OK, since no one else has brought it up... Where were you?

[Mrleft8]

I was cutting frames (posts and beams) for a garage addition I was putting on my barn while my wife and her mother were in London for the Murder-in-law's birthday.
I stopped to take a break and signed on to my at that time favorite internet chat room (AOL NAC1), and heard that a plane had flown into the WTC. I assumed it was a sight seeing plane. I turned on the TV and tuned in to ABC. Peter Jennings on air and watched the second plane hit the second tower right over Jennings' shoulder. "What the FUCK WAS THAT!" Jennings yells to his producer.
I never saw Peter Jennings lose his cool except for several times that day.
It was a completely beautiful, not a cloud in the sky day. Light breeze, and suddenly very quiet. No air traffic at all. The far off very distant hum from the highway disappeared.
I drove down to my boat, and sailed out in to Long Island Sound. Waaaaaaaay off to the west I could see a single thread of black rising straight up.
I went to the store after an hour or so of gentle sailing.
No credit cards. Lucky they knew me. I bought a case of beer, a steak, and some veggies on store credit.
Calls from everyone I knew except my wife on the answering machine when I got home. I sat and watched TV for another hour until the first tower collapsed, then I went back out and continued cutting frames.

 

[SloopJonB]

We were 30 or 40 floors up in the Wall Center hotel when my wife turned on the news - just in time to see the second plane hit.

After watching in stunned silence for 1/2 hour or so we GTFO and down to the ground.

Bought some comfort food on the way home and stayed in front of the news the rest of the day.

 

[Charlie Foxtrot]

In Cali - getting ready for work. Listening to Bill Handel, the morning talk jock on KFI, as I showered. Just another Tuesday morning. Then, in a shocked voice, came his announcement, "A plane has hit a Twin Tower in New York." For the next 15 or so minutes, there were reports of fire and smoke from the skyscraper. I thought it had to be a light twin, like the B-25 that hit the Empire State Building during WW II. A tragedy. An accident.

It all seems so surreal when Handel reported a second plane had struck the other tower and then brilliantly summarized it all as, "Ladies and Gentlemen, we are at war."

After watching the towers collapse on TV, I shook it off and went into work to see what I could do to help kill the bastards that were responsible.

 

[Autonomous]

On #2 at Towal.

 

[Mrleft8]

When I saw that second plane coming in, over Peter Jennings' shoulder, my first thought was "Forest fire tanker. Gonna dump a pile of flame retardant and water on that fire! They got that up and in operation fast!" That thought lasted about 5 seconds.

 

[DarthSailor]

In my office near the south end of Addison airport runway in north Dallas, watching on the web until the service was degraded by web traffic. Got sent home by noon, office stayed closed for about a week if I recall correctly.

 

[Mrleft8]

Even 25 years ago, everyone I knew, who was alive on Pearl Harbor Day, knew exactly where they were, what they were doing, and what the day was like. Even 25 years ago Pearl Harbor Day was mentioned on every radio station, every TV station, and in every news paper. Now, only 21 years later there's barely a mention of 9/11 anywhere.
Our disposable commodities culture has relegated this date to the dust bin of history..... So fast.
I lost a very good friend and former room mate that day. He was starting his first day as chief day-time wine steward at Windows on the World, after having worked for several years as the night time steward. I can only hope he opened several very good bottles of some insanely expensive vintage before the very end.

 

[Point Break]

Southern Cali….on duty. Woke up early having a cup watching the news when the first plane went in. The whole crew of 13 at my station was up watching when the second plane went in. The department announced over the radio to all stations that the offgoing shift was to remain on duty till further notice. Both shifts at the station (off going and oncoming) so now 26 guys at my station were watching when the towers came down. We staffed all relief engines for a fully doubled strength. Nobody knew what other attacks might happen. We went back to normal staffing about 4 days later and all but the duty shift got to go home. It was a very……odd time.

 

[P_Wop]

Just back in Palo Alto CA after several days of biz meetings in NYC, including one on the 95th floor of the South Tower. I watched TV some of the morning, then had to turn it off as I was shaking so badly. For once, alcohol didn't help.

 

[veni vidi vici]

I was working at home trading on the computer, the TV was on CNBC in the other room. I heard the tone change when they reported a plane had crashed into one of the WTC towers. They were thinking at that point just speculation that it was a small private plane. That got my attention but I didn’t go to the TV yet. When they got shots of the gash the tone shifted more dire as the size of the black burning gash didn’t match anything logical as commercial planes don’t fly close and the weather was CAVU. I sat on the couch and started processing what was before my eyes. Then the second plane came into the picture collided and fire burst out the other side of the the tower. It was instantly clear that this was the beginning of an attack on our country.
Terror and change big changes were coming what to do? I picked up one son from HS, the other just starting college and far away from home. My heart is pounding reliving as I type

 

[SloopJohnB]

We where doing a Trafalgar tour around Europe and where walking around around little village St Paul de Vence and just got in the bar for a beer and saw it on the tv, at first I thought it as a video game someone was playing but unfortunately no.

 

[boomer]

SSA/ Maersk Terminal Port of Tacoma - Manson Office. Crews had just finished our morning safety and job tasks meeting.

The first thing that was thought and said that morning among the crew - "this will lead to war, somewhere..."

 

[giegs]

In class as kids whose parents worked in the towers were quietly being pulled before we knew what was going on.

 

[Point Break]

In class as kids whose parents worked in the towers were quietly being pulled before we knew what was going on.

All turn out okay for you?

 

[giegs]

All turn out okay for you?

Fine for me, thankfully. You could see the smoke from a ridge near the house. A couple friends lost a parent or relative, some others escaped being there because of how life works some days. It's all pretty surreal. One of my early realizations that nobody has any idea what's going on a lot of the time.

 

[billsreef]

Was due to work at 1pm, so sleeping late. My wife woke me up, told me that a plane hit one of the Twin Towers and turned on the bedroom TV. Like Mrleft8, I saw that second plane hit over Peter Jenning's shoulder. That's when I went from thinking horrifying accident to some sort of attack. Went in to work to find that big bosses decided to close for the day. So spent time with a couple of coworkers outside being in shock and talking about it, when a pair of fighters flew overhead and we realized just how quiet the skies were from a lack of commercial air traffic. One of my coworkers lost an uncle in the collapse, several friends also lost relatives. One of my regular customers was a mortician and spent time picking up body parts in the aftermath.

 

[Mrleft8]

It took several days before the first flt out of LHR got my wife and her mother back to the USA. (She worked for Sir Richard Branson in those days). The pictures she has of Gander Island are insane.
Heavy planes parked like sub compact cars in a Walmart parking lot.... How they got them out of there eventually is a mystery to me.
The pictures you can find on the internet are nothing compared to what the airlines themselves had. My wife was recently ex-CO, and also USAir, but working admin for VA at the time...
All anyone who was stranded in Gander said was "These are the best people on earth!". About their hosts.... So yeah, bust a Canucks chops, but.....

 

[SloopJonB]

What else are you going to do when your neighbour or brother is in a jam?

 

[Snaggletooth]

givem PB?

 

[Mrleft8]

After my wife finally got back home, she started going back in to work on the train, as usual. From Guilford to New Haven, through the "Gold Coast" of Fairfield and Westchester, she watched the commuter train parking lots as she rode past every day. Saabs, Volvos, BMWs, Hondas, Fords, Toyotas and Hyundais sat in the same parking space for weeks, months sometimes. Collecting dust, and soot, and eventually some snow and sleet before being towed away.
These were people like she was. Simple working people, or maybe not so simple, but going to work on the train to make a living..... And the ones who weren't lucky..... Their cars sat in the parking lots collecting dust until someone came and either drove them home, or they were towed....