| Your 911 memories... 08:15 - Sep 10 with 3160 views | bluelagos |
I managed to be one of the few people who missed it developing. Was visiting a brewery in Benin city, Nigeria and was offline all day, blissfully unaware of what was happening 5k miles away.
Went to the bar after work and someone has put a page print out from the CNN website on the notice board so we asked them to put CNN on the telly. Then watched the events as reported perhaps 3 - 4 hours afterwards.
Sat in silence watching CNN that evening with barely a word said, just utterly stunned.
|  |
| |  |
| Your 911 memories... on 12:11 - Sep 10 with 1100 views | Tractor_Buck |
Working at a radio station in Wolverhampton at the time. The MD, programme manager and news editor were all out at a meeting, so I was the most senior person in the building when it happened.
The duty journalist shouted across to me as the coverage started appearing on BBC News - 'do you think we ought to run a newsflash on this'. In the first few minutes and before the second crash it was assumed to be an awful accident, so I gave the go ahead and that's the angle we went with. Obviously the situation changed rapidly and I spent the next how ever many hours removing songs and adverts from the running order which might have been thought of as inappropriate, and supporting the news bods to get up to date reports to air. Listening to the clips that were being sent through to us by the news agency was harrowing and some of the judgement calls we had to make, such as would our target audience really want to hear a live report describing people jumping from the upper floors of the buildings, were truly unreal. |  | | |
| Your 911 memories... on 12:38 - Sep 10 with 1062 views | allezlesbleus |
I had just bought a very run down property in rural Normandy and was blissfully unaware of what had happened. After a tiring day renovating, my sister went to the top of the hill nearby, to get mobile phone reception, to phone her (relatively new) boyfriend.
She came back a while later and said "I'm not sure if he is joking or not, but my boyfriend has just said that 2 planes had crashed into the WTC". I said "Why would someone even think about making a joke like that, so it must be true and if so, it would be the biggest terrorist attack in memory".
It was very surreal being so unaware of such a major event and as we didn't have tv, it wasn't until a few days later when we returned to Ipswich and saw exactly what had happened, that it all sunk in.
The only silver lining was that Ipswich were due to play Torpedo Moscow in the UEFA cup that Wednesday (or Thursday?) and I would have missed the home game, because I was in France. The game was postponed for a week, so I was able to attend that match, plus the other 5 home and away European matches that season. |  | | |
| Your 911 memories... on 12:42 - Sep 10 with 1057 views | Lesta_Tractor |
| Your 911 memories... on 10:50 - Sep 10 by Sparky85 |
I was in 6th form at the time. Had a free period so I was in a room with a TV, which I had on when I shouldn't. Didn't know it had happened at the time and can remember watching it in a bit of a daze. Head of 6th form walked in and shouted at me for having the TV on, so I Just pointed at the screen and can remember the look on his face even now. Wasn't long after the 2nd plane hit.
The memory of the day is a bit of a daze but for some reason I always remember the look on his face when he realized what I was watching |
Not sure of how it lines up time wise but I remember being in an A Level Biology class when I first heard what had happened |  |
| |
| Your 911 memories... on 13:02 - Sep 10 with 1049 views | CaptainAhab |
A fairly pointless aside, but I visited New York with my family a couple of years before 911 and went up the Twin Towers (well one of them anyway). The day after the attacks I got out the souvenir photo we had taken there to check the date; you guessed it, September 11 1999. |  | | |
| Your 911 memories... on 13:20 - Sep 10 with 1026 views | IpswichKnight |
Was working for an airline in central London, found out via R5 what was happening. We did have a plane on route to JFK that day it turned around about 1/2 way there and headed back to its base in Europe. We did have to find out from Dublin, Manchester and LHR if we could get it a landing spot incase it didn’t have the fuel for the trip back to Europe. | | | |
| Your 911 memories... on 13:43 - Sep 10 with 1014 views | ITFC_Forever |
I was in Milton Keynes for a morning meeting the first week or two into a new job.
Came out of the meeting and went to Staples to pick up some bits and pieces, then started to head back to IP2.
The news came on Radio 1 and I wasn't really paying attention and heard them mention a plane crash in New York and thought they were talking about a smallish light aircraft that had crashed.
Then heard "Twin Towers" and was still not paying full attention, I thought they were talking about the Wembley refurbishment that was going on at the time. It was only then I started paying full attention and the enormity of what was going on dawned.
Drove the rest of the way home listening to Radio 5, scarcely believing what I was hearing. |  |
| |
| Your 911 memories... on 14:31 - Sep 10 with 974 views | PhilTWTD |
Got in the car having interviewed John Wark for his Warky Talky TWTD column at the Black Tiles in Martlesham and heard what were initially confused reports about a plane hitting the WTC.
Once I got home I followed it on TV and on here for the rest of the day. One TWTD user, I forget who I'm afraid, was, if I remember rightly, meant to have travelled for a meeting there that day as he worked for a company that it subsequently emerged lost a lot of staff. RIP. |  | | |
| Your 911 memories... on 15:04 - Sep 10 with 932 views | Steve_M |
That whole thing, from two generations beforehand, about people knowing where they were when they heard Kennedy had been shot came into stark relief that day as this thread demonstrates.
I was at work, we picked up on it fairly early and followed it on the internet, mainly BBC News and TWTD. The same general sense of disbelief, followed by people hearing malicious rumours of planes heading for various European cities.
There was a lighter moment, a couple of hours after the first news, when someone in the office got an e-mail and turned round to say "Apparently, a plane has flown into the World Trade Centre", no idea how he had not heard the conversation. Well, actually I do but it was still funny despite everything else.
I don't know if I walked home or got the tube that day, hadn't been in London long at that point but I just put the tv on and watched that all night. |  |
| |
Login to get fewer ads
| Your 911 memories... on 15:11 - Sep 10 with 931 views | benrhyddingblue |
Living and working in London back then. Forgot I had a business lunch and had to go back home to get suited up, returned from said lunch to news of the first plane hitting a tower.
Our company was holding in a conference at the Windows on the World in one of the towers and we were told they'd been evacuated. So we all went down the pub to watch it unfold further.
I'd been to the Windows on the World bar a few years before and as I watching couldn't understand how they had been evacuated given the plane impact was below that level. The evacuation had just been moving rooms, we now believe, and we ended up losing 20 people, which out of a company of around 200 employees was very hard. I knew 15 of them, and five were people I'd regularly go for a drink with after work. A very tough time, still feel emotional just writing this. | | | |
| Your 911 memories... on 17:12 - Sep 10 with 867 views | Chondzoresk |
I was in between appointments. On Aldeburgh High Street. Listening on TalkSport. Then when I got to my next appointment they were in stunned shock. We sat down and watched the events unfold. Only when I got home that evening did I realise how awful it all was. Horrific. Still think there is more behind the atrocities than anyone was or is letting on. |  | | |
| Your 911 memories... on 20:18 - Sep 10 with 801 views | Bluespeed225 |
I was in the Constantine Road ticket sorting out Moscow Visa forms . 8 months later I was living in NY, used to go running along river down to a then almost cleared Ground Zero. It was a fantastic summer in NY, a real sense of coming out of the darkness. We did have a power cut one Saturday when a power station had a fire, that did get a few bums twitching and eyes to the skies as smoke bellowed up and over the city. | | | |
| Your 911 memories... on 23:33 - Sep 10 with 749 views | ronnyd |
Was walking with wife along the North Norfolk coast on a holiday. Went into a pub on the front in Sheringham and it was on the T/V in the bar. Took a few seconds to sink in what the hell was going on. | | | |
| Your 911 memories... on 23:33 - Sep 10 with 746 views | BlueForYou |
I had an apartment near Denver at the time. We were starting off on a road trip around Utah, left at around 6am, along I/70 I stopped at a Denny’s Diner at Glenwood Springs for some breakfast. Couldn’t work out why so many folk were crowded around the TV until I went over & asked. My only words were Bin Laden. Mountain time is two hours ahead of the East Coast. A very surreal day, continued the journey to the lovely town of Moab, not sure what would happen. There was talk on the car radio of closing all state borders, the military taking charge, no flights anywhere. There was no airport security for internal flights back then, it was very naive but beautifully easy to use. It really & sadly was an accident ready to happen. The Americans had no idea what was going on & were blissfully ignorant about Al Qaeda. Had some very interesting conversations at the time. Horrific day for New York. |  | | |
| Your 911 memories... on 02:00 - Sep 11 with 666 views | Ryorry |
I first learnt about it on here, happened to be on at the time when someone (sorry I can't recall who) actually in the USA posted an "OMG turn on your TVs, a plane has just flown into the Twin Towers" post, followed by further reports of people falling or jumping to their deaths. Still sends chills & horror down my spine.
Also remember Guthers calling it right re the perpetrators - I don't think many of us had heard of Al Qaeda or bin Laden until then. |  |
| |
| |
By continuing to use the site, you agree to our use of cookies and to abide by our Terms and Conditions.
