Letter From the Editor: Where Were You on September 11?

Photo: Taken by retired Det. Lt. Joe Capriotti

This day should be just another day on our calendars. It is a week after Labor Day, a weekend for residents of the Garden State that signals the end of our beautiful summers at the shore and the beginning, for many, of the school year, soccer practice, switching flip flop sandals for boots, and counting the days until pumpkin spice-flavored coffee becomes available.

The mornings this time of year are refreshingly cooler, and people are still have a little bit of that extra summer vacation energy then in the coming weeks, when we become burdened by things like holiday preparation, which seems to start earlier and earlier each fall. It was a day exactly like this, in 2001, when terrorists invaded our every day lives, and acted out a string of atrocious attacks that ensured this date will never again be just another day on our calendars.

It is now thirteen years later, and we are still carrying the memories of that day of September 11, 2001, and the images are still just as vivid in our minds and heavy in our hearts as they were in the hours following that fateful moment when the first plane struck the World Trade Center at 8:46 a.m.

One image that many cannot shake from their memories is that of something unique to residents of New Jersey, as the great commuter state, and that is the disturbing sight of all of the cars that remained in bus and train station parking lots, unmoved for days following September 11, as we realized just how many of our own people were taken so violently from us, and were not coming back.

Another image forever seared into the memories of hundreds of us here in New Jersey is that of the New York City skyline in the hours after the attacks, when many of gathered on the shores of places like Sandy Hook and Atlantic Highlands, staring at disbelief at the billowing smoke snaking the short distance across the water between New Jersey and our famous neighbor.

The smoke, of course, has long blown away, but what remains is an emptiness, where the Twin Towers once stood- those symbols of prosperity and global unity, of everything New York City and indeed America stand for. We had stared at that skyline for so long, we could trace it with our eyes closed in our mind. That familiarity was violated in a way that so few of us can fully grasp, to this day, and we are still trying to learn the new shape of the famous New York City skyline, because it just does not seem quite right without those towers there. Is there any other skyscraper in that silhouette that is so easily identifiable to us in New Jersey as the Twin Towers were?

New Jersey has long held honors bestowed upon us by New York City that we would rather not have. They claim sports teams as our own, but play on our soil. The Big Apple calls the Statue of Liberty its own symbol of freedom, but they placed it on New Jersey territory and muffle our protestations much like an older bullying brother elbowing us aside to take the spotlight.

But we do love that city, don’t we? And now, because of the events of that day, our bond with New York is forever unbreakable. We experienced something with that city that we can never forget, never quite heal from, but can continue to comfort one another with a deeply personal understanding that only victims of a tragedy can do.

In the comments below, or on our Patch Facebook pages, I would like to give you all a place to reflect on where you were when the World Trade Center was struck or when the towers ultimately fell. Some of you may have been working in New York City, and stranded, helpless to reach your loved ones, as the city descended into chaos amid scenes of war and destruction that so few of us thought we would ever see in our own country, let alone what many feel is the greatest city we have to offer the world.

Brendan Read, a Monmouth County resident and Patch reader, submitted his story to Patch, recalling how he and his family were thrown into the mayhem of fear and desperation to understand what was happening around them in Manhattan, and how he and his wife struggled to make it home to New Jersey, while his step-son, a first responder, fought to get in to the city to begin rescue work:

“My wife and I were commuting from our then-home on Staten Island to our employers in Midtown, Manhattan. As my wife didn’t like taking the subway, we boarded the M6 bus at Whitehall Street. We passed by the towers, watching the people stream out of the PATH station, going to Wall Street. A few minutes later the bus driver looked into the rear view mirror and screamed, “The World Trade Center is on fire!” All of the passengers rushed to one side of the bus and tried to see the smoke billowing from the North Tower.

I got out at my stop on 23rd Street and looked down 6th Avenue. A small, white van parked nearby had the news coverage. Spectators surrounded the van and spoke about how it was a small plane [that had struck the towers] and it was an accident.

I thought to myself, “No.”

Moments later I saw the second plane hit the South Tower in a cloud of orange flames, then debris, and smoke.

I walked to my office, got on the phone with my wife and said, ”We’re getting out of here.” As our offices were located near Madison Square Garden and the Empire State Building, and no one knew just how many planes were still in the air, we were in fear of our building being hit.

My company then decided to close our offices and we evacuated. I carried my laptop, an emergency kit with hardhat (my employer was SFO-based, we were ready for earthquakes) and the weight of it all gouged a still-present scar in my shoulder. I met my wife at her office and was joined by my late sister-in-law and we walked to the W. 39th Street ferry terminal. There were long lines of passengers to board the NY Waterway ferries. Enroute my sister-in-law had a mild heart attack, and those in line in front of us let us through.

On the other side [of the water] in Weehawken, there were ambulances waiting. My wife joined her sister and they went to a nearby hospital. Meanwhile, I boarded one of the many buses to Hoboken where I caught a train to Woodbridge, and contacted a family friend to pick me up and bring me home.

Another family friend recalled to me how they were walking their dog at the time of the towers burning, and noticed an acrid odor had settled in- only later did we realize that it came from Ground Zero.

At the same time that my wife and I were trying to get out of New York City, my wife’s son, an ALS (Advanced Life Support)-trained paramedic, who was working for Lenox Hill Hospital, was called to the scene. My wife lost contact with him when the towers collapsed. We didn’t know whether he was alive or dead for two days.

She finally connected to him while she was at the hospital (my sister-in-law recovered from her heart attack, but she passed away twelve years later) and because he was a first responder, and had the authority to go through security, he was able to get her, and eventually meet to get me, and take us home to Staten Island.”

Where were you on September 11th? Please share your memories, experiences, and reflections about that tragic day below in the comments.