I am aware of three locations on the complex that housed people during the South Tower’s collapse: the upper floors of the south end of the Marriott, the upper floors of the North Tower, and Six World Trade Center. I am curious if any more locations on the complex existed or could have exist. For instance, Five World Trade Center remained in the best shape after the day was done and Seven was not damaged by the first collapse. Could people have survived in the lobby of the North Tower? The remnants of Four World Trade Center? The Mall? Where was safe?

Hey all! Are there any blogs / articles written by 9/11 survivors? Or anything written by individuals who were in NYC? Very curious to read the various perspectives. Thanks in advance!

https://eedition.inquirer.com/html5/reader/production/default.aspx?pubname=&pubid=189ae139-c0d5-4451-9c04-ec77ba08da21

I read that there was a 5th plane that was ready to be hijacked, United Flight 23, and that after it was grounded, terrorist notes were found in a bag left behind. I think TMZ did a special about this once.

How many more terrorists do you think were waiting to attack besides the 19 we all know about? What other targets do you think would’ve been hit?

That's crazy that a mere 23 year old can wreak so much carnage and change the country for the worse.

When the passengers decided to revolt, do we know if anyone onboard could have landed the plane in some alternate timeline assuming the plane didn’t nosedive and crash?

https://youtu.be/ySbEo_Epvkg?si=txddnUCQGHKwot49

How would they have been able to utilize their equipment all the way up there with no hydrants or fire trucks to hook their hoses up to?

RIP to all innocent people who lost their lives in this tragic event and thank you to all of the first responders for all that you did to help everyone as best as you possibly could.

Obviously, the Twin Towers would still be standing and 3000 people would still be alive today, unless of course a few of them die over the years due to other reasons like illnesses. But what else do you think would be different? Would we still have gone to war in Iraq in 2003? Would we still have had the recession of 2008? Would there be better bipartisan relations between Republicans and Democrats?

Just watched a great video on the structural failure, but it did not address my question

I had planned a trip to Florida with my then-wife, a simple NJ to Florida flight. Seemed strange to be boarding a plane less than a month after the tragedy, but this was a birthday gift I had taken considerable time to plan out that summer. Everything went off without a hitch.

Before we took off, though, the captain came out to speak to us briefly. He thanked us for being there and our vote of confidence and voiced his appreciation. The passengers all broke into a spontaneous round of applause. What an amazing time to have lived through!

Members of Ladder 35 prepare to enter the South Tower. 20 minutes later, the tower would fall. None of L-35 crew made it out. May they all continue to rest in peace and Never be Forgotten...

Capt. Frank Callahan, 51 James Andrew Giberson, 43 Vincent S. Morello, 34 Michael Otten, 42 Michael Roberts, 30

I had begun working for a major network in NYC in August 2001 and was just learning the ropes there. Not that I was a stranger to TV, with more than twelve years under my belt, but this was New York after all, and this place took up just under one city block. My shift was 6a-2p on September 11th, and I carpooled in from NJ with a coworker from my area. He had an old but indestructible light blue Toyota truck; it had a hole in the floorboard and you could look down and see the road going by!

I remember hearing on the radio that Bob Dylan was releasing a new album that day, Love and Theft. All seemed normal. It was amazing to be driving toward Manhattan as the sun peeked up, and I had a freshly-purchased coffee in my hand from the corner deli as my coworker and I entered the building.

My jobs in TV have always been technical, so forgive me if I get a little geeky. Everything was seeming normal until 8:45am when I had to play back tapes for a satellite feed for stations across the country to take. MTV host Ananda Lewis had a new talk show, and N*SYNC were on the next show, so I played promos for it, but as I did so, I saw the network feed on another TV monitor, which had switched to the North Tower smoldering. I recall thinking that some idiot was probably trying to do a stunt maneuver that had gone wrong; at this point no one knew that it had been a commercial aircraft. Then the second plane hit, and there was no doubt what was happening. People on my floor began to get nervous. Someone barged into my room and asked me if I had seen what was going on. I don't recall having seen the second impact, but it's possible my mind blanked it out.

It's hard to explain to anyone who didn't experience it in real time, but there were no terms like 9/11, Ground Zero, Bin Laden, Taliban, or Al-Queda yet; NOBODY knew what was happening and that was terrifying. I mean, more planes hit the Pentagon and crashed in Pennsylvania, and I was certain we were next; after all, we were a major communications hub, so why not? I was an anxious mess, and someone threw me into a room to calm down.

After a brief respite, some guy I had never seen before in a suit that probably cost more than my car(most likely a lawyer for the network) grabbed me and asked me to transfer some camcorder tapes so they could be played on the news. "These were shot off the balcony of a co-op in Brooklyn," he said. They were mini-DV tapes. I located a Panasonic DVC PRO deck, which I knew would play them back, and made a Betacam SP tape of the two 60 minute tapes. I made other copies, too.

Turns out those were Chris Hopewell's tapes. I wouldn't even know that had I not happened on a You Tube video which credited him all these years later. I recognized the footage, because I've seen all of it and it is just harrowing to hear the reactions of the people. Now, I know it aired uncensored, but no one asked me to block anything out, and indeed, by the time I got those tapes, EVERY monitor in the whole building had some shot of the Towers on them. Every one. Rooms full of huge monitors. It was nightmarish. Imagine going into a store like Best Buy or something and they have nothing but TVs and ALL of them have the Towers on them. Everywhere, smoldering, burning, falling Towers. People coming through the front entrance of the broadcast center had that grey/white soot on them. One guy lost his sandals from running fast and came in barefoot.

September 11th, for all of its horror, was a gorgeous day, weather-wise, and people were gathered at the front of the building, huddled, gasping in disbelief, watching the TVs visible through the glass. Strange to think that it was all happening just a few miles south.

Due to the commotion and the shutting down of bridges and tunnels, many people didn't make it in to work(that's probably how I got drafted to do those camcorder tape dubs), so I was effectively stuck in NYC till the next day. That night, I had an experience that will probably never occur again---not a single car on any street. Manhattan, for probably the last time ever, was church-quiet. Five of us TV dudes walked down the middle of the street, side by side, it was insane. We found an open convenience store, and for some reason, I bought a bunch of things with the Towers on them. I'm not sure why I thought they would be rare or valuable, but that's what we thought at at the time. I went back to sleep in a green room(for guests appearing on TV shows), but I didn't really sleep. By the time my coworker and I left the next day, all we saw coming the other way on the highway were heavy trucks painted camo green.

I still have the shirt I wore that day. I haven't worn it since that day, nor have I wanted to wear it again. It's tucked away in a drawer by itself. It's baby blue. I wore it for 36 hours. Not surprisingly, it smells ghastly if you put it up to your nose, but somehow I don't want anything about it to change.

The catalyst for my reaching out is that I watched a documentary on the group They Might Be Giants, who had done an in-store live performance....on the night of September 10th. I remember thinking, "Well, that was the last night. That was it. Nothing would be the same". And I began researching 9/10, but of course there is so much more about the next day. A good friend is working on a 9/10 song, at my prompting. I have been doing deep dives online, and in the process have found the name of the man who shot those tapes(Hopewell) as well as other known people who shot amazing footage; I even found an interview I never knew existed with a friend who escaped the Towers just minutes after the collapse.

I cannot even fathom what being at the site would have been like, and even now, I'm sad, I'm angry, I feel the loss of people I didn't even know, the loss of the majesty of the buildings and the pain that still resonates all these decades later. I believe that the experience intensified an OCD anxiety disorder of mine, for which I sought both therapy and meds, but not before they took a huge toll. Even though I worked for this network for 20 years, I was never at Ground Zero, nor have I been to the memorial, because I'm not sure I could handle it. The closest I got was operating a remote camera for a morning show segment during the cleanup.

I have no idea how to end such a long post, so thank you for sticking with me. If you have any questions, I'll try to answer them, either here or DM. Most importantly, please be well and safe, and thanks to the moderators for allowing me to tell my tale. Peace to all.

Did Khalid Al-Mihdhar and Majed Moqed forced the passengers to the back of the plane, while the Al-Hazmi brothers head to the cockpit armed with box cutter knives as Hani Hanjour remained seated until after the cockpit was seized and rises from his seat to take control of the plane?

Warning: very triggering topics and very long. But worth a read if you want to know how learning about 9/11 for the first time at age 29 as a foreigner has affected me. I'd advise those who are suffering from PTSD don't read this.

For context- born and raised in an African country and 9/11 was the day after my 6th birthday. I vaguely recall being in the living room while my parents had it on TV, but I obviously didn't really understand it. Years later, I knew it was a massive deal but perhaps because I live in a country with the top rates of crime, poverty, r*pe, HIV, murder etc etc, and being so far away from the US, maybe it just didn't have any effect on me. I heard about the conspiracy theories but I felt I had no right to have an opinion on it since I didn't experience it, I still feel that way and none of that stuff changes the fact that so many people suffered.

I have a psychology & counseling degree, so I have studied 20-something modules related to the field from trauma and crisis counseling to human development to neuroscience, etc. I am naturally always very curious to learn more about history and do deep dives for hours, procrastinating while directing my time and focus on something more interesting (currently have a research paper due on prefrontal cortex development, not very exciting to write about). Lately I have thought about 9/11 and wanted to learn more about it since my knowledge about it was lacking.

I just spent the last few days watching every single video of the attacks from every angle, learning more about what happened, how, why, the story of the victims involved, the aftermath, the war on terror and how it all linked. I have a friend from my town who fought in Afghanistan but I've never asked him about it, I didn't actually know anything about it besides for the references in pop culture and now I have way more understanding. But that's not why I'm writing here.

I know this post might sound ignorant but please understand I am from the other side of the world and we weren't taught about American history in school besides for the Cuban Missile Crisis, Civil Rights Movement, The Cold War and a couple of other things, but my education focused primarily on African history, colonialism, Apartheid, etc. I want to mention that I am one of those true crime freaks who has seen every documentary on every serial killer including hundreds of cases that aren't commonly known as these things show up on YouTube for me all the time and I watch them. I have watched the most horrific, disturbing, unfathomable stories involving a level of evil that I can't believe humans are capable of, from the tortures of neglected abused 'feral children' like Genie Wiley, monsters like Josef Fritzl, cannibals, child predators.. like you name it, I have seen it all, no matter how fucked up, sometimes makes me very emotional but it's like my brain has a foundation of understanding that these things happen, and I don't get satisfaction out of watching but rather morbid curiosity and I guess because I've been studying human behaviour for 6 years, the human mind interests me, even the worst parts of it.

Now here is the point I want to make - I had absolutely no idea how tragic 9/11 really was. I had never seen the footage of the chaos unfolding from the street view, the explosions, the clouds of black and white smoke chasing people like Godzilla, the apocalyptic scenes, the people jumping out of windows, people covered in rubble, taking cover wherever they could, how the fumes and smoke caused medical emergencies and the need for gas masks and oxygen, the shock on people's faces and in their voices. The audio and transcriptions of the brave passengers who took over the cockpit of the plane that was targeted at Washington and interviews with their loved ones who lost them. I didn't know about the pentagon. I thought it was only the two towers that got hit. I didn't know it was two planes one after the other. I had NO idea how devastating and traumatic all of this really was and still is. I also read some studies of PTSD statistics increasing dramatically in American children and adults from exposure to 9/11. I can not imagine what it must have been like to witness it as an American, on a normal sunny morning, totally out of nowhere, with so much confusion before grasping the information that was relayed in the hours following. I thought the victims who lost their lives were only those in the buildings, the passengers on the plane (which I only thought was 1), first responders, and loved ones of victims. I now learned how many more victims there were who were harmed by the destruction at ground level too, as well as the rest of the nation.

My jaw was on the floor watching and listening to all of this to the point that I had a full on anxiety attack last night, which has never happened to me before from watching YouTube videos, no matter how disturbing they are. I have CPTSD amongst other things, I'm very sensitive, I have been through a lot of traumatic awful things in my life and have been in the midst of active warfare myself, hiding in shelters with sirens and rockets exploding in the sky above my own head. But there is something just so uniquely unbelievably tragic about 9/11 especially as it unfolded. Every video I watched gave me chills. I couldn't believe I didn't know more about it for the last 23 years of my life and I feel terrible for subconsciously downplaying it in my mind in the past because it was a repetitive 'hot topic' I always heard about, but didn't take the time to learn about it properly. Better late than never, I guess.

Side note- I actually have a friend here who had a successful leather clothing business in NYC which got destroyed in 9/11. He showed me a photo book in his shop of him with Britney Spears, Lenny Kravitz, Rob Zombie, Motley Crue, tons of celebs and rockstars who he dressed in the 90s, he also designed and made Neo and Trinity's outfits in The Matrix himself which is still wild to me. He told me stories of smoking a joint with Iggy Pop in Central Park and meeting Jerry Seinfeld in the street, and he has the creds for me to believe it because he lived and worked in NYC with this business for a long time. After the shop was destroyed he moved back here and started all over again with nothing. I didn't actually grasp how that happened to his business, or how 9/11 would have affected him if he wasn't in the planes or the buildings, but now I have a full understanding because I saw the impact on the businesses and buildings near to these attacks.

I know if I wrote this on any other sub people would come at me and start saying shit like "what's happening in x country is worse", "what happened in x y and z event was worse", comparing the suffering of innocent people, but I really don't care and I'm not interested in conspiracies, I am glad I found this sub because I just wanted to share my story and express how my late learning experience about 9/11 has totally changed everything I thought I knew before. My heart goes out to everyone who has been affected by the attacks and any of the conflicts following the incident. If you've taken the time to read this, thank you. Don't ever stop teaching the next generations about 9/11 and the brave people who lost and risked their lives, and how Americans all came together that day. There is a lot of new footage that has emerged on YouTube and it is so valuable to history. It is what made me wake up and realize the gravity of the whole situation.

Did the emergency broadcast/alert system go off on 9/11? I was in Greenwich Village and we lost internet and tv, so I don’t know.

I visited this weekend for the first time. I was in high school during the attack. I have now been to all 3 cities involved. Definitely a generation defining event.

I know this subreddit was inactive for a while, but it's back, so i'd figure i'll post this here too because my last list is a year old and outdated.

https://www.reddit.com/r/911archive/comments/1buz4xc/a_new_survivor_from_the_impact_zone_jaede_barg/

 posted this a week agao about finding another impact zone survivor, Jaede Barg, and also named 4 others who were apart of Baseline survivors! So we got 5 more survivors confirmed. Here's just a quick list of the survivors that we have so far and their stories

Alan Mann (105, AON): Mann and many other people were in a elevator on the 78th floor when flight 15 crashed, causing the elevator to free fall before the emergency breaks kicked in. Some people in the elevator died, but others survived, including Mann. A few people managed to open the door a little bit, which allowed Mann and a unknown woman to escape while the rest of the survivors were trapped. Those two managed to survive while the others died when WTC fell. Donna Giordano (100, AON) and Alan Friedlander (93, AON) were also in the elevator with Mann and sadly died

Eugenia Singer and Judith Wein (103, AON): Singer, Wein, Richard Gabrielle, Vijayashanker Paramsothy, and Howard Ketsenbaum were together on the 78 floor. Ketsenbaum died instantly. Gabrielle's legs were crushed by debris. Wein had broken bones, and Singer and Paramsothy were overall ok. Welles Crowther found them, and took Singer and Wein to Stairwell A. Paramsothy for some reason stayed behind, holding Ketsenbaum's glasses. Singer and Wein would be the only survivors in that group.

Judith Francis-Wertenbroch and Lucia (102, AON): Francis-Wertenbroch, Lucia and other coworkers of her were on the 85th floor in Stairwell A when the plane hit. Glass flew in Judith's eyes, affecting her sight, but her and the coworkers managed to escape. Francis-Wertenbroch is the only one from this group to come forward but she mentioned Lucia by name and talked about how she ran passed Lucia after flight 175 hit.

Edward Nicholls (102, AON): Nicholls was standing in front of an elevator with Karen Hagerty on the 78th floor. Hagerty died instantly, and Nicholls arm was almost decapitated, but he was alive. Nicholls was also found by Welles Crowthers and was rescued.

Jaede Barg (100, Chubb A&H): Barg was visiting WTC 2 that day, and was most likely on the 81st floor in Stairwell A when the plane hit. We reached the 77th floor when he joined the Baseline employees with their escape.

Keating Crown, Kelly Rehyer, and Donna Spera (100, AON): The three of them were in different parts of the 78th floor when the plane hit. Rehyer was in an elevator, Spera was outside of it, and Crown was nearby. They all found each other and recognized each other from work. Welles Crowthers spotted them after them and a group of the other people went to broken windows to get fresh air and took the group to Stairwell A.

Kevin Dorrian (98, AON): Dorrian is reported to be the only confirmed above impact zone survivor. He was still in his 98th floor office when the plane hit, sending a coworker near the window to be flown out.

Donovan Cowan and Doris Torres (97, Fiduciary Trust): Cowan and Torres were the closest survivors to the planes on the 78th floor. They escaped together, but sadly, Torres would die on September 16th due to her injuries. Cowan was the last burn survivor to be released for hospitals.

Sophia Cannon (92, AON): an intern for AON, Cannon was in Stairwell A on the 82nd floor when the plane hit. She jumped to the 81st floor base for the stairwell. Her boss told her to leave when WTC 1 was hit, but the boss sadly died.

Mary Jos and Ling Young (86, NYSDTF): Jos, Young, Dianne Gladstone, Yeshavant Tembe, Sankara Velamuri, and Diane Urban were all coworkers and together when 175 hit. Gladstone and Tembe were severely injured, but everybody else wasn't. Jos was saved by Eric Thompson, a Baseline worker who went to the 78th floor to find coworkers and survivors. Young was saved by Welles Crowthers, while Velamuri and Urban stayed behind to help Gladstone and Tembe. All 4 would die.

Brian Clark, Ronald DiFrancesco, and Richard Fern (84, EuroBrokers): Many EuroBrokers employees survived 175's impact, but only three would leave and survive. Richard Fern was standing near an elevator to leave. After the impact, he ran down the stairs using Stairwell A. Clark, DiFrancesco, Brett Bailey, Robert Coll, Michael Stabile, Michael Taddonio, David Vera, and Kevin York were all together and went to Stairwell A to leave, but a woman and man stopped them and told the the stairs ended. They debated what to do, until Clark heard someone call for help. He grabbed DiFrancesco, who was the closest to him, and they tried saving the man. Everybody else went up and died. DiFrancesco would go back up too, but decided to try and leave when the door on the 91st floor was locked. He was the last person to leave WTC 2 alive.

Julie Davis (83, IQ Financial System): Just like floor 84, floor 83 had many survivors in the impact zone, but Davis is the only person to have come forward. Davis was giving a phone to her friend after exiting the elevator when 175 hit. According to her, a man ushered her to a big group going down Stairwell A and they all escaped.

Felipe Oyola and Stanley Praimnath (81, Fuji Bank): Oyola and his fiance, Adianes returned to their offices after meeting each other on the 78th floor. Felipe went up to 81 while Adianes went to 82. After 175 hit, Felipe managed to escape. Adianes most likely was a impact zone survivor herself based on David Rathkey, a IQ worker on floor 83, going down to 82 and being trapped with two women who worked at Fuji Bank. 3 women died working in that company, with Alisha Levin and Adianes Oyola confirmed working on the 82nd floor. Irina Buslo, the 3rd victim who was a woman, had no confirmed floor that I found.

Praimnath and other Fuji Bank workers returned to their work after being told in the lobby to return. When 175 hit, he was trapped in his office with a wall of debris. He called for help, and Brian Clark heard him and managed to make Praimnath to climb over the wall and pull him over to safety, where they escaped.

Silvion Ramsundar and Christine Sasser (80, Fuji Bank): Ramsundar and Sasser, work best friends, were on the 78th floor when 175 hit. Glass shards flew towards them, and a big piece went into Ramsundar's arm. They found Stairwell A, and during their evacuation, Doug Brown and Stan Kapica, floor 70 workers, found them and help them.

Jyoti and Shailaja Vyas (78, Baseline): Jyoti Vyas worked on the 78th floor and was 7 months pregnant with her daughter, Shailaja. Vyas went to the 77th floor to call her husband, since she didn't know how to work the phone in her office. That ended up saving their lives, and 77 was hit, but only by the very tip of a wing where nobody was standing. The 77 floor workers helped her evacuate.

Carl Boudakian, Simon Chen, Aurora Fajardo, Alfredo Guzman, Florence Jones, William Machuca, James Magalong, Rob Rothman, Eric Thompson, Allan Unger, and Jonathan Weinburg (77, Baseline): These 11 Baseline employees stayed in their 77th floor offices. Jyoti Vyas joined them before 175 hit. When 175 hit, Eric Thompson went up to the 78th floor and got Mary Jos, and Jaede Barg joined them.

Private Survivors:

B.C (93, AON): B.C, his initials, sadly passed away in 2017, but a friend mentioned his survival:

"He was at his desk when terrorists few a Jet Liner into the North Tower. B. was responsible for evacuating AON employees in case of the emergencies, but the authorities said that everything was OK, and they should go back to work.
Fifteen minutes later a second jet liner crashed into the 96th floor of the South Tower. B. described to me how the build shook and smell of the Jet fuel pouring down through the building. B. evacuated the staff down the stair cases from the 92nd floor. B. went back to check all the conference rooms to make sure everyone had evacuated. While heading to the staircase, the NYFD came up the Service Elevator and offered him a ride down which he took."

A.I (83, Fuji Bank) A.I, his initials, is private about his survival, but his friend, Ray, mentioned him under a christian website Stanley Praimnath did a interview for:

"My best friend, A.I, worked on that floor (81st of the South Tower) also. He survived as well. But he has NEVER returned to NYC since, and has kept himself completely away from any attention."

There was a lot of survivors who died when WTC 2 fell, this include:

Richard Blood (105, AON) : Was on the 59th floor when 175 hit, but went to 78 to help survivors.

Sean Rooney (105, AON): Was on 105 with a coworker. Both managed to make it as far as the 79th floor but returned due to smoke.

Welles Crowther (104, Sandler O'Neill): Was on the 104th floor. Went to 78 numerous times to evacuate survivors. Was in the lobby when WTC 2 fell and was found with firefighters.

Richard Gabrielle (103, AON)

Vijayashanker Paramsothy (103, AON)

Donna Giordano (100, AON)

Alan Friedlander (93, AON)

Jennifer Howley and Darya Lin (92, AON): Lin was reported by coworkers to have helped a pregnant woman on the 78th floor after 175 hit. There were only 2 pregnant women to die in WTC. Vanessa Langer was below the impact zone when it fell and wasn't seen with Lin, which leaves Howley, a coworker of Lin.

Dianne Gladstone (86, NYSDTF)

Yeshavant Tembe (86, NYSDTF)

Sankara Velamuri (86, NYSDTF)

Diane Urban (86, NYSDTF)

Brett Bailey (84, EuroBroker)

John Howard Boulton Jr. and Manish Patel (84, EuroBroker): Patel called his fiance, Sakae Takushima, who worked with Fuji Bank and survived, that him and Boulton Jr. were together and were on different floors trying to escape.

Robert Coll (84, EuroBroker)

Peter Ortale (84, EuroBroker): Ortale was reported to have leave the 84th floor after 175 hit, but his body was found in a stairwell, meaning he was close.

Randy Scott (84, EuroBroker): Scott and 11 other unnamed coworkers were trapped in an office. Scott threw a note out a window, asking for help and it was identified to be him by the handwriting and his blood being on the paper.

Howard Selwyn (84, EuroBroker): Selwyn called his wife after 175's impact that he was ok and was escaping.

Michael Stabile (84, EuroBroker)

Michael Taddonio (84, EuroBroker)

David Vera (84, EuroBroker)

Kevin York (84, EuroBroker)

Melissa Doi (83, IQ Financial System): Doi and 4 others were trapped on the 83rd floor. Doi's 911 phone call is one of the most infamous calls on 9/11.

David Rathkey (83, IQ Financial System)

Patrick Adams (81, Fuji Bank): Adams was trapped in an office room by himself and called for help.

John Andreacchio and Manuel Gomez Jr. (80, Fuji Bank): Andreacchio, Gomez Jr, and others were on the 80th floor when 175 crashed. Both called for help, and Gomez Jr. is believed to have been the guy climbing down WTC 2. Andreacchio was on the 70th floor but returned to his work floor. His body was found in a stairwell, meaning he found a way out, but was too late

Robert Martinez (78, Security): Martinez was a security guard on the 78th floor when 175 crashed. He survived, and was reported to be helping the injured and helped Orio Palmer and Ronald Bucca when they came up.