#160 | Tuesday, September 25th 2001
well when i first heard what had happened i was in my ecocnomics class and we thought oh, it must have been a little plane that hit the towers, but we got on e internet and we saw the pictures...i couldn't believe it. i didn't find out about the pentagon until my theatre class which is towards the end of the day and i had no clue the towers had collapsed until my mom picked me up from school.that night i watched the news for hours still not believeing what happend. i get goosebumps just thinking about all this.
Melissa | 17 | New York

#156 | Tuesday, September 25th 2001
I was listening to a few CDs I just bought when I flicked on the TV at 3pm British time (which would have been about 10am in New York). The sight of seeing the initial fire on top of either building is one that will stay with me forever. I watched a re-run of the 2nd plane crashing into the World Trade Centre. It was completely horrifying. I flicked through every news channel to see if this was indeed such a newsworthy event. Every single one provided live coverage. Watching the texted captions underneath the coverage on the TV will stick with me for a long time. They were filled with updates on things like a 3rd plane crashing and which areas were being evacuated. Even some of the music channels broke the news. Then I saw the events slowly unfold. Whilst this was happening, I was texting my friends to tell them what was happening. I was ringing people up and discussing initial thoughts on the attack. To be honest, I never suspected any one person to be behind these attacks. I didn't even know they were deliberate at first. I was stunned. From then on, I knew that things were never to be the same again. Then, my mum and brother came home from work at about 5. They rushed to the TV. As they saw repeated coverage of the WTC buildings collapse, they watched in horror and shock, much like I did. I explained to them exactly what was going on, still shocked. I couldn't believe I was saying what I was. Yes, the events of September 11th, 2001 will live with me forever. It is something that I have never seen anything like before in my entire life, and something I never want to again.
Mike | 17 | United Kingdom

#152 | Monday, September 24th 2001
No one will ever forget September 11th. Here is how I remember it. It was my sisters birthday. When I woke up I wished her a happy birthday, ate breakfast, and went to check my e-mail. I was in my room and my sister was in the living room watchng tv. She went to put on "The Ananda Lewis Show" but instead it was breaking news. I heard the new announcer say, "A plane apparently crashed into it just moments ago." Then I heard my sister say, "Oh my God." I asked, "Where did that happen?" She said, "The Twin Towers." I ran into the living room just as the second plane hit the building. We live right in Queens and have a perfect view of the Manhatten skyline. So we walked to my dads job to see it from there. He told us that one of the customers said that it looked like smoke was coming from one of the Twin Towers. My uncle said that maybe it was from another bulding. But then they saw a mushroom of smoke as the other plane hit. My sister and I wanted to see the buildings better so we went home to get binoculars. While we were walking home some guy said, "They hit the Pentagon." We were like, "The Pentagon? What's he talking about? They hit the Towers." After we got the binoculars and started walking back to my dads job we ran into an older lady. She said that "it's a shame what happend, they just hit the Pentagon too." As we were walking through the parking lot to my dads job I looked towards the skyline. I said to my sister, "It looks like one of them fell." because there was so much smoke. Then all of a sudden these people come out saying, "Building 2 just fell!." When we got to my dads job we tried to see the other building with the binoculars, but there was too much smoke. After a while there I went to call my sister-in-law from a pay phone. As I was walking there two women came running out of a store yelling, "The other building just collapsed!." A group of people were just standing there looking towards Manhatten. Then I remember a woman had to stop her car and get out. She stood there with us and was crying, she said over and over again, "I can't believe they're gone." When I called my sister-in-law she told me that something happened in Pennsylvania too. I remember how everyone was trying to use their cell phones, or make collect calls but they couldn't. Nothing like that was working right. When I went back to my dads job I heard the first fighter jet go over. It was the first of many. Later on at home, when no planes besides military planes were supposed to be flying, I heard a little propellered plane going over and right behind it were those fighter jets. My brother got some show though. They watched the fighter jets flying in the sky and saw when they hit their turbo buttons, the fire coming from the back and the ground rumbling even though they were so high up. They heard a plane going over and it sounded like a regular plane. They were looking for it but couldn't see where it was. My sister-in-law said that she looked at the houses across the street and saw headlights shining off of them. Then all of a sudden an American Airlines plane flew right above their heads with two fighter jets right on it's tail. People started calling into the police and news about it. We found out on the news that it was carrying military people on it. For a while we saw all the warships in the ocean. I remember the night we had a candle light vigil on my block. Everyone was staring out at the ships. And everytime a plane went over everyone looked up. And then while my friend was ending the speech she wrote, two army helicopters flew over. It was perfect timing and that gave eveyone chills. But the warships all left to do what they were ordered to do. Later on in the night there was a firefighter that found out that his friend, John Moran, was in one of the buildings when it collapsed. My sister-in-law told me that he couldn't read the number he was trying to call because he was crying so much, so she read it off for him. I asked him if he wanted to light a candle. Then we just stayed up on the boardwalk with him and his friend for a while. It was sad to see our heroes the way they were that night. Last night, September 23, there was another candle light vigil. This one bigger, this one sadder. Sadder because we now know how many people from our area are gone. Rockaway lost about 90 people. That's the most out of any other community. The mayor was there. There was donations for a permanent Rockaway Memorial. And there was a big picture in memory of the lives lost. Everyone left their handprint on the picture and I think it's going to be suspended from the Marine Park Bridge. Thats how I remember everything. And that's how I will always remember everything.
Crystal | 17 | New York

#142 | Sunday, September 23rd 2001
I was getting ready for school that day, when I hear my mom calling me saying that a plane had hit one of the towers.

I enter the room with the TV on, I had been watching the Today show. Now they had the camera focused on the fire in the first tower. I thought to myself "oh my god, that was no small plane." However, I had no idea that it was an attack. My thoughts were "how will they put out that fire?"

Then, as I was watching I saw the other tower explode. The camera angle didn't show the plane, so I thought it was a bomb or something, until they showed it from a different vantage point.

I can't even describe how I felt when I saw the other tower explode. I knew it was an attack then, but it was so incomprehensible. My mom said I could go to school late and watch the news for a while more. I had an econ test first period, and I knew that would be the last thing on my mind if I went to school.

Then, as they are talking with their Pentagon reporter, he says he just felt an explosion of some kind. They show a camera view from across DC and it shows all the black smoke rising up. Then reports come in about an explosion at the State Department and a fire on the Mall in DC (Those were false though). I was panicked. They evacuated the White House, and then a local Special Report comes on saying they had evacuated the Sears Tower, and that all Illinois state offices and the state capitol were being closed. My mom then called in to say I wasn't going in at all. The attendence woman says "Oh what, does he think the school will be next?" At that point, heh, who knew if it would be?

Then the airplane crashes near Pittsburgh. It was all so crazy.

I stayed glued to the television that day. My life changed that day, I can feel it.

The next day on my High School's radio station, I hosted a two-hour special about the attacks. I talked with my Congressman Jesse Jackson Jr., about what he saw in DC. It was still surreal, and to some degree it still is.

I had never been to New York City, and just a few days ago it hit me that I would never be able to see those towers.

So unbelievable. There are no words.

Dave | 17 | Illinois

#139 | Sunday, September 23rd 2001
I was at home, my mom told me about the first plane, So i turned on the TV, every news station was talking about this, I saw the second plane crashing and the buildings collapsing live. It was unbelievable. Unbelievable.

Dutzi (Rishon LeZion)

Eldad | 17 | Israel

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