I was actually six blocks south of the World Trade Center at work when this attack happened. I heard about the first plane, and SAW the second plane hit. Once the second plane hit we knew it was terrorism and left our building. Not thinking clearly (as one tends not to do in shock) we did not immediately leave the area, but gathered with thousands of other folk in Battery Park away from all other tall buildings. We were in the park for a while trying to determine how to get home (I live in Westchester about 30 minutes north of the city), when the first tower fell.

The noise, the dust, the vision of the building falling, I cannot even fully recall the horror. We started running through the choking smoke and ash, up the FDR highway. We were walking dazed for what I now figure to be an hour, but it felt like moments. I (in true black woman fashion) had an umbrella that helped to keep the larger pieces of ash and dust from covering me, but I was still covered. We walked to canal street, a point where the air was clean. Along the way I was offered assistance for climbing over some obstacles (the kindness of strangers) and was amazed when people stopped to calm strangers.

I was with my boss and another colleague. As we passed cops (picking up hysterical people) and others calming raving mad men (this when the second tower fell), I saw the look of blank shock on every face.

While we trudged along, I saw an empty bus. I said out loud to my companions that I wish a bus would stop and just let people on. Right then the bus stopped. It was a B line bus (they only run in Westchester County). We got on the bus; oddly there were other people that I work with getting on the bus though we did not see them while walking.

It turns out that the driver had just ended his run and decided to be a Good Samaritan and take people north through Manhattan just to help out. He was also going all the way to Westchester, where his last stop was two blocks from my boss's mother's house. Talk about a heaven-sent miracle. I was home (dusty and tired) by noon.

I am very fortunate that my lack of immediate action (the subways were still running before the buildings collapsed) did not cause me actual harm. I now know that if I am in a situation like this again (which I have had a fill of for my life time) that I am going to follow the wise example of my colleague, whose only instinct was to leave the scene as fast as possible. He was on a train home to Westchester prior to the collapse of the first tower.

unbound Special Report

Of Madness and Miracles