9/11: One Day in America 1x5

1. I was never so proud to be a fireman as I was that day.

2. Our orders were to go upstairs in the North Tower

3. for a search and rescue.

4. So, we were going to pull as many people out as we could,

5. that's what we were gonna do.

6. And we got to the 27th floor when we felt and experienced

7. something that nobody had ever felt or experienced before.

8. We heard a loud noise outside, our building shook violently,

9. so violent that you had a hard time standing up,

10. you know, it was like you were on a ship at sea;

11. the South Tower had collapsed.

12. And, in my mind,

13. this was the scariest part of the day for me.

14. I knew prior to this day a high rise building had never

15. collapsed after a fire, and now the sister building

16. to the one I was in,

17. that got hit after my building, was down.

18. I did the quick calculations in my mind and I says,

19. "Alright, if that one can go, this one can go,

20. it's time for us to get outta here."

21. So, we start our retreat down the B stairway of the North Tower.

22. We got to around the 20th floor and there was a woman

23. standing in a doorway, she was crying,

24. and my guy stopped and Tommy Falco,

25. one of my firemen, turns around and looks at me,

26. he says, "Hey Captain, what'd you wanna do with her?"

27. And she literally couldn't walk anymore,

28. she'd made it down from the 70s,

29. I think the 73rd floor.

30. We didn't know it at the time,

31. she was one week shy of her 60th birthday,

32. so we continued our evacuation

33. with Josephine Harris in tow.

34. We were carrying her down the stairs, slowly.

35. We were going so slowly that a couple of times we had to step

36. aside because we created a log-jam of people behind us,

37. so we had to let them pass.

38. And made it to the tenth floor,

39. I'm thinking, "Wow, we might actually get outta here."

40. And then Josephine Harris fell to the floor on the fourth floor.

41. And she starts yelling at us to leave her.

42. And the collapse of the North Tower starts

43. with us still inside.

44. Let's get in here!

45. Get away from the glass.

46. Oh, my shit is out there.

47. My shit is out there.

48. You wanna die? Don't worry about it.

49. The whole building.

50. Watch the debris come down the street.

51. Don't open the door, please.

52. Get away from the windows.

53. Oh, my God.

54. Oh, my God.

55. Oh, my God!

56. You're right, Oh, my God, you saved my life!

57. You saved my life!

58. Thank you! Thank you!

59. Thank you. Thank you.

60. Thank you, thank you!

61. Oh, my God! Thank you.

62. Thank you. Thank you.

63. I remember looking up into the dust.

64. And I remember thinking to myself I'm the last person

65. left on the planet.

66. I don't hear anybody.

67. I don't see anybody.

68. I am completely alone.

69. I am this huge feeling of being empty.

70. As I'm looking around there's cars that are destroyed.

71. There was an ambulance on fire.

72. I really thought this was it, this was the end,

73. this was the end of the world, this was the Armageddon.

74. So I remember grabbing a hose line that was laying on

75. the floor and I actually put out the fire in the ambulance.

76. And the dust started to lift.

77. I, I couldn't believe what I was actually seeing.

78. Both buildings were gone.

79. And now it's just seven story pile of debris and garbage

80. and there were people in there.

81. And I'm thinking to myself there's no way that we're

82. gonna find people that survived this collapse.

83. The collapse started from the top down.

84. And every time a floor would hit another floor,

85. collapsing what we call, pancake fashion,

86. it would create a loud noise, a loud boom,

87. so it was boom, boom, boom, boom.

88. And every time a floor would hit another floor there'd be

89. a tremendous vibration in the building.

90. Whatever air was in the stairway was being compressed

91. and it was filled with debris, so we were getting pummeled

92. with debris as we were covering up and, uh,

93. we just waited for that big beam or that big piece of concrete

94. to come and get us.

95. And then the collapsed stopped and it didn't come.

96. And, uh, so I gave a shout out, I said,

97. "Who's still here? Who do I hear?

98. Who do I have?"

99. Turns out all my guys from Ladder 6,

100. Tommy Falco, Sal D'Agostino,

101. Billy Butler and Mike Meldrom,

102. we had Mickey Kross, who was a Lieutenant in Engine 16.

103. I think it took about eight seconds for

104. the building to come down.

105. It was a tremendous noise and tremendous raw,

106. tremendous vibrating and, uh...

107. within a few seconds, it was over

108. and it went to total, absolute silence.

109. No more shaking, absolutely no noise.

110. Having no experience being dead,

111. you don't know what it's like, so I thought I could possibly

112. be dead "cause I couldn't feel,

113. I couldn't feel my body, I couldn't feel anything.

114. And after a few seconds I heard talking so,

115. I yelled out and we all got together.

116. It was between the third, I think,

117. between the third and fourth floors was still in tact.

118. We were in a void.

119. You know, it was the fact that Josephine stopped there,

120. you know, there weren't many voids in that building,

121. and we found a void because even if you made it to

122. the ground floor, you didn't make it.

123. If you made it just outside the building,

124. you didn't make it.

125. We looked around for a way out.

126. A couple of guys had tools and they were forcing what was

127. left of the stairway door,

128. and they opened it and it was just

129. a wall of debris so, we realized there wasn't

130. a thing we could do.

131. We're not getting outta this.

132. There's no up, down, to the side, no way to it.

133. The only way we're gonna get out if somebody comes and gets us.

134. We're gonna regroup on Murray Street.

135. Does anybody have Al Tori with them?

136. Jesus Christ.

137. Right after the collapse,

138. miraculously we regrouped with everybody in the company.

139. We realized that we possibly could be, like,

140. one of the last companies that kinda made it outta that area.

141. Your gonna upload it?

142. Yeah.

143. Here, take a white rag. You need a white rag?

144. And before it collapsed,

145. we were coming down

146. the B stairwell in the North Tower,

147. and I remember speaking to Captain Jonas,

148. who was Captain of Six Truck.

149. So then it was, "Well, where is Six Truck?"

150. They were at least three to four floors above us.

151. 247, 246.

152. Where are the guys?

153. I have no idea.

154. So, we were like,

155. "Oh, man, gotta try to get back in there and try to find them.

156. You know where he is?

157. And then we went to go make our way back in.

158. But, that area that we just came from wasn't there anymore.

159. I'm on channel one.

160. Everything was, like, completely destroyed.

161. It tore a part of my heart out,

162. like, you just feel like you got ripped on the insides.

163. And you have this feeling of helplessness

164. because you don't know...

165. where to start.

166. Live continuing coverage here on 1010 Wins,

167. the horrible tragedy of the World Trade Center.

168. How off it looked to see those two twin towers,

169. so much a part of our landscape, disappear.

170. But then now to keep in mind there were people inside those

171. buildings and many did not get out.

172. When you have something like this you think,

173. "Well, death toll and casualties,

174. that's something we simply don't know because in many

175. respects the rescue effort is really just getting started.

176. 1010 Wins report that...

177. We were planning for the worst,

178. planning for a long entrapment,

179. maybe a couple of days, try to conserve our radio batteries,

180. our flashlight batteries.

181. I didn't want my guys to use their air masks

182. but during that time,

183. received a mayday from Mark Warcola

184. the Lieutenant from Ladder Five

185. that we had seen on the way down,

186. and he said he was in the...

187. the B stairway on the 12th floor

188. he was trapped and he was hurt bad.

189. So Sal D'Agostino turned around and looked at me,

190. he says, "Hey Cap, did you get that?"

191. I said, "Yeah, I got it."

192. And I started climbing the B stairway.

193. And the stairways there is filled with rubble,

194. it was like a real bad vacant building stairway but it was there.

195. So, I could climb up the banister

196. and maneuver my way around.

197. And then a second mayday came in when I was on

198. the fifth floor for him.

199. And again, I'm trying to maneuver my way around.

200. And I got to the half landing between the fifth

201. and the sixth floor and I couldn't move the debris anymore;

202. it was too heavy.

203. And he gave a third mayday which was more distraught

204. and I just said, "Sorry, Mike, I can't help you."

205. It was terrible.

206. Here's somebody we know and he's calling for our help

207. and we can't help him.

208. You know, we couldn't get to him.

209. And then we didn't hear from him anymore.

210. Yeah, finally I transmitted my own mayday.

211. Go on with the mayday, go ahead.

212. Okay, 10-4.

213. When we kinda all heard them on the radio,

214. I remember myself, personally, I kinda just dropped down onto

215. one knee and kissed the metal that was around my neck.

216. It was a feeling of elation that,

217. "Okay, there's a chance here."

218. I started getting radio transmissions from other guys

219. that I knew, some of them were some of my best friends.

220. A very close friend of mine was Nick Visconti.

221. And he got put in charge

222. of the rescue effort to find us

223. and I talked to him on the radio and, uh...

224. it was great hearing his voice.

225. Ladder 6.

226. Tower one.

227. Stairwell B. There's also a wounded civilian

228. and chief on the first floor.

229. It's the love of your fellow firemen

230. coming to save you.

231. I thought to myself, you know, there's gotta be people

232. who are much worse off than I am.

233. I'm not worthy of this.

234. But I had this army of firefighters coming to find me.

235. And it was humbling.

236. Take any gear we can carry,

237. especially First Aid stuff.

238. Then I heard from my neighbor, Cliff Staffner,

239. "Rescue Three to Ladder Six, Captain J. Jonas,

240. this is Cliff, I'm coming to get ya, where are ya?"

241. And I tell him.

242. And he would end every transmission by saying,

243. "I'm coming for ya, brother, I'm coming for ya."

244. We're coming for ya, brother,

245. we're coming for ya.

246. Liberty, we have your command post.

247. Go ahead.

248. This is still very much an active scene right now.

249. I've seen dozens upon dozens of firefighters getting to the

250. World Trade Center area.

251. They're trying to get together and go back in there

252. and try to take care of the people who obviously are in serious trouble.

253. There's no other way to describe it.

254. Did you already go in?

255. What? Did you go in?

256. I was there, yeah.

257. Are you going back?

258. It's my job.

259. New York City firefighters have this special bond.

260. This level of being, of belonging.

261. We become a second family.

262. No matter what happens, if you feel threatened,

263. if you feel afraid in a fire, these guys will tear down

264. the building to get to you.

265. They will do everything in their power to get to you.

266. We don't leave a brother behind.

267. Oh, my God, I've never seen anything like this

268. in my entire life.

269. There's debris for miles, blocks.

270. There could be people under there,

271. but again, this was a plaza...

272. We were gonna try to advance into this debris field

273. trying to locate Ladder Six.

274. It's the top of the building.

275. And when we got there it was just...

276. there was, there was no way to get through it,

277. it was just solid concrete, rebar and steel.

278. On top of that, while we were in there,

279. stuff was starting to collapse again.

280. Come back! Come back.

281. Get everybody out.

282. You know, these piles were unstable and as

283. you're going into them now, they're still starting to like,

284. have secondary and third collapses on these piles.

285. It was almost like standing in the ocean.

286. Initially, we were really optimistic.

287. But now we had this greater sense of how are we gonna find them?

288. Everybody was scared because we could hear fires

289. crackling outside.

290. And at one point...

291. there was an explosion nearby,

292. and um, it shook the stairway

293. and it caused some debris to fall

294. and it was striking us.

295. And, uh...

296. Josephine, you know, started crying out that

297. she was scared.

298. And I said, "Yeah, we're all a little scared,

299. darling, hang in there."

300. But when that happened,

301. Um...

302. Mike Meldrom, my senior guy, my chauffeur,

303. he rolled his body on top of hers

304. so she wasn't being hit by any debris.

305. And Sal D'Agostino took his coat off and put it around her.

306. And they told her "Nothing's going to happen to you.

307. As long as we're here, nothing's going to happen to you."

308. And they took turns talking to her,

309. trying to keep her mind off what was an impossible situation for us,

310. it's definitely an impossible situation for her.

311. Without orders from me, they did it on their own,

312. they took care of this woman.

313. The situation was getting really bad.

314. And then after about three, maybe two and a half to three hours,

315. I'm not sure, I started,

316. I was looking up and I saw like a flicker of light.

317. And then it went out.

318. And then it flickered up again.

319. And I'm looking and I'm trying to figure out what it is.

320. At first I thought it was an emergency light that was

321. hooked up and flickering on and off.

322. And then in a couple of minutes,

323. the light lit up and I was, it was the sun.

324. And it came in, a beam of sun came in,

325. and it was like something from God.

326. It was like from heaven.

327. You know, that meant an opening above us.

328. What was happening was the smoke and dust

329. was clearing outside.

330. And we got to the point where all of a sudden you could look up

331. and I could see a sliver of blue sky through the rubble.

332. And I looked down and I could see a...

333. a beam of light striking

334. the stairway and I'm like,

335. "Guys, there used to be 106 floors over our heads,

336. now I see blue sky."

337. And I said, "I think we're on top of the World Trade Center."

338. So, you know, we started poking around.

339. You know, with this added light we were able to find

340. an area where we could breach a hole through the rubble.

341. When the dust cleared away,

342. and we knew we had an opening,

343. we had to climb to it, it was 20 feet above us.

344. So, you know, there was all criss-cross,

345. bent up beams inside the area so,

346. those of us who were physically able were able to

347. climb up and get to that opening and actually

348. wiggle our way out.

349. And I poked my head out

350. and I couldn't believe what I was seeing.

351. You know, you see the façade

352. of what's left of the World Trade Center,

353. and there's flame and smoke coming up from everywhere,

354. numbers four, five, six

355. World Trade Center on fire,

356. there's like seven story buildings.

357. Number Seven World Trade Center is a high rise office

358. building and it's on fire.

359. It was very eerie sticking your head out and especially

360. seeing the iconic façade of the World Trade Center,

361. the arches.

362. And there was nothing left of it.

363. We waited until we could see a fireman,

364. we saw a fireman off in the distance,

365. and we were to make contact with them.

366. What's the name of the street that is on?

367. Thank you.

368. And they made their way to the stairway.

369. Got Josephine Harris, Engine 53 and Ladder 43 got her out.

370. They brought the stokes basket stretcher up.

371. It's almost like she took a stand,

372. like on the fourth floor, like,

373. somehow she knew.

374. that we have to be here, this is the spot.

375. One by one I was sending everybody in the stairway out.

376. And one by one I saw every one of my guys climb the rope

377. and that was a very satisfying part of the day for me

378. to see that.

379. It was a wonderful feeling.

380. I don't have to explain that.

381. You think you might die in that hole

382. and then all of a sudden, you're outside

383. and somebody's giving you a sandwich and a soda.

384. It's a pretty nice feeling, right.

385. We were the last people to come out

386. before Tower One fell.

387. We're sending everybody this way, towards the water.

388. And I evacuated with my coworker, Muzua,

389. who to the day, is my hero.

390. We were coming down the stairs

391. and I wanted to stop because I was tired.

392. So, he grabbed my hand and he just pulled me down

393. the rest of the way.

394. And I'm going down like, "Please, please, let me stop."

395. He said, "We can't stop. We have to keep moving."

396. And when I came out and that smoke,

397. or that cloud, that scared the life outta me.

398. It's like a hurricane coming through and it was this air

399. blowing through and I saw people were caught up

400. in the air, just blowing through.

401. Can you tell me what happened?

402. What'd you see?

403. We got to the...

404. All the way to the lobby and all of a sudden,

405. it was this big explosion.

406. Mom, I just want you to know I'm alright.

407. I don't know what else to tell you.

408. We came from the 82nd floor and I don't know where

409. my peers are, I don't know, I hope to God they okay.

410. It was like a comet just hit the earth.

411. Like a comet? Yeah.

412. Look at this. Look at this.

413. Look at your clothes. Look at you.

414. Whatever this stuff is,

415. I hope it doesn't kill ya.

416. Daphne, don't give up now. Daphne.

417. I just cried. I remember crying a lot.

418. I'm just tired. I'm tired.

419. And I remember just being sad. I was sad.

420. I was like, I just couldn't understand, you know,

421. what happened, why it happened.

422. And I remember sitting there and this lady was trying to tell me.

423. Can you even begin to fathom the people who may have died?

424. I dunno.

425. Can you even begin to fathom why?

426. Why it happened?

427. Why a plane hit the building?

428. Why a plane was hijacked and...

429. Excuse me.

430. I hope you understand,

431. that plane might have been hijacked by a terrorist.

432. This didn't happen by chance.

433. Jesus. In America?

434. I don't know what to say.

435. I don't know what to say.

436. All I could think about

437. was all the firefighters...

438. running up the stairs,

439. you know, going to help whoever,

440. you know, was up there.

441. And I remember this young kid running behind them

442. with a fire extinguisher going to help the people,

443. I think it was like a young kid,

444. right outta high school, looked like a little boy.

445. And he, he was going to help.

446. And I remember his face, he was like,

447. "Yeah, I'm going, I'm gonna help some people,

448. I'm gonna help some people."

449. I'm like, "Okay, alright, alright."

450. And when I get downstairs, you know,

451. get out to find out that the building collapsed.

452. And I'm like, this young kid trying to...

453. I consider him a hero.

454. And I'm like, I always ask myself,

455. I wonder if they survived?

456. I wonder if they made it out?

457. That bothered me a lot.

458. Some companies didn't make it out though

459. that were in that original fifth alarm,

460. made it out but a lot of guys didn't.

461. After a while, I realized

462. I needed to contact my family.

463. I remember taking out my cell phone and I'm thinking,

464. "Let me try and call my mom, you know,

465. and people that know me.

466. So I dial the phone and I call my mom and busy, busy, busy.

467. And then all of a sudden the phone picked up and it was my aunt.

468. And she tells me, "Oh, my God, you're okay, you're okay."

469. I go, "Yes, I'm okay, I'm alive, I'm down here,

470. I'm working", I said, "But I survived",

471. I said, "I was in the building, I survived."

472. She goes, "Your mom's here, your mom's here."

473. And I remember my mom getting on the phone and she was

474. panicking and crying and she's like,

475. "Oh, my God, thank God you're alive, thank God."

476. She goes, "Your brother was dispatched,

477. he's somewhere down there."

478. My brother Michael was also a firefighter.

479. So I said, "Okay, I gotta go, Ma.

480. I gotta go, I gotta go find Michael,

481. I gotta go find my brother."

482. And I remember getting on my radio

483. and calling my brother's company.

484. He was in Engine Company 228.

485. And I'm like, "Ladder Ten to Engine 228.

486. Come in Engine 228", a couple of times,

487. "Ladder Ten to Engine 228."

488. No response.

489. Then I go, "John Morabito to Michael Morabito",

490. like now I'm like desperate to find him.

491. And I see my captain, Captain Mallory,

492. he comes walking up to me, he's like,

493. "What's doing? You're okay, right? You made it through?"

494. And I'm like, "Yeah, Cap", I go, "But I'm looking for my brother."

495. He's like, "Alright," he goes, "Let's",

496. he goes, "There's a command center over here, they gotta table",

497. he goes, "They're marking off everybody that's not accounted for."

498. He goes, "Let's go look at the command center."

499. We went over to the command center and I'm looking at

500. the paper that they got and they got all names written on

501. pieces of oak tagging and I'm spotting names of guys that I know.

502. I'm like, "Oh, my God, he's not here."

503. And this was just a list of names of guys that were

504. unaccounted for.

505. And as we go down the list,

506. my brother's name is on the list.

507. And he's like, "Listen, this is just an early list,

508. don't think about it", you know,

509. "Don't worry about it."

510. And I see all the guys in his company,

511. I see their names on that list,

512. I'm like, his whole company is gone, they're gone.

513. I'm like, "I don't even know how I'm gonna go home,

514. how am I gonna go home and face my family?

515. Knowing that my brother, who got on the job after me,

516. kinda followed in my footstep, he's no longer with us because

517. of this situation, how am I gonna do this?"

518. I felt lost.

519. And I remember walking around,

520. and I remember seeing a fire hydrant

521. in the middle of the street and I was so thirsty

522. and I took a little bit of water.

523. And I'm drinking the water and I wash my face and I looked up

524. and my brother...

525. walks right in front of me, like it was meant to be.

526. I'm like, I grab him, I'm like, "Mike! Mike"

527. And he jumps up, he's like, "John",

528. he goes, "How are you alive?" I go, "How are you alive?"

529. He goes, "I was coming out of the tunnel when I saw that

530. debris go, so I turned to my friend and I said,

531. "My brother just died."

532. And it's just like this moment of fate where we were at

533. the same place, at the same time,

534. and we needed to make contact.

535. And we grab each other and I said to him,

536. I said, "That's it, the rest of the day,

537. I'm not gonna lose you again", I go,

538. "We're staying together.

539. We're staying together.

540. We gotta go home together."

541. It was a tremendous relief.

542. We were safe.

543. All you wanna do at this point is get outta here,

544. you just wanna get away from all of this.

545. But we knew we needed to turn around and go back in.

546. There were people who were underneath the debris.

547. And that we couldn't give up on looking for them.

548. I just felt so bad. I just...

549. I felt so guilty for being alive "cause so many was gone.

550. And I thought about those firemen I saw and that little boy,

551. and to this day, I still wonder about that.

552. Did they make it out?

553. They could move, I couldn't.

554. And I figured that they could run,

555. they could get out.

556. But they stayed with me.

557. Hello, how are you?

558. Hello.

559. There was a lot of media attention and the fire department

560. wanted to get our story out because it was one

561. of the few positive stories from September 11th.

562. Did you realize that the other tower had collapsed?

563. No. No, you didn't.

564. I wondered why you were so calm.

565. She trusted us a lot and we protected her.

566. You've been listening to a live news conference on 1010 Wins

567. of Mayor Giuliani and Police Commissioner, Bernard Kerik.

568. Bernard Kerik's saying that there are some people alive

569. in the rubble of the World Trade Center.

570. He's confirming that there are some people alive.

571. Mayor Giuliani confirmed that several people in the rubble

572. have been calling from cell phones to family members

573. including a person who's been calling to family in Seattle.

574. Maybe there is a bit of brightness,

575. there is tomorrow.

576. Captioned by Cotter Media Group.