WTC Attack Thread 2

Just checked my email. I think I’ll scream now.

AIEEEEEEEEE!!!

I got a freaking chain letter. A chain letter to show support for the victims.

I don’t like chain letters anyway. But that’s not what honked me off. What honked me off was that down at the bottom of this letter, right after it said to send it to ten people (It did, I swear, it did) in BIG BOLD LETTERS LIKE THIS it said “DON’T BREAK IT!!!”

What???
AS IF breaking the chain could possibly cause more damage than has been done today. AS IF not sending it to ten friends means I’m a heartless, compassionless a**hole.

I deleted it.

Now, I’m going to bed.

Apparently, the individuals(like Barbara Olsen) who made calls to their family were ordered to call their families on their cell phones and tell them, "I am about to die."

Can this get crueler? Can this get more horrid?

His eyes have been puffy and red and he’s been on the verge of tears off and on for the past several hours. When I first heard him stammer slightly, flub his words even a little, I listened closely and watched intently and before long I was crying like I have not cried in many years.

Watching CNN just now, they showed footage (actually, at around 8:20pm PDT) of the first plane hit (this was apparently “new” footage). A couple of minutes ago, they showed footage of the second plane again, but from a different angle - facing the side which was struck (below and behind the plane as it approached).

I am horrified anew, moreso than I was all day.
Tears well up as I write this, again, for the first time today. I cannot imagine the horror felt by those in the planes, or those in the towers.

Ah, I was cut off from the TV all day and have only been able to watch BBC announcers via a webfeed! Missed all that.

There is something really moving/weird about a “pro” losing it. I guess we just had a good thread about this re: the Hindenburg crash.

Right now I’m talking to a girl whose sister is still missing. I could really use some moral support, if anyone feels like talking on AIM to andyasaurus.

Or scratch that, because I’m going to phone her now.

I stayed home from class after I got back from work this morning. I watched CNN, watched the check-in threads, and tried to process everything I was seeing.

At 1:00, I realized that I had to get out or I was going to go crazy. I had a class, so I went there. As I walked down the street listening to NPR, everything looked so normal. I wanted to scream “Hey, you freshmen! You sorority girls, you gothbois! Haven’t you been listening? Everything is wrong now!” I didn’t.

I go to the Missouri School of Journalism. It’s supposed to be the finest place in the world to learn the craft. Everyone was glued to the big sceeen tv in the Jstudent lounge. Gannett Auditorium was closed to classes and set up as a makeshift media nerve center. I went to class anyway, though Computer Assisted Reporting seemed rediculous when we had zero useful information and all of the big news sites were inaccessable anyway. We talked and sort of huddled together in the classroom.

After class, I did something I’ve never done before: I went to the Missourian, the school-owned city newspaper where all journalism students work for free, outside of my scheduled time. There were lines out the door to donate blood, I couldn’t call anyone in New York, and I had to do something. So I went to the paper for eight hours and tried to forget everything that was going on while I edited dozens of stories about the attacks. I never did lose the big picture, but pitching in on the coverage made me feel like I was really helping. I did some of my best work tonight writing headlines and captions and mining the facts out of the purple prose of beginning reporters. I’m glad I was there. People will learn things and maybe be comforted by the truth tomorrow morning. The copy chief says it was an effort to tell my grandchildren about, but I don’t really want to remember.

Now I’m home. Now that I’m not working, the whole day is creeping up on me again and becoming horrible. I partook of too much of the junk food the newsroom coordinator provided to keep us all contented and at our desks. Every time CNN shows the new footage of the second plane, my too-full stomach does a lurch. I’m going to bed before it gets worse. When I wake up, I want it to be yesterday.

Stay safe, Dopers, no matter where you are.

I wish I could stay up all night following the latest on this story, and refreshing this page every couple of minutes. I have class tomorrow morning, and I know I should go. It will be good for me to pull away from the TV and get back into a routine. But “Advanced Data Structures and Algorithms” seems pretty damned pointless right now. :frowning:

I’m going to bed. My heart goes out to every victim, every family member of every victim, every friend of every victim, and … everyone. I’m not sure there’s anyone untouched in some way by this.

Hopefully tomorrow I’ll wake up and this will all have been a bad dream. At the very least, maybe it will make more sense or maybe this damned headache will go away.

(((Everyone)))

Just got back in. Went to go donate blood around 4:00 pm; they had us sign a list. I was on page 61. By 8:00 pm, they were on page 14. 25 people a page; that meant over 1500 people signed up to donate blood. Given the wait, only about 200 stuck around long enough to donate, and there were probably only about 150 people ever sitting around waiting at once. I ended up being drafted to help man the sign-in tables; the volunteers had only been slated to work until 8 pm, and had been there since 10 that morning. At first, they said they’d take everyone who waited, but by 11 pm the clinic decided that a doubleshift of their doctors was more than enough.

Every once in a while it would hit me. There was a tv out front, and every once in a while, they would show footage of the collapse. Or an interview with some of the survivors. I watched adults hold each other and cry, and I watched children frolic at their feet. And I realized that the children would never understand my world, never understand a time without terrorism, never see the New York skyline in the form I had always known it. And I wondered what would be next, for us or for them, whomever the them might be.

But mostly, I saw a thousand people gather together for no reason other than to help those who were hurt. And old man with a t-shirt proudly proclaiming him a Republican stood in line behind a teenager with a purple mohawk, who stood behind a mother trying to keep her children in tow, who stood behind an off duty police officer, who stood behind someone in a mechanic’s uniform. And all of us watched the news, and all of us shook our heads, and all of us applauded the President’s speech and cheered Secretary Rumsfeld when he stated “I’d like to make it clear that I am conducting this briefing at the Pentagon.” And all of us were eager to do what we could, as little as it was.

And the emotions that waved over any of us seemed to wash over all of us; and I felt truly that at that place, there was brotherhood of man.

Today, as thousands of our fellow citizens have perished, as over 200 of my brothers and sisters in the FDNY have perished in their effort to save those who never deserved to be in harms way, several thoughs have gone through my mind…

There is no question on how, or why. That is plainly ovbious. The nationwide reaction, the knee jerk, that gave those who decided this to triumph even more so…

Or goal first and foremost must be to return to a “normal” lifestyle as soon as possible. One or two days if possible. The longer that the US stays in its state of fear the terrorists continue to be victorious.

I refuse to have any terrorist group dictate my life to me. I refuse to have any terrorist group make me afriad to go about my daily life. I will continue to go to class; I will continue to serve my fire department; I will continue to run calls on my ambulance.

To everyone in the US affected by this, my heart goes out to you, to my brothers and sisters in FDNY, be safe and stay low. Help is on its way.

I’m going to bed. I leave you with a word from the Bible, which shows us that we are not the only one’s in history who don’t understand suffering. Indeed, darkness seems to reign.

Psalm 88

“Psa 88:1 O LORD, the God of my salvation, I have cried out by day and in the night before You.
Psa 88:2 Let my prayer come before You; Incline Your ear to my cry !
Psa 88:3 For my soul has had enough troubles , And my life has drawn near to Sheol.
Psa 88:4 I am reckoned among those who go down to the pit ; I have become like a man without strength,
Psa 88:5 Forsaken among the dead, Like the slain who lie in the grave, Whom You remember no more, And they are cut off from Your hand.
Psa 88:6 You have put me in the lowest pit , In dark places, in the depths.
Psa 88:7 Your wrath has rested upon me, And You have afflicted me with all Your waves. Selah.
Psa 88:8 You have removed my acquaintances far from me; You have made me an object of loathing to them; I am shut up and cannot go out.
Psa 88:9 My eye has wasted away because of affliction ; I have called upon You every day, O LORD; I have spread out my hands to You.
Psa 88:10 Will You perform wonders for the dead ? Will the departed spirits rise and praise You?
Psa 88:11 Will Your lovingkindness be declared in the grave, Your faithfulness in Abaddon ?
Psa 88:12 Will Your wonders be made known in the darkness ? And Your righteousness in the land of forgetfulness ?
Psa 88:13 But I, O LORD, have cried out to You for help, And in the morning my prayer comes before You.
Psa 88:14 O LORD, why do You reject my soul ? Why do You hide Your face from me?
Psa 88:15 I was afflicted and about to die from my youth on; I suffer Your terrors; I am overcome .
Psa 88:16 Your burning anger has passed over me; Your terrors have destroyed me.
Psa 88:17 They have surrounded me like water all day long; They have encompassed me altogether.
Psa 88:18 You have removed lover and friend far from me; Darkness is my only friend.”

I agree with you completely. Even I, as to the bone an athiest as you are likely to meet, took some comfort in iteven if I took the “you” in “you are with me” to mean, my fellow Americans. :slight_smile:

Mauvaise, maybe it’s just because I’m another desert baked Phoenician here, but I agree with you completely, right down to your qualification about the innocents.

Anybody who’s going to flame you for that can send as many BTUs as they want my way as well.

You know, ever since I heard this morning, I’ve had tears in my eyes off and on. At times they’ve been tears of frustration and rage, at times of sadness at times tears of fear and at times tears of pride for how my countrymen (and women) have banded together during this nightmare. But they STAYED IN MY DAMN EYES!

Until I read this post Arden. I’ve spent the last few minutes crying like a starving baby, part of that time curled up on my den floor.

Out of everyone’s attempts and literally millions of words, to personalize this darkest day in our history, you’ve managed in one sentence. Thank you for finally being the one to break down my last reserve. I may never meet you Arden Ranger, but I’ll always love you for that.

Trying to put my thoughts together and make sense of things is nearly impossible, I have watched and listened all day to what has happened in New York and Washington and can barely make sense of things.

I feel sick to the core of my being at the events of this day, I will never forget this day for as long as I live although right now, I wish it would just stop. It has been all I could do today to keep myself together and there have been times when I have failed and simply broke down and cried.

I watched the news this morning in disbelief, I wasn’t thinking so much that America was under attack but that thousands of people just like you and me had just been murdered. I saw scenes of people jumping from the top of the WTC before the buildings collapsed in a mountain of dust and debris.

I rejoiced when our fellow Dopers checked in to say they were safe. Although I don’t often express it, I have grown quite fond of many people here. I felt selfish in my joy as there are countless mothers, fathers, and children are mourning the loss of their own beloved. Four hundred firemen gave up their lives in an attempt to save people they never even knew and left behind many family members. Like true heroes they answered the call, the cost of that heroism was their own blood.

I came home tonight and hugged my children knowing that there are hundreds and perhaps thousands of children who are still waiting for a mom or dad who is never coming home.

Those who have celebrated this as a victory are beyond contempt. To celebrate the death of another human being simply because they believe or live differently is wrong.

The story keeps coming and miraculously, there are people calling from the wreckage with those damned cell phones we like to bitch about so much. They are alone in the darkness awaiting rescue and I know that some of those people may not live through the night. They will spend their last hours or minutes saying goodbye to their own loved ones or crying out for help. I cannot imagine their terror or their pain.

I have experienced an anger that frightens me. The people who did this do not deserve to be called human and like the vermin they are, they need to be exterminated. Sadly, there is no punishment to fit this crime. To make these people suffer pain for a thousand years wouldn’t be enough.

I am an agnostic but should there be a God or Allah, may they condemn the pilots of these aircraft and those who sent them to an eternity of fiery unrelenting hell. May they be given pain on a scale a hundred times of what they have caused for all eternity.

I am afraid for our tomorrow and the days that will come after that. The death toll will rise by the minute and the hour and I don’t believe that the enormity of this horror has even come close to being realized…

Perhaps those people hiding these terrorists will simply give them up and avert their own destruction. Yes, you can laugh because I don’t believe this will happen either.

There has been many calls for war and it scares me to find myself in agreement with the President when he said he would hold the perpetrators of this crime and anyone who harbours them equally responsible. I too want justice but at what cost? War means that more innocents are going to die. More mothers will grieve for their children, many children will wait for fathers who just won’t come home. The pain of today will be repeated.

My heart goes out to everyone who has been affected by what has happened today and I wish that you might find some measure of peace in the coming days.

John Lennon said it best when he said, “Imagine…”

(((hugs)))

Feynn

A very loud plane just flew over my house (in NJ). What’s going on? I thought all planes were grounded? It didn’t look like a private one to me…

god, I’m scared.

To the best of my knowledge, all my people in New York City and DC are safe and accounted for. I am as sure of this as I can be without actually physically holding on to them.

My friend Graham, who’s posted here a few times as DreamWorks, is one of New York’s Finest. He’s not in the thick of things (someone has to police the rest of the city, too), but I’m still all kinds of proud of him, just for serving as a cop in the first place.

I found out a close friend in Boston had a friend on one of the planes. He’s reportedly been pretty stoic about it.

I only received word around 9 p.m. that another one of my close friends, who works in the World Trade Center, is in fact alive.

I’m babbling, I guess. I’ve managed to keep myself together all day, although it got a little dicey when I was reading manny’s thread. I’m not confident in my ability to maintain the trend once I go to bed, and it’s just me and the dark and the silence and the time to think.

NYC and DC dopers, I was worried about you; I’m glad everyone seems to be okay.

I believe that all commercial air traffic has been grounded till at LEAST 12 noon. Must have been on some sort of official business.

probably an F-16 like many that have been circling the city since 10AM