September 11, 2001 - 8 Years ago today

[Azure]

Can't believe nobody started a thread on this, considering 8 years ago today, our world changed dramatically.



What will always be amazing to me is how much everyone pulled together afterwards.

September 11, 2001. I was in Grade 8. Went into the art room in school to watch the news. Took a long time before I understood what happened.

[Tyler]

Think this was the first week of my grade 12 year.

We had just gotten TV's in all of the classrooms, and the entire school watched everything unfold pretty much for the entire morning. Definitely a surreal day.

[TSXCman]

I was in grade 8 or 9 in shop class. I didnt understand what was going on, I never heard of or saw the towers before.

A friend of mine's dad had flown to new york a couple nights before for a meeting at the towers, so i remember how scared she was. Luckily he had been in the building the day before and not during

[cyclone3483]

true story: two people I worked with were scheduled to be in New York for a conference. They had everything booked. The conference was to start a little later in the morning, so they agreed to go to the top of one of the twin towers for site-seeing before the conference. Sept 7th, a sudden business opportunity means they both (manager of strategic planing, manager of treasury) are required to stay in Calgary and cancel their trip.

They would have both been at the top of the tower when it was hit.

[Bigtime]

I was working on my instructor rating for flying. Was supposed to fly that morning, well you know the rest. I did keep the faxes that the flight school got advising of the Canadian and American airspace being shut down, I figured it would be a unique piece of the history of that day to keep.

[JohnnyB]

Wow. Time flies...

That event is still vivid in memory though.

[Dion]

The Falling man: RIP

http://www.cbc.ca/passionateeyemonday/fallingman

[Bob]

I still remember almost everything I saw and heard that morning.

Edit: Grade 8? Some of you are young bucks. I was in 3rd-year engineering when that happened. I was sitting in traffic on 14th st @ 90th avenue when the second tower fell.

[Nammer403]

I was in grade 8 also sitting in social discussing what happend

[Bigtime]

Originally Posted by cyclone3483

true story: two people I worked with were scheduled to be in New York for a conference. They had everything booked. The conference was to start a little later in the morning, so they agreed to go to the top of one of the twin towers for site-seeing before the conference. Sept 7th, a sudden business opportunity means they both (manager of strategic planing, manager of treasury) are required to stay in Calgary and cancel their trip.

They would have both been at the top of the tower when it was hit.

I may be remembering incorrectly but I'm pretty sure I heard that the observation level on the south tower was not opened up yet at the time of the planes striking the towers. So your two coworkers would have hopefully been ok had their original plans stayed.

[rubecube]

I find it almost surreal that this happened eight years ago. I was in Washington, D.C. that day and I can still feel emotions and vividly remember the sights and sounds of that day as if they happened yesterday.

Even though I didn't know anybody who was in the towers that day, the day still ranks as one of most horrific and saddest moments of my life.

[Komskies]

I was in grade 10 at Bishop Carroll and there were about 300 people trying to get into the computer lab to check out what happened.

[The Goon]

[Shazam]

[Bigtime]

A link to the original picture of the AA 757 used in that photoshop, the 23rd highest viewed photo over at airliners.net with 814,963 views!

http://www.airliners.net/photo/Ameri...464f6266276ffa

[Flash Walken]

My world didn't really change that much, other than new terminology in my lexicon, like 'Post 911 world' and 'second gulf war'.

[rubecube]

Originally Posted by The Goon

######ed fake picture.

Don't clutter up this thread with garbage like that.

[CaptainCrunch]

I remember waking up and turning on the news and the first plane had just hit and they were talking about a horrible accident. I went and took a shower and came out just in time to see the live footage of the second plane hitting the building.

I went to work anyways, and nobody got anything done, we were pinned to our computers, and our boss lost his temper because we weren't being effective. I packed my stuff up and left for the day, if I was going to be ineffective, I'd do it at home.

My sister who's a doctor in hamilton, was in Manhatten for a conference she managed to eventually get a call out to my parents, they had called her and all of the other doctors to the emergency room at the nearest hospital. To this day she was stunned at the low number of casualties.

A classmate of mine from 10 years before was in the tower that day and never came out. Another classmate that had remained close to him phoned me up in a complete range of emotions from rage to incredible sadness.

My sister who worked downtown at Husky and her whole floor were sent home.

Then the planes started landing, and the rumors started. There were planes enroute to Vancouver and Toronto that weren't answering radio calls.

The Pentagon was hit and were were sure, then the other plane went down in the field.

Then a client phoned me up on my cellphone drunkenly trying to convince me that it was the end of the world and the American's in their rage were going to nuke all of the middle east states that supported terrorism.

I remember that night, I met my neighbours for the first time, they had lived their for years, but they saw me having a smoke outside of my house and called me over and offered me a beer.

I remember the shock, I remember the frantic worry about my sister, I remember the vivid news footage of the world trade centers going down.

I remember I said a little prayer for the victims, and a prayer for the firefighters and the cops hoping for their safety.

And I remember thinking of the line from Bull Haisley when he pulled into Pearl Harbour the day after the attack in 1941 where he stated that from this day forward the japanese language would be spoken exclusively in hell.

I didn't sleep very well that night, I had the feeling that all of mankind was tottering on the brink of darkness.

None of us can deny, that even though we all went to work the next day or school, we all shopped for groceries and worried about our bills, but the world had changed, and for a while we marvelled at how New York dealt with it, and we had a lot of sympathy for our American friends and their pain, but a new form of paranoia and mistrust started growing in us.

[BlackEleven]

Originally Posted by Bob

I still remember almost everything I saw and heard that morning.

Edit: Grade 8? Some of you are young bucks. I was in 3rd-year engineering when that happened. I was sitting in traffic on 14th st @ 90th avenue when the second tower fell.

I was in third-year engg as well at the time.

I was just about to head out for the day and I turned on the tv while making a quick breakfast and they were talking about a plane hitting the towers. At this point they were still speculating on whether it was an accident or what had happened. I remember watching the second tower come down live.

[Dion]

My brother lives in Minneapolis and was in flight to Boston when the planes hit the Twin Towers. His flight was diverted to Chicago like many other planes that were in the air. Word got around the cabin while they were taxing to the gate that 2 planes had crashed into the twin towers. He came off the plane to see people crying in the arrivals area with countless people viewing the TV screens as the events of the day were updated. It was like a scene out of a terrorist movie - very surreal he said.

Then came the mad rush for rental cars. Everyone was in a panic to find a way to get home. My brother got lucky and managed to rent a van. His travel agent was on the ball and got him a vehicle as the plane was landing. Himself and 4 other guys shared the vehicle for the long journey home. People were milling around the rental car lots looking for those that got lucky enough to find a a vehicle and if they had extra room.

After the planes began flying again I asked him if he had any fears of flying. He said if i don't board that plane the terrorists have won! That's how he viewed 9/11. Part of the goal of the terrorists was to install fear in the hearts of the flying public. Getting on that plane was his way of fighting back

He commented that when the planes began flying there was this uneasy silence about the passengers. Memories of 9/11 were quite fresh in thier minds and they were quite nervous. The cabin was deathly quiet.