that they all die pissing themselves in fear by the most painful manner available to the rough men who mete out swift justice in the dark of night.
I called home on the 11th to see if everyone was alright. I found out that my cousin who worked at Cantor Fitzgerald was in the North Tower and he hadn't been heard from. Later on I found out that he rode the 108th floor to sea level. His widow was 8.5 months pregnant. I think his family got to bury a finger, and that was 6 months later.
I fucking hate Muslims. Fuck the lot of them. They are fucking cowards. If they aren't active participants, then they are sympathizers or enablers. I think we should behead captured terrorists live on FOX News. There is no death that is too awful for any of them. I didn't feel bad for any one of those fucking criminals at Abu Ghraib or Guantanamo. As a matter of fact I pray that they all die pissing themselves in fear by the most painful manner available to the rough men who mete out swift justice in the dark of night.
Ranger School Class 08-02
"Extremism in the pursuit of liberty is no vice, moderation in the pursuit of justice is no virtue."
--Senator Barry Goldwater
"Extremism in the pursuit of liberty is no vice, moderation in the pursuit of justice is no virtue."
--Senator Barry Goldwater
-
ANGRYCivilian
- Tadpole
- Posts: 2143
- Joined: July 16th, 2004, 9:02 am
I was listening to Howard Stern, on my way to work. I thought it was a joke at first. When I finally got to work, I turned on the tv just in time to see the second plane hit.
I don't even know anyone in New York, but it brought tears to my eyes.
I don't even know anyone in New York, but it brought tears to my eyes.
St Barbara's Bastards
82C1P
"Parole officer says I gotta upgrade, or he won't give me back my stabbin' knife!"~Roberto
82C1P
"Parole officer says I gotta upgrade, or he won't give me back my stabbin' knife!"~Roberto
I live in NJ, and about half of the people I went to school with had parents who commuted into the city for work. I was a kid in high school at the time. I was sitting there in math class when our security guard came in, and without saying a word, dropped a yellow note on this girls desk. He did this for several people. We all figured it was routine administrative things, or perhaps a large prank getting busted. On the way out of the class I picked one of these up from the trash, and it had the girls name and just said that "mom called, everythings okay". I didn't know what it meant, and tossed it out. The thought of it now sends chills down my spine.
...So many little things from that day.
Seeing the six year old girl that lives down the street, sitting alone on the curb waiting for her mom to get home. A half hour later, cooking her grilled cheese and my 9th grade self trying to explain to her why her mom isn't able to come home for a while.
Hearing that Kristin's dad was killed.
Most of all, the feeling of wanting to do something, but not being able to because I was too young. Wanting to go to ground zero and give blood and dig for survivors. Watching American soldiers gearing up to go get some. Wishing I could be one of them, knowing that someday I would be.
...So many little things from that day.
Seeing the six year old girl that lives down the street, sitting alone on the curb waiting for her mom to get home. A half hour later, cooking her grilled cheese and my 9th grade self trying to explain to her why her mom isn't able to come home for a while.
Hearing that Kristin's dad was killed.
Most of all, the feeling of wanting to do something, but not being able to because I was too young. Wanting to go to ground zero and give blood and dig for survivors. Watching American soldiers gearing up to go get some. Wishing I could be one of them, knowing that someday I would be.
-
CGoog
My daughter was 5 mnths and 20 days old, therefore feeding time came pretty early. I remember me and my Sister-n-law watching the news and saw the second plane crash. As I was sitting there rocking and feeding my baby all I could do was think to myself and say "you dirty little son of a bitches", of course that was after my eyes watered up with tears. I know I sat there and thought about how bad this world would be when my daughter gets to be my age. In my heart I know with men like all of you, Hopefully it wont be too bad for her to live in.
