9/11: One Day in America 1x1

1. Alright, come on down this way.

2. Paul?

3. Yeah, let's get out the way we came in!

4. Come on.

5. Come on back, everybody down.

6. Durrell?

7. Yeah, right here.

8. Are you ready for this?

9. Go out the way we came in!

10. Right here!

11. Yeah. We got it.

12. Watch out!

13. That's the way outta here.

14. Got a light?

15. No, no. Come here.

16. We gotta get everybody out!

17. Let's go! Let's go!

18. Let's get some lights.

19. Let's go. Don't panic.

20. Many people ask me, "What was it like that day?"

21. Command post, tower one.

22. All units, evacuate the building.

23. Command post to all units.

24. Command post to all units.

25. And I think what they're asking is,

26. "What was it like to be part of history?"

27. And then I tell them my story.

28. And I tell them that there was signs of devastation everywhere.

29. But there were also signs of hope.

30. And at this extraordinary time in history,

31. those little moments of caring for another were

32. the difference between life and death.

33. It's two minutes before the top of the hour.

34. AP Network News,

35. good morning, I'm Ross Simpson.

36. Air Jordan is apparently ready for take-off.

37. Former NBA superstar, Michael Jordan,

38. is on his way back to the NBA.

39. President Bush is going to get an ear full from

40. Republican members of Congress when he hosts

41. the annual congressional barbecue tonight at the White House.

42. The President visits a school today to tout his education proposals before

43. heading back to Washington.

44. Barbara Bush travels to Capitol Hill...

45. I woke up at 6:00 to the ringing of a phone,

46. the meeting that I was supposed to attend was moved from The Marriott,

47. mid-town, to The Marriott at World Trade.

48. Watch your step please.

49. Thank you. Good morning. Good morning.

50. Morning. Thank you.

51. Watch your step, please.

52. This meeting was very important

53. and I shared a lot of the details with Ruth,

54. my sister and she said,

55. "Ron, you know, stand out."

56. And I said,

57. "Look I have a new suit and a nice,

58. bright yellow tie."

59. And Ruth thought that was perfect for

60. this, this meeting.

61. And taking the ferry across in the morning,

62. walking through where the boats are,

63. there was a man with a glass of champagne, you know,

64. cheering people and he passed a comment

65. that I had a good suit on.

66. You know he said, "That's a good suit."

67. So I felt very confident that things looked good,

68. not a cloud in the sky.

69. Let's get this meeting over with.

70. I worked at the hotel that was between the two towers and

71. I was a production chef.

72. The Greenhouse Restaurant at the back of

73. the hotel was all glass,

74. so when you'd look up you had the two towers

75. going up and when you looked out

76. you had the courtyard.

77. And the first time I saw 'em I was going in for an interview.

78. It was like love at first sight.

79. They're massive.

80. And they go literally into the sky.

81. And I remember thinking to myself,

82. "This is where I wanna be."

83. At all.

84. Two alpha.

85. Please notify caught at the response, 10-4

86. I was a Battalion Chief in the First Battalion.

87. And my responsibility was for the tip of Manhattan.

88. I'm the first one in my family to be a firefighter.

89. My, my father was a letter carrier in the Post Office and

90. after I became a firefighter,

91. uh, a number of years later my,

92. my brother joined the Fire Department too.

93. Kevin was three, three years younger than me so there was always this looking

94. up to the older brother.

95. You, you know sibling um, I'm following in your footsteps and uh,

96. and every now and then I'll, I'll do you.

97. Battalion Chief was just a great rank.

98. It allowed me to step back a little bit and yet at the same time to be connected

99. to our firefighters.

100. S-5 Fox, it's pretty full.

101. I don't think it goes into.

102. These babies are all locked up.

103. We have the start forcing things.

104. And that morning I had 20 years and six days in the Fire Department.

105. In other words I could've retired six days earlier cause I had my 20 years in,

106. but I was enjoying being in the Fire Department so much

107. that I didn't even think about retiring.

108. All there was, was just a connection, a bunch of connections.

109. Alright.

110. And then we get a call for a gas leak on the corner of

111. Church Street and Lisbernard.

112. Two alpha, two alpha.

113. The gas leak's right here, right along side this.

114. The case line's, looks like a six inch gas main.

115. That day I was working as the aide to Chief Pfeifer.

116. And that was a position that I had only done,

117. like, once or twice.

118. John, we have uh,

119. several manhole covers that have blown.

120. Being a Battalion Aide is a very important job,

121. but I was always the truck guy.

122. I loved being in the truck cause you get to break down doors,

123. break windows.

124. It was like being a big kid.

125. Listen, we were never looking forward to people's houses burning down,

126. that wasn't it.

127. But you did look forward to going to fires,

128. you know, it was your job, it's what you were paid to do.

129. And, and, the, the feeling you got was very intense

130. and while it was going on,

131. definitely, I've been in a lot of scary situations.

132. But when it was done, you couldn't wait for the next one.

133. They wanna know who's been stabbed, who,

134. and I don't know but Karen said he got stabbed.

135. Can anybody get up to the cockpit?

136. Can anybody get up to the cockpit?

137. When I got to The Marriott I was early.

138. I mounted the steps that led up to the hotel.

139. People were generally just fussing about, walking about and uh,

140. just preparing for their day.

141. First thing I wanted to do was go to the bathroom,

142. check my hair, check my tie,

143. make sure I looked good for this meeting.

144. So when I came back out, I still had time to spare.

145. I walked around the lobby of the World Trade Center.

146. Always in awe of the tree of life windows.

147. And then I walked back and sat down in the hotel lobby.

148. I go into work,

149. it was already open for breakfast.

150. A very, great busy day cause we had, like, two parties that day.

151. Hey, we got pepper mill, please?

152. So I cooked all the pasta and the sauces for the banquet parties

153. and I was stacking it.

154. I'm in the walk-in refrigerator, doors close.

155. I guess it's like, like a sealant.

156. Like, you really can't hear what's going on outside.

157. There could be people right outside the refrigerator talking,

158. I can't hear a thing.

159. Gas leak right here.

160. Holy shit!

161. Holy shit!

162. Go to World Trade Center.

163. The World Trade Center, tower number one is on fire.

164. All around the side of the building there was just a huge explosion.

165. That's something big,

166. it looks like an American Airline.

167. That looked like a direct attack.

168. Looked like what?

169. World trade center for two 60.

170. Send every available ambulance,

171. everything you've got to the World Trade Center, now.

172. Oh, my God!

173. We have a number of floors on fire,

174. it looked like the plane was beaming towards the building.

175. Transmit a third alarm, gonna have the staging area.

176. Right.

177. West Street.

178. I have the third alarm side of me, it's that area,

179. second alongside to the left of the building.

180. I remember sitting in the car with sirens blaring,

181. air-horns from the engines and the trucks

182. and lights on.

183. I remember saying to myself,

184. "Let me slow down my thinking."

185. Realizing I was going to the largest fire of

186. my life and initially I was gonna be in command.

187. As we pull onto the West Side highway and I look up it,

188. it was overwhelming.

189. That went clear through the fucking building.

190. I could see that the whole,

191. the, the plane went directly through the building and I see

192. that there's gaping holes in tower one.

193. So the, the ride seemed like an eternity, you know.

194. My mind was racing.

195. It was an extremely frightening feeling.

196. It, it really was.

197. We pulled up right in front of the North Tower

198. and there was a lot of broken glass.

199. Did you get that notice there?

200. No. Just hold that door.

201. I got out of the car,

202. I put on my gear and I walked into the lobby.

203. And as I walked in I saw two people to my right, badly burnt.

204. The plane hit the top of the building, looked like 78th floor.

205. My instinct was to help them but I knew that wasn't my job.

206. My job was to take command and I knew we had firefighters who would come in and

207. take care of that.

208. As we walked in we found out that all the jet fuel went down the

209. elevator shafts and blew out the whole lobby.

210. So anybody standing in the path of that blast was dead.

211. You know, I, maybe 20, 30 people I just seen, you know,

212. basically burnt to death on the floor.

213. It was pretty horrific.

214. Yeah.

215. Scott?

216. Look at it, straight into the building.

217. Oh, my God!

218. I, I don't know. There were two explosions.

219. I saw a plane in there.

220. A plane and two explosions.

221. Both at once.

222. I don't know how he could fly so damn low, man.

223. I don't know, I don't want that to be a suicide plane.

224. People were running around

225. and I could start to smell kerosene

226. from the hotel lobby.

227. So I walked over to the revolving doors and I looked out.

228. I couldn't figure out what was happening.

229. And I saw this woman coming through the haze with her hands out.

230. And I, I just couldn't figure out for the life of me,

231. like, what was wrong with her.

232. And as I went closer to her

233. and as she walked to me I could see that she was badly

234. burnt and I could see that she was still smoldering.

235. So I, I brought her into the lobby and I sat her down by the wall.

236. She said she couldn't see and uh,

237. that there was a ball of flame and her eyes were burnt,

238. like pretty much burnt shut.

239. So after, after a minute or two um,

240. after I could get her calmed down a little bit

241. I asked her her name.

242. She said her name was Jennieann Maffeo and she said she was on her way to work.

243. And then she said,

244. "Holy Jesus, Mother of God, don't let me die."

245. She said, "Help me. Don't let me die. Help me."

246. Chief!

247. We haven't found an elevator yet.

248. You don't have an elevator yet?

249. Did you get that?

250. Any of the elevators working?

251. We haven't found one that's working.

252. Captain Tardio came back to me and said he couldn't

253. find an elevator that was working.

254. So that meant we had firefighters who had to climb

255. and to the top would be 110 stories.

256. Elevators, we got none.

257. Where are you going? Nothing running.

258. No.

259. Find out, see if you can get freight,

260. anything going up.

261. Use something.

262. Jimmy! Jimmy!

263. And as firefighters came in they came in quietly.

264. There was noise from the equipment we carry,

265. but they didn't say a lot.

266. They were thinking about what lied ahead.

267. And they thought about how they would handle it

268. and I can remember one lieutenant

269. coming up to me uh, lieutenant from engine 33,

270. not saying a word and we looked at each other

271. wondering if each of us was gonna be okay.

272. And then I told that lieutenant,

273. as I told many other officers that came in.

274. I said, "Take your firefighters,

275. go upstairs, as you up evacuate the building

276. and then go up to the 70th floor where you'll regroup so

277. we could rescue those that are trapped."

278. The lieutenant turned around,

279. took his firefighters and as he turned around and

280. started to go upstairs that was the last time I saw my brother, Kevin.

281. We had a long way to go.

282. But when I was 18 I joined the Marine Corps

283. and I remember in Boot Camp, the, run back in my head a

284. jingle that we used to, to say when we were marching.

285. "One, two, three, four, I love the Marine Corps."

286. And that's what I, that popped in my head when I was climbing the stairs,

287. that old jingle from the Marine Corps in Boot Camp.

288. It, it just came right back.

289. It was amazing cause I hadn't thought about that, in like...

290. In over thirty years and then it just all came back to me and it,

291. and it helped me get through.

292. It helped me climb those stairs.

293. The stairways are relatively narrow

294. but everybody handled themselves very well.

295. Nobody panicked.

296. People were thanking us, "thanks for doing a great job".

297. And I just said to the guys,

298. "This is gonna be a tough day.

299. But we're gonna get through it."

300. A fucking plane's hit the World Trade Center.

301. Something happened at the World Trade Center and it's not good.

302. Mike and I are here, yeah, we're both standing here,

303. we're looking right at it.

304. It's unfucking believable.

305. So, you trying to call?

306. Mike, Mike, there's three floors down.

307. Hey, hey. See it falling.

308. Right, I love you, bye.

309. I uh, we uh, I got somebody up here we're fine.

310. Right, bye.

311. Mike, let's go check it out, come on.

312. This stuff is gonna fall, let's get out of here.

313. Mike, you're gonna get killed.

314. Mike, you're gonna get killed!

315. Mike! Mike!

316. Traveling on the ground in the area of

317. the World Trade Center and he heard an explosion and...

318. As we look at live pictures of the World Trade Center.

319. An airplane crashing into the side of the World Trade Center.

320. This happening, as far as I can tell...

321. It's a plane, it's crashed into it.

322. A plane crashed into it? I wonder who did that?

323. I'm in the walk-in refrigerator for a good 15 minutes.

324. The door's closed

325. and when I come out of the refrigerator

326. there's nobody there.

327. There's no kitchen staff,

328. there's no waiters, there's just nobody there

329. and I'm like, "Where's everybody at?"

330. You know, "Where's everybody at?"

331. I look at into the chef's office and I notice the ceiling is cracked,

332. there's a crack in the wall,

333. there's a little bit of water coming down and then a guest

334. comes in from the restaurant and I go to tell him, like,

335. "You can't be here."

336. You know, "You gotta go back out."

337. But I already notice he had a crazed look in his eye.

338. And then he's like, "Just go and look.

339. Just go look."

340. As I'm pushing the door open there's something caught in the door.

341. But I'm looking at it thinking, it's like a dead animal.

342. So I'm like, "What is this?"

343. You know, "What is this dead animal doing here?"

344. And I look closely and it's an arm.

345. And then I get ready to go back in and he said,

346. "No, no, no, no. Go outside and look."

347. As I look around the courtyard there's nobody there.

348. And I saw burning pieces of metal everywhere.

349. I saw pieces of luggage.

350. I had no idea where they came from.

351. I look around the corner,

352. and there's, there's,

353. there's bodies everywhere.

354. As, as far as I can see.

355. It's like just broken up bodies,

356. like that's all I can see.

357. Maybe 100 bodies broken up into little pieces.

358. Just arms and legs and heads and everything and like um, so like right away

359. I'm freaking out.

360. And then um, some,

361. a body comes falling out of the sky and lands right in front of me.

362. Just boom!

363. Like loud and just like breaks up when it hits the ground and then,

364. like a friend of mine,

365. Abdul, like I don't even know where he came from.

366. He's like, "Did you see that Kevin?

367. Did you see that?"

368. And it's like, "Yeah, I saw that."

369. So now we're trying to figure out how to get out.

370. He was saying, and probably correctly so,

371. "Never get on the elevator."

372. And I remember thinking to myself,

373. "It's only two stories,

374. I would be downstairs before you know it."

375. And I remember pressing a button thinking to myself,

376. "If the door opens up I'm getting on it."

377. I pressed the button, the door opens up.

378. I look at it.

379. "Abdul" I says, "Come on, you coming, you coming."

380. And he says "No."

381. And he goes the other way and I get on the elevator and he never made it out.

382. You're listening to live continuous coverage of a

383. plane crash into the

384. World Trade Center this morning.

385. This is 1010 Wins New York, I'm James Faraday.

386. For more on the story, 1010 Wins News man, Lee Harris.

387. Good morning and it is not a good morning in

388. New York City.

389. A major disaster.

390. A plane crash into the World Trade Center.

391. We're on the line with 1010 Wins account executive, John Fleisher,

392. a witness to terrible unfolding scene.

393. John could you maybe just recap for those just joining us on what happened and.

394. When I was on the floor with Jennieann

395. I held her hand and I yelled,

396. you know, numerous times for EMS,

397. for Emergency Services, for help.

398. Nobody was coming.

399. People were just running by,

400. one after another, and, and I, I got concerned.

401. So I ran into the bathroom,

402. pulled a clean plastic bag and I filled it with water

403. and patted Jennieann down with it.

404. And I could see that Jennieann's clothes were fused into her skin.

405. And...

406. when we were on the floor

407. and when there was no emergency services,

408. help or aid coming,

409. um, Jennieann was getting more and more concerned that she was going to die.

410. She said, "Sacred heart of Jesus, save me.

411. I don't want to die."

412. And I said, 'Are you Catholic?'

413. She said she was.

414. So I said to her, 'Let's say the Lord's Prayer.'

415. Our Father, who art in heaven,

416. hallowed be thy name.

417. Thy kingdom come.

418. Thy will be done on Earth as it is in heaven.

419. Give us this day our daily bread,

420. and forgive us our trespasses

421. as we forgive those who trespass against us.

422. And lead us not into temptation,

423. but deliver us from evil.

424. Wednesday's time, 9:02.

425. We have been talking to John Fleischer,

426. account executive at 1010.

427. Right now, we're gonna switch over to Kye Kendall.

428. He saw the whole thing transpire.

429. From his vantage point on 14th Street, and, again,

430. we're talking about a plane crash into the

431. World Trade Center.

432. Kye, what did you see and what can you see now?

433. Well, I saw the plane come from overhead...

434. Oh, no, no no!

435. A woman from the other building.

436. Please don't go over there!

437. What did he say?

438. Let's go, let's get the fuck outta here!

439. Get the fuck outta here.

440. Oh, look at those people!

441. Look!

442. Oh, no stopping.

443. God damn!

444. And what you are seeing is both towers of

445. the World Trade Center on fire.

446. A second plane the size of a passenger jet flying into the second tower of

447. the World Trade Center.

448. And this is a horrible tragedy unfolding in New York City on this,

449. well, I wanna say bright, sunny morning.

450. Joan, obviously the situation has been growing

451. worse as you've been watching it.

452. How much worse does it appear to be than initially?

453. Stay together.

454. Alright.

455. Stay together. Let us know what's going on.

456. A second plane just hit motherfuckers...

457. The other tower, the other tower.

458. We knew at that moment that our problem just doubled in size.

459. So, at that point we met in a football huddle.

460. And the Deputy Chief of the Division,

461. Chief Pete Hayden, gave us an order.

462. Half of us would stay in the North Tower,

463. the other half will proceed to the South Tower.

464. Pete, want me to head up this operation?

465. Then it was my turn.

466. It's my turn to go stand in front of Chief Hayden.

467. Our orders were to go upstairs in the North Tower for

468. search and rescue.

469. And one of the firemen from Rescue One looked up.

470. He said, "We may not live through today."

471. And we stopped, and we thought about what he said.

472. I said, 'You're right. We may not.'

473. And we stopped and we took the time to shake each other's hands and

474. wish each other good luck,

475. and, "It's great knowing you."

476. And, "Hope I see you later."

477. Out of all those guys I was surrounded by,

478. I'm the only one that's alive. They all died.

479. So, I walked over to where my guys were standing by,

480. the guys from ladder 6.

481. And I say to 'em,

482. 'It's alright, guys. Here's the deal.

483. It's a raw deal, but this is what we have to do.'

484. 'We have to go upstairs for search and rescue in this building.'

485. And the last thing I told 'em was,

486. 'They're trying to kill us, boys.

487. Let's go.'

488. Is this guy hooked up?

489. Yeah.

490. Command Post to battalion seven.

491. Command Post to battalion seven.

492. The repeater radio system got

493. knocked out when the first plane hit.

494. So, Chief Pfeifer's having a horrible time trying to get in touch with anybody

495. on the upper floors.

496. Not gonna not use your radio, turn, there's a little knob.

497. Turn it and just remove the radio.

498. I'm gonna take it off a second.

499. And that's when he sent me back out to see

500. if I could grab the repeater radios.

501. When I stepped outta the building,

502. it was absolute chaos at this time.

503. People trying to go out, firemen trying to come in.

504. And I look up,

505. and there were hundreds of people...

506. hanging on to the building.

507. That's one of the things that sticks with me every day.

508. Where? It's possible there is.

509. Look, look, look, another man.

510. Oh, God Almighty!

511. Oh, God Almighty! Oh, God! Jesus!

512. I can't imagine...

513. being in those people's shoes, having to make

514. the choice of either burning to death or,

515. I mean, jumping, and knowing you're dying.

516. Horrible.

517. That's absolutely horrible.

518. Poor people.

519. Oh my God! Oh!

520. When we heard the crashing sound,

521. it was something that we never heard before.

522. We're gonna cancel out.

523. Get the repeater on.

524. Put your radio to Channel Two.

525. Ooh, but we knew exactly what it was,

526. every time it happened.

527. Another life being lost.

528. And it would rattle us for a couple seconds.

529. But it was almost motivating us to push even

530. further to get to the people that were trapped.

531. And I grabbed the PA system and made an announcement,

532. to "Wait, if you can. We're coming."

533. I may just come over to the Hudson,

534. the Hudson River K.

535. at the Hudson River.

536. Understood.

537. Standby on 106th floor, this floor is crumbling.

538. People are trapped at that location.

539. In 1993, we were able to rescue people off the roof, so,

540. having experienced this somewhat before,

541. we kinda thought that was gonna be the

542. same game plan.

543. And I had so much confidence in the skill of this pilot

544. flying this helicopter,

545. that I was, like, 'If there's somebody there,

546. we're gonna be able to get them off.'

547. But as we're approaching, you could start to see the size and

548. scope of this.

549. Just standby. Just standby one, we get...

550. The first thing we did was survey the rooftops of both the

551. North and the South Tower.

552. Command Post on here?

553. Command Post?

554. The South Tower,

555. the amount of smoke that was billowing up and coming over the roof,

556. just it was outta play.

557. People are hanging from the windows

558. about 5 feet from the top.

559. There's at least 50 people hanging on.

560. We proceeded over to the North Tower,

561. and there was an opening by the northwest corner.

562. We're taking a look at the

563. northwest corner of the north building.

564. I could make out the little pebbles on the roof.

565. I could see the individual pebbles, that's how close we were.

566. They're all hanging on the side of the building

567. on the Church Street side.

568. We continued circling the towers.

569. If we coulda saw somebody there, we woulda made a try,

570. but there was nobody up there.

571. My heart just sunk into my stomach,

572. and I'm looking out the window of the helicopter,

573. and I'm seeing people.

574. I'm seeing mothers, I'm seeing fathers,

575. I'm seeing brothers, I'm seeing sisters,

576. literally standing on the damaged portion of the building,

577. what looked like white napkins, handkerchiefs, tablecloths,

578. and they were waving them to let us know we need to assist them.

579. "We need assistance. Can you help us?"

580. And there were so many, and...

581. there's nothing you can do,

582. but you're witnessing it, you're watching it.

583. And I was reading those facial expressions and those look in the eyes.

584. And I'm sure they were looking back at us

585. and they maybe were reading our facial expressions that it was bad.

586. It was very bad.

587. There was nothing he could do for us.

588. I think we actually waved to him and that was it,

589. and then they flew away.

590. So, I told everybody to call their families.

591. I called John, my fiancé.

592. My voice shook.

593. And John, asked me what was going on, and I said,

594. 'John, we're on the 89th floor.

595. We're trapped here.

596. The door to the stairwell is jammed shut and we can't get out,

597. and I don't know when it'll get fixed.

598. I don't know what will happen.

599. But we are trapped on the 89th floor.'

600. I think at that time,

601. when we were making our phone calls,

602. there were probably a lot of people throughout the

603. World Trade Center making similar phone calls,

604. calling friends, family, loved ones,

605. and communicating probably

606. fear, anxiety and love.

607. I think all of those emotions were just running rampant throughout everybody.

608. The FBI is looking at reports that

609. there was a plane hijacking before the crashes,

610. and while we don't have any reports of casualties at this time,

611. looking at the scene,

612. the gaping holes in both towers,

613. the smoke and the flames,

614. it is reasonable to assume that there has been massive loss of life in

615. New York City this morning.

616. And this makes the World Trade Center bombing of about nine years ago look

617. like a relatively minor incident.

618. After the second plane hit,

619. a rumble came through the lobby.

620. I can remember standing up in shock wondering,

621. 'What the hell is that?'

622. I knelt down beside Jennieann again,

623. and I said to her, you know,

624. 'We should try and get outta here if we can.'

625. And, around the same time, pieces of ceiling were falling,

626. and the vapor was getting thicker.

627. You know, you could see a haze,

628. a grey haze with the kerosene smell was developing more,

629. and people were just panicking and running.

630. And somebody said help was on the way, but we had to walk for the help.

631. The help was on the opposite side of the highway.

632. And as I entered the street,

633. um, a fireman approached me,

634. with a white helmet.

635. I always remember him.

636. And he just said,

637. "Jesus, he said,

638. "For fuck's sake get outta here as fast you can.

639. Run!"

640. And so I asked Jennieann if she could run,

641. and she said she could,

642. and so our group ran across the West Side Highway.

643. Give the locations that saw the second plane,

644. that I guess is a vantage point issue...

645. While they were packing Jennieann into the ambulance,

646. I leaned over and said to her,

647. 'You're gonna make it.

648. You gotta make it now.'

649. As you see is down on Broadway.

650. Randy, what is your vantage point?

651. What can you see from there?

652. We are at 52 Broadway on the 17th floor.

653. As I look out, I see smoke pouring out of the...

654. All I knew was I'd been through something horrific,

655. and all I wanted to do was just go home,

656. have a shower, go back to life.

657. And it was probably 20 minutes when the phone rang,

658. and it was my sister's husband, David.

659. David McCourt.

660. David asked me if I knew here Ruth was.

661. Ruth was a little bit over a year-and-a-half younger than me.

662. We were very close.

663. Juliana was Ruth's daughter,

664. the most loveliest child you could imagine.

665. And David caught me by surprise.

666. I'm, like, 'David, like, why don't you know where she is?'

667. Watch the second plane hit the building,

668. we'll watch it enter on the right portion of the...

669. And he said,

670. "Ron, they were going to California.

671. They were on the plane that left Boston,

672. United 175."

673. I think I got down on my knees and I cried,

674. and I couldn't believe, like, that, you know?

675. I was literally saying the Lord's Prayer with this woman

676. on the ground of the World Trade Center,

677. you know, when my sister's plane hit.

678. One of the most special people were killed.

679. This was my world, never to be the same again.

680. The smoke was so thick,

681. it was hard to see.

682. But I was trying not to think too much about the fear.

683. So, I would go out and check the door,

684. and it was always jammed.

685. And then the one time I did go out,

686. there was a sudden pounding on the door.

687. And I saw these two white hands coming through.

688. And then the door opened, and the smoke went out,

689. and there were two men standing there in helmets,

690. with flashlights and an axe.

691. They had come to rescue us.

692. They told us to get out, go downstairs and run.

693. And they went up to rescue more people,

694. and I also learned that they did not survive.

695. They were such good, brave souls.

696. I do call them "angels,"

697. because I think that they were,

698. and they were doing everything they could

699. that day to make sure that people got out of the tower,

700. and, as I said, they went up when they should have gone down to save themselves,

701. but they didn't.

702. They went up, and put themselves back in harm's way,

703. just to save other people,

704. so I do think they were angels.

705. They were true heroes.

706. Every firefighter and every first responder

707. knew this was dangerous.

708. They saw the smoke

709. and the flames coming from the top of the building,

710. but they also knew that people were in their greatest moment of need.

711. And they made a personal decision

712. to go into the building to rescue lives.

713. But in the lobby of the North Tower,

714. we had our Fire Department Chaplain,

715. Father Mychal Judge, and I could see his lips moving.

716. Because he was praying.

717. It was almost like there's something bad about to happen.

718. You, two. And two and two, one.

719. This is as close as we can get to the base of the World Trade Center.

720. You can see the firemen assembled here,

721. the police officers, FBI Agents,

722. and you can see the two towers.

723. A huge explosion now raining debris on all of us.

724. Every cell in my body said,

725. "Get out of here."

726. And he's telling me to cut his leg off.

727. Put it over your face. Oh my God!

728. Nobody is coming to save us.

729. We have to get out of this building on our own.

730. There is still one more aircraft somewhere that is...

731. I took the phone and I heard Mark's voice.

732. He said, "Mom, I just wanna tell you I love you.

733. There are three guys on board who've taken over the plane,

734. and they say they have a bomb.

735. You believe me don't you, Mom?"

736. He was on the radio,

737. he was talking to me, and he said,

738. "I'm coming for you, brother. I'm coming for you."

739. Captioned by Cotter Media Group