Hey Martin,
well first of all I wasn't an EMT at the time of 911. I wish so much I was but faith wanted different.
I work for Morgan Stanley during the day as a programmer. Most of their web pages are supported either directly by me or my web team. I start work at 0700 and finish at 1500. One of the few reasons I got this job (since I have forensic psych and military background) is that they needed somebody who is never late and dependable. On that Tuesday I show up for work at usual 0650, got my coffee and set up. My office is on 46th floor with my window facing towards the Hudson River and Jersey. Tuesdays are quiet because people are already over the Monday stress. We had a new employee starting with us that day. She was from Israel and her mom brought her down here to the US so she would be safe from all the bombings and violence. She shows up around 7ish. We do regular office stuff. I show her around, we go to our Network Control Center on 68th floor and than back to 46th floor. I knew it is going to be a great day so I brought my panoramic camera equipment so after work I can hop over the bridge and shoot some nice pics. Day was going slow and than we hear this noise like two brushes with high pitch sound sliding across the building. I turned around to her and say watch this is going to be cool. I assumed that noise was made by the window cleaning robot that scared me few times before. So I’m waiting for the robot to show up and that our window is hit with debris: tangled chair, papers and office stuff is flying in the air. She looks at me and asks how the hell did I know this was going to happen. I don’t know what’s going on. I think maybe a kitchen or a boiler exploded. My pager is going off that plane slammed into the building and I’m assuming that it is probably one of those one engine JFK planes since few weeks ago one of the guys crashed one into his house in NJ to collect insurance. I’m confused at this point but since I was in charge on the floor I grabbed all the people and told them to leave. I gave my guys a day off and told them to go home. They all get out and are on the way home. I stay behind with my friend Gene. We basically are standing in front of the window watching all the Emergency personnel pulling right up front of the building. It gets boring after a while. PA system says that there is a problem in WTC1 and WTC2 is not in danger so employees can go back to work. Our guys (my floor) didn’t hear that announcement since we sent them home. I go back to my computer and than second explosion comes. All stuff falls down and it is pitch dark from the cloud of smoke that went down. Gene jumps out of his office and we both look at each other confused. Gene has two little girls and I tell him to go home. He stays and we again just go back to work starting slowly backing stuff up. This time I think that one of the news choppers tried to get the pic of the WTC1 burning and it crashed into WTC2. Finally they make the evacuation notice. Two of us ignore it but we were mostly done anyway so after 20 min we leave. I leave all my stuff behind since I know I be back in the office the latest tomorrow. We take the stairs and everyone is being nice and civil to each other. We are having a good time walking down after all it is Tuesday we are getting out and it is a beautiful day. I see fire men going up and Building Manager. We give them a wide berth. I ask if I can help and they say no need they are just checking things up. We get to the basement (concourse area) and earths starts to tremble. I get to the level and thru the window I see people on the sidewalk in pool of blood and body parts. And this sound like you took a bag of water and drop it on the sidewalk happens in uneven intervals. I turn around and see a woman landing head first. Now I know where the sound comes from. Then earth shakes building starts crashing, people push back and run inside and tower 2 collapses. I bolted down the road towards the church and walk towards the bridge. I have no idea what direction I’m going but I see the sun thru the thick clouds and I know roughly how to walk. I hop on the bridge and cops close it. Some guy on delivery truck is threatening the cop that he needs to go into the are to make a drop off. In the middle of the bridge I jump on the rope and I see second tower going down. People around me are crying. I walk over to Brooklyn and walk into the bar that I used to go to when in college. I just sit down, put my face down and just space out. I get a beer and look up and see planes slamming into WTC. I’m thinking to my self who the hell would be so sick to play a movie, why don’t they put on the news or something. And than it hits me that this is the news. All communication is down except for AOL pagers and my buddy meets me in the bar. We sit there for 2 more hours. We get out and decide to walk home. I call my dad at home and ask him to pick me up. He is glad to find me alive since news he was watching said people from floors 2 and up are dead. My mom is happy. My roommate who also worked with me but didn’t start until 11 or so also thinks I’m gone. My dad picks me up and my buddy around 4th ave and 1st street in Brooklyn. He knows better not to say anything. I get to my place, go over to pick up my dog and just sit down on the step with him and just hug him. He knew. We just sat there for a long time. I went back to my place and tried to figure out what happened but we got mobilized and sent to Newark NJ to restore everything. We worked straight until Monday. And than I was putting mad hours until January. After that I needed a break. I went to Africa for a month and it really helped to forget and get me straight. A lot of solitude trekking and climbing and I really had good time.
I didn’t know who died that day until a year later. I had to do a memorial 911 webpage for our sites and they got me pictures of people from our company that were murdered that day. I realized that I knew 10 of them. Since we were divided into so many officies and work places all over tri state area we just assumed that missing person is at the different location.
Now when I’m writing this tears are coming to my eyes. Just a senseless loss of lives. Friends, coworkers, future friends that I would know right now. I meet families of firemen and ems guys who died. It all hurts.
Matt
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