OT: 8 years ago this morning....

and we almost forget. Thanks for the reminder as we have all been complacent. Also, I don't think this could ever be OT!

I was a senior in college. We had Tuesday morning lifting (outside of the 20 hour mandatory hours) and I was back in our dorm by 8 to take a nap before my 10 o'clock class. I was on the couch in the TV/video game room(we had a 2 room suite and we put all beds in the other room of the suite) and was woken up by my roommate telling me to check out the TV. As I woke up I saw the second plane hit. I thought it was a movie or a joke. Practice that day was weird. I remember saying a team prayer for everyone involved before we started practice.

The thing I remember most was the patriotism on campus. It was too bad it took something like that for us all to come together.

God bless those who were lost and their families. And God bless the troops who are away from home fighting because of the events of that day. Thank you to all service people.

I was in bed sleeping when my fire department pager went off saying several cities across the country had been attacked. I'm a firefighter in Houston, Texas so I called into work and was turning on the TV when tower 1 fell. I'll never forget that feeling that I can't even put into words still today as it crashed to the ground. 343 of my FDNY brothes gone and a couple thousand of our countrymen and women. I am thankful that it wasn't more. Make no mistake it could have been much worse if it wasn't for the FDNY, NYPD, NY Border partol and stories of everyday people who did things to help others that we will never hear about.

9/11/01 NEVER FORGET!

starting my second day of work after graduating from UM. I was at the Arthur Anderson headquarters building in Chicago and when I logged into my computer I pulled up CNN.com, as I always do. There was a small little blurb about a plane (the first one) hitting the tower. I assumed it was a commuter or private plane, and thought nothing of it. Then people in the office started chatting, and we all went to the cafeteria on the 10th floor and watched the rest of the morning up there.

We stuck around until the first tower fell, at which point they began evacuating the downtown area (we were pretty close to the Sears Tower). The crush of people to get into the trains was so large that a bunch of us just ended up walking home (several miles). Rest of the day was blur of watching TV in a bar...

Followed by:

I got sent home from work that afternoon because I was so pissed off my boss told me to go out and tie one on. I did just that. Oddly enough, it wasn't the first time he had told me to do that. It was, however, the first time that he handed me a $50 along with the comment.

I bet Bin Laden didnt intend for his actions to result in a long term occupation of two countries within the region, the toppling of two governments, the prosperity of the two most Western style Middle Eastern countries to flourish, the Saudi government to take real action against extremist within their borders instead of just talking about it, help to set in motion the eventual collapse of the most radical Muslim gov't (see Iran and recent televised events), and the change in US policy from handcuffing Israel to simple slaps on the hand when they defend themselves aggressively. And most importantly, did less to the Western economies with blowing up the World Trade Center towers than a bunch of irrespponsible mortgage brokers did with no doc loans, buydowns, balloons, 40yr mortgages, and interest only plans.

Thirty years from now Bin Laden's picture will be next to pussy in Webster's...

God bless the USA, her troops, and her will to survive

i was sales manager of a major office by ohare airport- we had a vendor giving a presentation when my secretary came in and gave me the news- i immediately interrupted the presentation and told everyone they could go home. i went down to the restaurant/bar of our building and watched dumb founded as the buildings collapsed. i am originally from new york and my wife and i lost many friends. we will never forget/ no one should ever forget.

To all for posting, and to HurryUpYost for doing what you do every day!

I was in Oceana, Virginia for a weaponeering class which I was able to put use a few months later.

Didn't know anyone who lost their life that day, but know too many friends who did in the ensuing training and fighting.

RIP Puj and Nathan.

Our Men and Women of the armed forces who have given there everything for our freedoms because of that day...

Union, before I knew what had happened, amazed at the number of people with concerned faces on cell phones. I knew something wasn't right and then I saw a mass of people gathered infront of the TVs. Very odd day.

What I also recall is, given the hysteria immediatly following concerning nuclear reactor security, the fighter jet fly overs North Campus. Very uncanny day.

I was still in elementary school when it happened. I remember we were all moving into another classroom like we normally did during the day and the principle was there along with another class. She explained to us the situation, but I didn't get the full effect until I went home and watched it on TV.

It was a very powerful image and never (in my short life) had I seen people come together like they did in this country. It made me proud that I was part of such a strong country, one that when united stands against all that opposes it.

WOW!! It seems like yesterday. I was on my to class at Angell Hall when I heard the news. Crazy.

Thoughts and prayers to everyone.

I've been going to games for 25 years and the most eerie moment was the moment of silence before the next home game. I love that the coaches decided to have the team on the field for the National Anthem after that.

God Bless our troops, firefighters, police, emt's and all other's keeping us safe.

Story: Got in my car around 9:30 to go to the art supplies store to get stuff I needed for arch. studio that day. By that time I still didn't know anything was going on. Had the car radio on and it was playing some music like FM stations do. After the song, the DJ mentioned that he'd sort of heard a plane had hit the WTC. And then he spun more tunes. Seriously? There's a missing building in NYC and your report is "a plane might have hit the World Trade Center, now here's some Metallica"? I figured if there was anything to that other than a lost small plane in the fog (it's happened before) the AM stations would have it, and sure enough.....

I was cooking my way through college that morning...making biscuits and hashbrown casserole in Cracker Barrell. We stayed in the office watching television that morning(obviously it was slow). I don't know if there was a day in my life that I was more pissed off. I could barely drive home I was so upset with tears welling up in my eyes.

Although there is still controversy looming over the events of that day...I know one thing....some awesome people were taken from us all....fathers, wives, sons....Americans. I'm praying and thinking about their families today.

I just stepped out of the shower and was getting ready to head to North Campus when my roommates yelled out "Holy sh*t." I thought it was just a horrible accident; then we saw the second plane hit.

I don't think anyone will ever forget.

Skipped that day because I had a dental appt. for 11am...I was up and just happened to be watching the news and having my coffee when the story broke that a plane had crashed into the WTC. I immediately thought it was terrorism, even then, but when I saw the second plane go in live, I knew it. Anyways, I was in shock I would say. Then, I had to go in and get a tooth drilled, which seemed like a walk in the park compaired to what other people where going through at that time, on that day.

RIP to all who were lost 9/11/01.

I remember it as clear as day - I was in an American History class in high school as a junior and someone walked in and yelled that someone had bombed one of the World Trade Center buildings. We turned on TV just in time to watch the second plane plow through the building. I find it incredibly ironic that I was in a history class when this happened. Needless to say, I don't think I will ever forget that day.

However, while 9/11 galvanized the American people, it also led to the unfortunate circumstance of immense racial tension between America and the Muslim world. Just earlier this week, a Muslim girl was beaten up by five teenagers in Ann Arbor. Would this have happened regardless of 9/11? I don't know, but I feel as if it wouldn't have. While 9/11 brought America closer, it also segregated a huge part of it's population and I think that to this day, there is still animosity towards those that don't deserve it.

We need to rise up, above everything, and just realize how strong we all are as a society and as individuals. This event was and still is a turning point in annals of history and how we treat our fellow man after something like this reveals much about how we are doing as people. We are strong and we will persevere.

Go Blue.

Good comments by all.

I was living in MI working from my home office for a Manhattan-based software company. I had two of my employees in the air that morning -- one headed to LaGuardia when the order was made to ground all aircraft. It took me a while to make sure everyone was okay, although one landed in Cleveland, the other in Detroit.

I found out about the WTC attack when my wife came into my office, eyes wide, and said, "Do you want the bad news or worse news?" The bad news, she said, was that she'd just struck a construction barrel driving home from a doctor's appointment and there was damage to the car. I figured that whatever was "worse" must have been news I wouldn't want to hear.

We turned on the TV and I watched CNN as the towers fell. I sat there in stunned silence as the news reporter said, "50,000 people work in those buildings." It was a miracle more weren't killed.

Who could ever forget that day?

Pray for our troops, and those in harm's way.

I was about to start my freshman year at Northwestern and had signed up to go on a backpacking trip with some of my fellow classmates. We were up in the Porcupine Mountains of the UP. It was a beautiful morning and we were ahead of schedule, so we decided to get fancy with breakfast and make some chocolate chip pancakes. Then we packed up and just kept hiking. Not a clue that anything unusual was going on in the larger world. Not a damn clue. This lasted for almost 36 hours. 36 hours of strange serenity while our families, friends, and neighbors were all dealing with the largest terrorist attack on American soil ever. Finally, mid-afternoon on Sept. 12th, I encountered an elderly couple at Presque Isle. We began to chat and, noticing my cheery nature, surmised that somehow I remained ignorant to the events of the previous day. The story they told was long, saddening, and, at many points, incorrect. It's easy to forget now how much confusion there was as to what had actually happened. Most of all, though, the story was just plain unbelievable. It just didn't feel real. How could something so huge have happened and yet my life, for 36 hours at least, had gone on unchanged, unaffected? When the rest of my crew caught up, I had to break the story to them. Two were from New York, and they immediately broke down. The full impact still hadn't really hit the rest of us yet, though. Our immediate surroundings hadn't seemed to notice the gravity of the situation. The trees weren't hanging their branches in sadness. The sky refused to dull or gray over. It was still easy to pretend that maybe it hadn't happened afterall. Maybe that old couple was talking about a movie they'd seen. Two days after the event, we saw our first newspaper. It was the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel and it was plastered with images. It absolutely took my breath away. This was real and almost beyond comprehension. I felt sad and helpless. How could this have happened? This wasn't the way things were supposed to be.

The girl I'm dating now was a mere 4 blocks away when the planes hit. She stood there in the street as the towers crumbled. I don't know how to reconcile our experiences. I don't know how to tell her that while she was standing there in horror, while she was losing family friends and a part of her city, I was blissfully chowing on chocolate pancakes in the woods.

May it never happen again.

i was on the north campus diag. on my way to class. a girl came up to the guy i was walking with and asked "do you know what's going on?". i misinterpreted it as "hey, what's up? what's going on?". what a weird way to start a day.

we watched the towers burning in my eecs class for a while. no one knew what to do. later, at home, i was so overwhelmed by the media coverage that i made one of my roommates go with me to elbel field to play catch. i couldn't watch that footage anymore.

I was at the office. My wife called and asked if I'd heard anything about a plane and a tower.

I went to the conference room, turned on the TV and still remember that feeling of numbness that spread from my face to my arms and finally to my feet; scenes so surreal they rendered me too paralyzed to move. I'm still haunted by the image of someone leaping from 90 stories in the air - a tortuous, split-second decision between two terrors, hurtling toward eternity...

To this day I can't fully fathom the utter despair of looking fate in the face and seeing a grim reality so stark - so cold and austere, realizing in that moment the only choice left in life is to decide - NOW! - which way you're going to die.

I had just finished my morning run in/around central campus and was watching the Today show when the first plane hit. Like many others I found it odd but just assumed some poor pilot lost control of his small plane and had hit the buildings.

However, when they finally got a camera on the first tower and you saw all of the smoke you could tell something else was up.

I lived on Wilmot St. (behind the CCRB) at the time and my roommates were starting to get up as well. They had just both stepped back into their rooms when I saw the second plane hit live on TV. I've never had a feeling like it before in my life. I let out an audible "HOLY SH*T!!!" and everyone came running back out into the living room.

If you remember, it was a crystal clear morning both in Ann Arbor and NYC so it was clear at that point something was up.

I was mesmerized for the next 40 minutes and at that point I had a morning class I had to get to. At this point classes had not yet been cancelled.

Just before I left for the strangest walk to class I can ever remember, the 3rd plane hit the Pentagon. In retrospect, I can't believe I even walked to class but I was never one to cut class so I went anyway.

I arrived to a room full of shocked classmates. All of us shaking our heads and visibly scared. Many of them were from the CT/NY/NJ region and were frantically trying to call family members. Shortly after arriving the first tower fell. The class went silent.

The professor (Prof. Maloy, who died later that fall after a fight with cancer) gave an extremely heartfelt speech to the class, told us to go home and be with our friends and family and we promptly filed out.

Campus felt weird and sad that whole week and throughout the year. Being at the game against WMU two weeks later was about as cathartic an experience as I've ever had. We all cried, sang "The Victors" and defiantly went on with our lives that the terrorists had so brazenly attached the week before.

Easily and sadly the most memorable week of my entire 4 years at Michigan.

I didn't have any morning classes that day, so I was sound asleep when the planes crashed. When I woke up, I found that I had a phone message that just said that something "awful" had happened and that classes were cancelled. I remember thinking that something must have happened to President Bollinger or some other faculty member. Then I turned on the TV and . . . whoa.

I was in 8th grade English class and they turned on TV... I don't think I really cared about anything until that moment.

I was in my grade 6 class when the principle came on the PA and announced what had happened to the entire school. I did not fully comprehend what had happened until I got home and turned on the news.

today, I was sleeping when the phone rang. I rushed downstairs and turned on the TV. Tears streamed down my face as I witnesses the unthinkable... I'm a cop here in SC and just hurt so bad for my fellow law enforcement officers, as well as firefighters, who lost their lives that day. I still hurt to this day thinking of it.

was a Tuesday morning.

The previous Saturday, I was in Seattle and saw the Wolverines lose a close game to the Washington Huskies. Monday was a beautiful sunny day, I was on my way home from work with the top down, basking in the sun, still thinking about the blocked field goal which lead to the collapse the previous Saturday. The radio was tuned to NPR, and I recall a story about an Afghan warlord who was the victim of a suicide bomber posing as a journalist. I thought to myself, "How unfortunate for the poeple in that part of the world. I'm glad that kind of turmoil is so far away."

The next morning, Sept. 11, our clock radio clicked on with a story about a plane hitting the World Trade Center. We have a group of buildings in Portland called the World Trade Center, so at first I wasn't sure what/where this had happened. The a commentator mentioned the city bound lanes on the Tri-Borough bridge were being closed, and I knew that the WTC inquestion was in New York City, where our son was in his first full week of class. We rushed downstairs to turn on the TV, all long distance telephone circuits were busy, we couldn't reach our son by phone. I'll never forget hearing a second plane had struck the South Tower, the instant realization that this was not a horrible accident, but a diabolical act of terrorism. We spent a frantic half hour, until our son logged onto IM and let us know he was fine, had been in Calc class at the time.

Thanks to all for sharing your stories about that day.

way to work, listening to Gregg Henson and Jamie Samuelson, and contemplating the fact that today was my 22nd birthday and how I was getting "old" (I'm 30 today, unbelievable). As they were signing off, Gregg mentioned something about a plane hitting the WTC. I thought that was odd, and pictured a small two seater out on a joy flight crashing into the building. After arriving at work, I asked a co-worker if he had heard about a plane hitting the Trade Center, to which he responded, "yeah, two of them."

I'll never foget my initial thought: "How dumb was the pilot of the second two seater who followed the first guy into a building?"

I had no idea we were talking commercial airliners here. Needless to say, I turned on the radio and quickly learned the truth. We had no TV around, so I listened all morning. I'll never forget Dan Rather's voice quivering as he described the first tower coming down. At lunchtime I went and picked up our food from a local diner that had a TV on which provided me my first pictures from the day. All I could think of was that it looked like a scene from Beirut, not NYC. I dont' know how many times tears came to my eyes that week when driving by an American flag at half mast.

What a crazy, Earth shattering day. I remember waking up real early in the morning calling my good friend who was shipping off to the Army that very morning. I walked into class as a senior in high school, wondering why everyone was staring blankly at the TV above the door. I walked in, saw the first tower in smoke and asked the person next to me "what movie is this?" Then the second plane hit. Never have I been so angry at something I wasn't directly involved in. I felt like something was taken from me. I frequently think of those who lost their lives and their families and just feel so thankful that we have the great men and women who sacrifice themselves to defend America! USA! USA! USA!