10 years ago

[vthomley]

Where were you when th eworld stopped turning....?

Sadly I remember is like it was yesterday. Back then I was mowing with a John Deere 314...or 312

I had just driven my kids to the farm on the deadend road before school. We were planning to and did moved there on September 15th 2001. I thought to myself of how peaceful and quiet it was there. I then dropped the kids off at school, I was turning onto main street coming to work when my wife called and said it appears a plane hit the World Trade Center. I came into work went right into our President's office and told him the news. I was watching TV when the second plane hit the other tower.

We had 15-20 guys from across the US here at work for a training seminar, each of them had to figure out a way to get home. It was like the movie planes trans, and automobiles - except no planes.

One guy from Hawaii was going to help me move on Saturday if the planes had not started flying by then. On Thursday of that week he and I drove out to the farm I was renting and he stated, "You could piss in the front yard and no one would notice." He called me 2 days ago and true to form, as always, he asked if I was pissin in the front yard....

After moving there I acquired a Farmall H, then 2 years later I built a house and found the H to be too big so we sold it and bought a 127...

 

[fcurrier]

Well -- were you .... ?

 

[kshultz]

I remember too.
I was at work and I went towards the break room and someone said have you heard that planes are bombing the pentagon. I turned right around and got on the internet to see. (no tv here) Sad, sad day.

 

[gcoleman]

I was in the fifth grade, the principal came over the intercom and announced that schools were closing early but nobody said why. Mom picked myself and my younger sister up and told us in a nutshell what had happened, and when we got home I was glued to the TV, still not sure what to make of what I was seeing. My dad worked a couple blocks away from the pentagon at that time and when I saw that it had been hit, I knew we were in trouble as individuals and as nation. I was never so glad to see him walk through the door that afternoon. Its hard to believe its been ten years already, seems like yesterday. Every year since I watch the TV documentaries on it, and every year I gain a better concept of what really happened and what I was lucky to still have a whole family.

 

[fcurrier]

Vince: This could become as long a topic as there are (posting) members here. Thanks for starting it.

 

[dross]

We were doing morning chores, three of us plus the boss, all had 2 way radios. Boss comes over the radio and says a plane hit the WTC. I asked how big, he said a big one, We all huried up chores that morning and went in the office and watched the second plane hit. Then they broke away from that and showed pictures of the Pentagon. That night there was parent teacher confrences, when we crossed main street we could see the gas station a block down was charging like 5 bucks a gallon. Wasn't much talk about the kids at school that night.

 

[thoffman]

I remember work on a road project literally in the shadow of a giant cathedral. Maybe I should have stopped in and said something to The BIG Guy that day.

 

[glippert]

I was still in the Air Force in Alaska and turned on the morning news while I got dressed. When I saw the news I left early to get on base ASAP to see what our response would be. Elmendorf Air Force Base and Ft. Richardson Army Post are next to each other and both lanes of the highway were jammed with soldiers and airmen going to work early, with no "recall" directing them to do so. It was amazing to see Americans so ready to respond to such a horrific event.

 

[jstertz]

Vince- Thanks for starting this thread! I'll be sure to read everyone's posts here. My cousin is in the Navy, many of my family members have been in the armed forces, and I have some that are firefighters and policemen. I have the utmost respect and thanks to all those men and women who put themselves in harm's way for the rest of us. To any members of the forum who serve or have served in those capacities--THANK YOU and may God Bless you.

That sad September morn, I was prepping the floor in my newly built garage with my dad. The excavator had dropped about 5 ton of clear stone in the door way and we had the grueling task of hand shoveling it around and then prepping the floor for concrete later that week. My lovely young wife had just got home from working the night shift and was trying to sleep. My mom called our house phone and said that a plane had hit the WTC! I didn't have a TV and so we turned on the radio and stood there in shock listening to the news. Dad and I left and went back to his house for awhile to watch the updates on his TV. I'll never forget walking into his living room where mom had on the TV just in time to see the second plane hit. That moment an awful realization hit me--we were under attack!


I have always been a sentimental and patriotic person but I was never more proud to be an American than in those upcoming weeks and months. I was a relative youngster at 22 years old and the wave of patriotism that followed that horrific experience was amazing. People setting aside many of their differences to bond together under one common banner, our standard, "Ol' Glory"! It's too bad how many have forgotten the attrocities committed against our own that day. I, for one, will not forget. It is a painful day and tine to remember but we must to honor those who lost their lives that day. Some as a result of the act committed against them and some running into the fire trying to save someone they had never met. "Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for others."

I was and am and always will be proud to live in the land of the free and the home of the brave.

 

[sblunier]

Heard it on the radio on the way into work (at first I thought it was a Bob & Tom radio prank, but quickly realized otherwise when even they were serious), saw the second plane hit and the towers go down on the TV in the break room. Spent the afternoon on a job supervising the installation of a natural gas regulator station in a near by town and vividly remember watching Air Force One fly over on it's way back from Omaha and then watching cars line up at gas stations.

Steven III was 6 mo. old at the time and I remember Monica and I wondering how it would be explained to him some day as we watched the coverage that evening......

 

[wshytle]

I was in a small crawl space under a house fixing plumbing of all things. There wasn't a TV around so everything I saw was a rerun that evening.

It was the worst day I have ever experienced (to date) as far as threats go to the USA. I hated seeing what had happened and even worse, why.

It also brings out anger in me. The reason is it takes crap like this to happen in order to revive patriotism. This is the greatest country in the world and we are letting it slip right through our hands. There are so many "Americans" out there that don't know nor give a crap about the land on which they walk...freely. A lot of these people are the reason we lack good leadership and honesty in our government as well.

One example and I'll shut up. The NAACP puts on a MLK ralley in South Carolina. The place where they meet happens to have a statue of George Washington so what do they do??? they build a box around the statue so as not to offend anyone. This is the father of our country. I'm not saying a thing here about race...I'm saying we shouldn't tolerate this stupidity about the history of our country. How is this action suppose to help bring people closer?

The WTCs were destroyed by Islam. Now that Bin Laden is gone people think it's over. NOT! This is what we can't afford to forget.

It's simply a matter of when, not if, that we shall experience this terror again. As a matter of fact, we are welcoming it by not protecting our borders...north and south.

I really hated the fact that so many people lost their lives that day. We awoke for a while but our eyes have been closed for much of the ten years since.

 

[mschutz]

I was getting fuel at our terminal in upstate NY when the fueler said something about a plane flying into the WTC. I thought he was kidding, but when I went inside I watched the 2nd plane hit the tower and hit the pentagon. I delivered out by Albany and then came back and said to my boss, anything I can do to help let me know. Myself and 3 other drivers went to Manhatten with loads to the Salvation Army 4 blocks away from Ground Zero. We stayed down there all weekend to haul things because the response from the people was overwhelming. Alot went to Shea Stadium where they let us shower in the locker rooms. You ichted because of the insulation in the air. I could go on and on about what I saw but the biggest thing was we were all Americans working together at that point.

 

[kweaver]

Wayne - The USofA was NOT attacked by Islam , it was attacked by terrorist of a radical Islam group. There's quite a distinction between the two.
My doctors are of the Islam faith and they've not tried to kill me (well maybe that one that did the heart cath without numbing me) so you can't say it was Islam.
We have plenty of native born Americans that have the same intentions of doing the same thing if / when they get the chance that probably were brought up with Christan beliefs.

As to what I was doing on that black day in our history , as usual I was sitting out here in da Shack at the keyboard and watching a movie on tv with no commercials. Looks like ALL stations would have broke in for a national emergency like that. I was typing with someone on Yahoo IM and didn't know anything about it until they asked if I'd seen the tower fall (first one).
I then switched over to the news to watch the chaos and horror of it unfolding.

It hit me hard , as I was to young for Vietnam and to old for The Gulf and by then I had already destroyed the five disc in my back. I always said that if we got attacked on our Home Land I'd fight.

I'm a damn good shoot at long range and I've got the rifle to do it, all 18 pounds of it. All I wanted to do was pack up and go to the mountains of Afghanistan ... somehow.

Health wise I knew I'd never make it but I had to do something. The only thing I could think of was what I did , I emailed the President of our Great Country and told him if he needed somebody at his back I would be there.

I didn't know if they would try an assassination next or what was unfolding in the days to come but I wanted to be a part of it.

It bothered me so bad that I couldn't do anything, I was driving Kathy and the rest of my family crazy with my ranting and news watching 24/7 not sleeping.

I wanted to drive to NYC and try to dig or haul or something.
I thought about sending dust mask as I knew the trouble they were in for with all that dust.
We were to broke to send anything. Times were hard on us then but it had been harder in the past.

Other things that I thought about doing I can't type ... but I was almost a nervous wreck by then having to eat Xanax like M&Ms to try to keep from having a stroke with my nerves and high blood pressure like they were then. Doctors kept telling me that I was going to stroke out if I didn't calm down.

I've pretty well had the news on ever since not wanting to miss anything ever again.

Gotta stop now before I start on the political side of things and to try to relax and calm down as rethinking those days has me hyped up again.

All I can say is Iran should have been made into a parking lot in 1981 and we would have no problems now.

 

[wshytle]

Ken-

OK, radical Islam...but it was Islam for damn sure.

 

[lhinds]

I enjoy the posts guys. I was in a computer class at our corporate office when the first plane hit. We moved a t v into the room and watched it almost all morning. Like ken i wanted to do something and felt like i should be there.

 

[mgonitzke]

I was in 7th grade in gym class, and we were running around on the track. I knew something odd was going on, because about a dozen large commercial airliners flew over on approach to land at the Rockford, IL airport, which had no commercial service at the time. Another teacher came out and said planes had crashed into both towers of the WTC, and we all went inside. I remember us having the classroom TVs on the rest of the day. Some of my classmates were still too immature to understand the significance of what was happening.

What I remember more was that I had just started taking flying lessons shortly before all of this; I had in fact flown on September 10th, 2011, and what I wondered most was whether or not my freedom to do that would go away. Thankfully, it hasn't (mostly). This was on my mind yesterday as I was flying, 10 years to the day after that lesson.

My instructor at the time was piloting a charter flight on 9/11 and had to land somewhere along his path, and was stuck there for quite awhile if I remember correctly.

 

[jchamberlin]

I was at a Trade Show in Houston, Texas. I learned what happened in an elevator. When I got back to the room, I turned on the TV and watched the second plane hit and the towers come down.

My first thought, "This means war." My heart sank. I don't think anyone wins a war. I realized in that instant that our nation's energy would be consumed for years to come in fighting the war that was sure to follow the terrorist acts. I didn't foresee that we would be fighting two of them and that it would be ten years and we would still be fighting them. I question then, and I question now, what purpose the wars serve, what is their end? If the perpetrators were radical Islamists, then how has our war effort weakened or eradicated them? If anything, the USA has given credence to their claims of evil empire.

Nowhere do I find efforts to build bridges with MODERATE Islam, and isolate the extremists. Escalations of violence always seems to serve their ends, not ours. I would love to see some effort made to establish a dialogue on the topic of religious SIMILARITIES rather than differences. For instance, we share the same Scripture in the Old Testament, its just that Mohammed is their prophet, not Jesus. (Of course, I affirm Jesus as "Savior" which takes it to another level.) Christianity is essentially a peaceful religion, Islam is reputed to be as well, although, from what I read, the Mohammed's first move was a military campaign, he made peace with his avowed enemy, but on his way back home took time to pillage a Jewish settlement.

In a nutshell, we've all got to learn to live together on this blue marble in the universe, I don't think we have time anymore to make war between nations. Nations no longer seem to be as relevant as they once were, but family and tribe are as thick as ever.

That being said, the men and women in our Armed Forces, and all our First Responders deserve our respect and even admiration for their willingness to put their lives on the line to save their fellow human beings and to protect what they are told are our national interests. The factual tragedy, in my opinion, is that our leader's decisions are not worthy of their blood. As far as I'm concerned Iraq and Afghanistan, as well as Ground Zero, have become hallowed ground because of the sacrifices made by our best and brightest young men and women. I wonder if, in time to come, our veterans will make pilgrimages to those countries as the veterans of WWII make pilgrimages to the beaches of Normandy today, or like the Vietnam vets do to Vietnam.

Like Bill Russell's grandmother told him, "Choose your enemies carefully, you will become most like them." My father liked to quote William James to the effect that Peace will not become a reality until or unless it gains the moral imperative of war."

My point? Making war is seldom in our best interest, peace is almost always better for everyone involved. Its a pity that as the human race we're not better at making peace than we are at making war.

Ask yourself, as you consider the souls that died in 9/11, the wars subsequent, and all the wars before, which path --war or peace-- is worthy of your blood? --Your children's blood?

Just adding my two cent's worth to the forum . . .

 

[aschumacher]

It's a quiet day here in NJ. Dozens of memorial services are being held in towns and cities. NJ lost about 700 people, NY even more. A number of permanent memorials are being dedicated today in Lower Manhatten and across the river in Jersey city. I'm about 25 miles from NYC and have many memories of that day. One was all viewing points on mountain tops had been closed by police, I suppose to prevent possible bombing of crowds. But I knew we were in real trouble when I saw a jet fighter plane force a large commercial helo to find the nearest airport he could.
With that, please go here as todays memorial. A.

 

[kweaver]

Jeremiah - Go back and check history , the Crusades killed a lot of innocent people in the name of The Church.

Christians and Islamist have been at war since their inception.

Christians have been just as extreme through history and have raised a hand in the name of religion to destroy masses.

Believe that my god is the greatest and kindest or I'll kill you , makes no damn sense at all from either side.

Biases is what causes war.
There is no innocent side, just innocent people.

 

[dtanner]

Wayne S

(It's simply a matter of when, not if, that we shall experience this terror again. As a matter of fact, we are welcoming it by not protecting our borders...north and south. )

I do find fault with that statement, Canada did all it could and more than it was ask to do that day.people from my small town drove 70 miles to Halifax airport when ask to take people in that were stranded in the no fly because of the plane crashes . It was a terrible day for all of us to see such madness and horror. If I were you I would not worry to much about the border to the North . We share to much to ever be separated.