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Remembering 9/11 - 'How is this happening?'

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I started my day under a clear blue sky on a crisp sunny Tuesday morning. This was an unusually busy morning for me that started at 6:30 a.m. with back-to-back meetings. The fact that today was Sept. 11 held no significance and the building across the street from where I got my coffee was not yet referred to as Ground Zero. Just like all the other bustling people around me that day, I was focused on my job and all the important tasks directly ahead of me. I was three weeks into my new position as branch manager and people were counting on me – nothing I could imagine at that point could possibly distract or deter me from the busy day ahead. It was Manhattan’s financial district: we were all there to make money.

I was back at my desk on the 18th floor of the old AT&T building on the corner of Broadway and Cortland when the first plane hit the north tower. I heard a loud explosion followed by tremors that shook the floor for about 45 seconds. Although I was only 300 feet from the World Trade Center, I was sitting in a windowless room concentrating on an unpleasant classroom scheduling conflict. I finished responding to a client’s email and had just opened another when the news started to pour in over the radio, and the yells from outside my door to “come look!” started to grab my attention. We had clients in our offices that day from all over the country who were desperately looking to me for answers.

Nervous and shaking, two colleagues and I went down to street level to investigate. We were immediately met with chaos and disbelief. For every person that was running frantically past us there were two more standing in the middle of the street staring up at the north tower, struggling to sort out what they were seeing. The tower seemed to be engulfed in smoke and it appeared that huge chunks of debris were breaking off from the top and crashing to the ground. “A small plane crashed into the tower,” someone said. We moved across Church Street and got closer to the towers to discover that what we were looking at was not debris at all, but people. We were watching people fall from 90 to 100 stories up. Everyone around us was horrified and asking the same question out loud: “Are those PEOPLE ?!” Nobody needed to answer.

My shaking intensified as I tried repeatedly to call our office on the 78th floor of the north tower, but there was no cell signal. My cousin worked there and I was panic stricken for him and his family of four kids. Within 45 minutes I learned that he was in the lobby of the WTC at the time of the attack and had made it out safely. I was relieved, but nothing I was seeing or hearing was registering with me properly that morning. I was disoriented and scared and while nearly 10 years have gone by I still feel the same sense of confusion when remembering that day. As I stood there struggling to deal with it all I still believed there had been a horrible mistake; a mechanical malfunction or perhaps human error. When I watched the second plane fly into the south tower all I could ask myself was, “How is this happening?” The answer to this question has changed my perspective on humanity forever. I kept my copy of the Wall Street Journal from the morning of 9/11 and no word similar to ‘terrorist’ can be found in that edition. The word was simply not a daily part of our North American vocabulary.

Michelle French’s complete account from 9/11:

I started my day under a clear blue sky on a crisp sunny Tuesday morning. This was an unusually busy morning for me that started at 6:30 am with back-to-back meetings. As I skipped out for a second cup of coffee after 8:00 I headed towards the Starbucks under the Millennium Hotel. The fact that today was September 11 held no significance and the building across the street from where I got my coffee was not yet referred to as Ground Zero. Just like all the other bustling people around me that day my focus was sharply pointed on my job and all the important tasks directly ahead of me. I was three weeks into my new position as Branch Manager and people were counting on me – nothing I could imagine at that point could possibly distract or deter me from the busy day ahead. Come on, this is Manhattan's financial district. We are all here to make money. 

I was back at my desk on the 18th floor of the old AT&T building on the corner of Broadway and Cortlandt when the first plane hit the north tower. I heard a loud explosion followed by tremors which shook the floor for about 45 seconds. Although I was only 300 feet from the World Trade Center I was sitting in a windowless room and was focused on the tasks in front of me. I finished responding to an email and started another just as the news started to pour over the radio and the yells from outside my door to “come look!” began to grab my attention. We had clients in our offices that day from all over the country that were desperately looking to me for answers.

Nervous and shaking, two colleagues and I went down to street level to investigate. We were immediately met with both chaos and disbelief. For every person that was running frantically past us there were two more standing in the middle of the street staring up at the north tower, struggling to sort out what they were seeing. The tower seemed to be engulfed in smoke and it appeared that huge chunks of debris were breaking off from the top and crashing to the ground. "A small plane crashed into the tower," someone said.  We moved across Church Street and got closer to the towers to discover that what we were looking at was not debris at all, but people. We were watching people fall from 90 to 100 stories up and everyone around us was horrified and asking the same question out loud – “Are those PEOPLE?!?!”. Nobody needed to answer.

My shaking intensified as I tried to call our office over and over on the 78th floor of the north tower but there was no cell signal to be found. My cousin worked in our 78th floor office and I was panic-stricken for him and his family of four kids.  Within 45 minutes I learned that he was in the lobby of the WTC at the time of the attack and made it out safely. I was relieved, but nothing I was seeing or hearing was registering with me properly that morning.  I was disoriented and scared and while nearly 10 years has gone by I still feel the same sense of disorientation about that day. As I stood there struggling to deal with it all I still believed there had been a horrible mistake, a mechanical malfunction or perhaps human error. When I watched the second plane fly into the south tower all I could ask myself was “how is this happening?" The answer to this question has changed my perspective on humanity forever.  I kept my copy of the Wall Street Journal from the morning of 9-11 and no word similar to 'terrorist' can be found in that edition.  The word was simply not a part of our North American vocabulary.

The realization that this was indeed a terrorist attack, on not only my work neighborhood but my home four blocks away, began to set in. This realization coupled with the sightings of kind, grand gestures of neighbors around me charged me to make a shift in my priorities forever.  In work life, my focus shifted from all business to a combination of business and community as I developed a fierce patriotism for a city and a country I was not born and raised in but whose reaction to the most incredibly tragic attack in its existence was to soothe, calm and with power and might rebuild.  The first tower collapsed as I reached my apartment and I would soon be evacuated from my home. I realized at that point that I was still holding the same coffee that I had purchased less than an hour earlier and now it seemed to me like a foreign object from another place and another time.

I was determined to remain living and working in downtown Manhattan. When options were presented to move or sell the branch I extended myself personally in order to dig in and continue to live and work in the community that was struggling to rebuild in every possible way.  With an unyielding newfound drive my team cultivated a new goal, which was to ensure that we prevailed, kept our jobs and did not enable the terrorists to end our lifeline of work, happiness and prosperity.

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