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kuangningThis is the last of the article. It's no easier to read than the rest, but it is worth it. Providing, of course, that it isn't just words to you.
9:45
South Tower, 105th Floor, 14 minutes to collapse
Minutes after the second plane struck the south tower, Roko Camaj called home to report that a throng had gathered near the roof, according to his son, Vinny Camaj. "I'm on the 105th floor," Roko Camaj told his wife. "There's at least 200 people here."
The promise of sanctuary on the roof had seemed so logical, so irresistible, that scores of people chased their fates up the stairs. They were blind alleys.
Mr. Camaj, a window washer who had been featured in a children's book, carried the key to the roof, his son said. That key alone would not open its door: a buzzer also had to be pressed by the security staff in a command post on the 22nd floor. And the post had been damaged and evacuated.
The roof seemed like an obvious choice - and the only one - to people on the upper floors. A police helicopter had evacuated people from the roof of the north tower in February 1993, after a terrorist bomb exploded in the basement. For a variety of reasons, though, the Port Authority, with the agreement of the Fire Department, discouraged helicopters as part of its evacuation plan. Police commanders ruled out a rooftop rescue that morning.
Whatever the wisdom of the policy, it came as a shock to many people trapped in the towers, according to their families and summaries of 911 calls. Only a few realized that Stairway A could take them down to safety, and that information never circled back upstairs from those escaping or from the authorities. Frank Doyle, a trader at Keefe, Bruyette & Woods, called his wife, Kimmy Chedell, to remind her of his love for her and the children. She recalls he also said: "I've gone up to the roof and the rooftop doors are locked. You need to call 911 and tell them we're trapped."
The 105th floor was the last stop for many of those who had climbed toward the roof, a crowd dominated by Aon employees. At 9:27, a man called 911 and said a group was in the north conference room on the 105th floor. At 9:32, a man on the 105th floor called 911 and asked that the roof be opened. At 9:38, Kevin Cosgrove, a fire warden for Aon, called 911, then rang his brother.
Sean Rooney called Beverly Eckert. They had met at a high school dance in Buffalo, when they were both 16. They had just turned 50 together.
He had tried to go down but was stymied, then had climbed 30 floors or so to the locked roof. Now he wanted to plot a way out, so he had his wife describe the fire's location from the TV pictures. He could not fathom why the roof was locked, she said. She urged him to try again while she dialed 911 on another line. He put the phone down, then returned minutes later, saying the roof door would not budge. He had pounded on it.
"He was worried about the flames," Ms. Eckert recalled. "I kept telling him they weren't anywhere near him. He said, but the windows were hot. His breathing was becoming more labored."
Ceilings were caving in. Floors were buckling. Phone calls were being cut off. He was alone in a room filling with smoke. They said goodbye.
"He was telling me he loved me."
"Then you could hear the loud explosion."
10:00
North Tower, 92nd Floor, Carr Futures, 28 minutes to collapse
"Mom," asked Jeffrey Nussbaum. "What was that explosion?"
Twenty miles away in Oceanside, N.Y., Arline Nussbaum could see on television what her son could not from 50 yards away. She recalls their last words:
"The other tower just went down," Mrs. Nussbaum said.
"Oh my God," her son said. "I love you."
Then the phone went dead.
The north tower, which had been hit 16 minutes before the south, was still standing. It was dying, more slowly, but just as surely. The calls were dwindling. The number of people falling from windows accelerated.
That morning, the office of Carr Futures on the 92nd floor was unusually busy. A total of 68 men and women were on the floor that morning, 67 of them associated with Carr.
About two dozen brokers for Carr's parent company had been called to a special 8 a.m. meeting. When the building sprang back and forth like a car antenna, door frames twisted and jammed shut, trapping a number of them in a conference room.
The remaining Carr employees, about 40, migrated to a large, unfinished space along the west side. Jeffrey Nussbaum called his mother, and shared his cellphone with Andy Friedman. In all, the Carr families have counted 31 calls from the people they lost, according to Joan Dincuff, whose son, Christopher, died that morning.
Carr was two floors below the impact, and everyone there had survived it; yet they could not get out. Between 10:05 and 10:25, videos show, fire spread westward across the 92nd floor's north face, bearing down on their western refuge.
At 10:18, Tom McGinnis, one of the traders summoned to the special meeting, reached his wife, Iliana McGinnis. The words are stitched into her memory.
"This looks really, really bad," he said.
"I know," said Mrs. McGinnis, who had been hoping that his meeting had broken up before the airplane hit. "This is bad for the country; it looks like World War III."
Something in the tone of her husband's answer alarmed Mrs. McGinnis.
"Are you O.K., yes or no?" she demanded.
"We're on the 92nd floor in a room we can't get out of," Mr. McGinnis said.
"Who's with you?" she asked. Mr. McGinnis mentioned three old friends - Joey Holland, Brendan Dolan and Elkin Yuen.
"I love you," Mr. McGinnis said. "Take care of Caitlin." Mrs. McGinnis was not ready to hear a farewell.
"Don't lose your cool," she urged. "You guys are so tough, you're resourceful. You guys are going to get out of there."
"You don't understand," Mr. McGinnis said. "There are people jumping from the floors above us."
It was 10:25. The fire raged along the west side of the 92nd floor. People fell from windows. Mr. McGinnis again told her he loved her and their daughter, Caitlin.
"Don't hang up," Mrs. McGinnis pleaded.
"I got to get down on the floor," Mr. McGinnis said.
With that, the phone connection faded out.
It was 10:26, two minutes before the tower crumbled. The World Trade Center had fallen silent.
I started reading it much earlier - I haven't yet been able to read it straight through. And![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
kenhighcountry has already said almost everything I could say, better than I could have said it. But I'm going to borrow the one line from him, and also add the only thing I can add. What I see in the account isn't just heroism, horror, shock, a Cause. All of those are there if you look for them, and so much more - but above and beyond them, I see humanity. The best and the worst of it - of us. And right now, it's a stunning thing to me, that I was born a part of this race that can do such things, be such things. Ken said: We are the living, and it is our responsibility to live. To me, right this second, it seems that it's also our responsibility to live up to this label of humanity that we take for granted so often.
9:45
South Tower, 105th Floor, 14 minutes to collapse
Minutes after the second plane struck the south tower, Roko Camaj called home to report that a throng had gathered near the roof, according to his son, Vinny Camaj. "I'm on the 105th floor," Roko Camaj told his wife. "There's at least 200 people here."
The promise of sanctuary on the roof had seemed so logical, so irresistible, that scores of people chased their fates up the stairs. They were blind alleys.
Mr. Camaj, a window washer who had been featured in a children's book, carried the key to the roof, his son said. That key alone would not open its door: a buzzer also had to be pressed by the security staff in a command post on the 22nd floor. And the post had been damaged and evacuated.
The roof seemed like an obvious choice - and the only one - to people on the upper floors. A police helicopter had evacuated people from the roof of the north tower in February 1993, after a terrorist bomb exploded in the basement. For a variety of reasons, though, the Port Authority, with the agreement of the Fire Department, discouraged helicopters as part of its evacuation plan. Police commanders ruled out a rooftop rescue that morning.
Whatever the wisdom of the policy, it came as a shock to many people trapped in the towers, according to their families and summaries of 911 calls. Only a few realized that Stairway A could take them down to safety, and that information never circled back upstairs from those escaping or from the authorities. Frank Doyle, a trader at Keefe, Bruyette & Woods, called his wife, Kimmy Chedell, to remind her of his love for her and the children. She recalls he also said: "I've gone up to the roof and the rooftop doors are locked. You need to call 911 and tell them we're trapped."
The 105th floor was the last stop for many of those who had climbed toward the roof, a crowd dominated by Aon employees. At 9:27, a man called 911 and said a group was in the north conference room on the 105th floor. At 9:32, a man on the 105th floor called 911 and asked that the roof be opened. At 9:38, Kevin Cosgrove, a fire warden for Aon, called 911, then rang his brother.
Sean Rooney called Beverly Eckert. They had met at a high school dance in Buffalo, when they were both 16. They had just turned 50 together.
He had tried to go down but was stymied, then had climbed 30 floors or so to the locked roof. Now he wanted to plot a way out, so he had his wife describe the fire's location from the TV pictures. He could not fathom why the roof was locked, she said. She urged him to try again while she dialed 911 on another line. He put the phone down, then returned minutes later, saying the roof door would not budge. He had pounded on it.
"He was worried about the flames," Ms. Eckert recalled. "I kept telling him they weren't anywhere near him. He said, but the windows were hot. His breathing was becoming more labored."
Ceilings were caving in. Floors were buckling. Phone calls were being cut off. He was alone in a room filling with smoke. They said goodbye.
"He was telling me he loved me."
"Then you could hear the loud explosion."
10:00
North Tower, 92nd Floor, Carr Futures, 28 minutes to collapse
"Mom," asked Jeffrey Nussbaum. "What was that explosion?"
Twenty miles away in Oceanside, N.Y., Arline Nussbaum could see on television what her son could not from 50 yards away. She recalls their last words:
"The other tower just went down," Mrs. Nussbaum said.
"Oh my God," her son said. "I love you."
Then the phone went dead.
The north tower, which had been hit 16 minutes before the south, was still standing. It was dying, more slowly, but just as surely. The calls were dwindling. The number of people falling from windows accelerated.
That morning, the office of Carr Futures on the 92nd floor was unusually busy. A total of 68 men and women were on the floor that morning, 67 of them associated with Carr.
About two dozen brokers for Carr's parent company had been called to a special 8 a.m. meeting. When the building sprang back and forth like a car antenna, door frames twisted and jammed shut, trapping a number of them in a conference room.
The remaining Carr employees, about 40, migrated to a large, unfinished space along the west side. Jeffrey Nussbaum called his mother, and shared his cellphone with Andy Friedman. In all, the Carr families have counted 31 calls from the people they lost, according to Joan Dincuff, whose son, Christopher, died that morning.
Carr was two floors below the impact, and everyone there had survived it; yet they could not get out. Between 10:05 and 10:25, videos show, fire spread westward across the 92nd floor's north face, bearing down on their western refuge.
At 10:18, Tom McGinnis, one of the traders summoned to the special meeting, reached his wife, Iliana McGinnis. The words are stitched into her memory.
"This looks really, really bad," he said.
"I know," said Mrs. McGinnis, who had been hoping that his meeting had broken up before the airplane hit. "This is bad for the country; it looks like World War III."
Something in the tone of her husband's answer alarmed Mrs. McGinnis.
"Are you O.K., yes or no?" she demanded.
"We're on the 92nd floor in a room we can't get out of," Mr. McGinnis said.
"Who's with you?" she asked. Mr. McGinnis mentioned three old friends - Joey Holland, Brendan Dolan and Elkin Yuen.
"I love you," Mr. McGinnis said. "Take care of Caitlin." Mrs. McGinnis was not ready to hear a farewell.
"Don't lose your cool," she urged. "You guys are so tough, you're resourceful. You guys are going to get out of there."
"You don't understand," Mr. McGinnis said. "There are people jumping from the floors above us."
It was 10:25. The fire raged along the west side of the 92nd floor. People fell from windows. Mr. McGinnis again told her he loved her and their daughter, Caitlin.
"Don't hang up," Mrs. McGinnis pleaded.
"I got to get down on the floor," Mr. McGinnis said.
With that, the phone connection faded out.
It was 10:26, two minutes before the tower crumbled. The World Trade Center had fallen silent.
I started reading it much earlier - I haven't yet been able to read it straight through. And
kenhighcountry has already said almost everything I could say, better than I could have said it. But I'm going to borrow the one line from him, and also add the only thing I can add. What I see in the account isn't just heroism, horror, shock, a Cause. All of those are there if you look for them, and so much more - but above and beyond them, I see humanity. The best and the worst of it - of us. And right now, it's a stunning thing to me, that I was born a part of this race that can do such things, be such things. Ken said: We are the living, and it is our responsibility to live. To me, right this second, it seems that it's also our responsibility to live up to this label of humanity that we take for granted so often.
Re: Fighting to Live as the Towers Died
Date: 2002-05-27 10:25 am (UTC)