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Images of 9/11 attack on World Trade Center seared my soul

What do I remember most about that day?

NIALL O'DOWD,

IrishCentral Founder

Published Tuesday, September 11, 2012, 8:21 AM

Updated Tuesday, September 11, 2012, 8:25 AM

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FDNY hero at Ground Zero

Photo by Peter Foley

What do I remember most about that day?

The massive cloud of ash gently floating in the breeze across the skyline, wondering if it was part of a nuclear fallout of some kind.

Clutching my daughter's tiny hands to mine wondering if we'd see another dawn together.

Rushing to get my copy of Jim Dwyer's book on the 1993 World Trade Center bombing with it's eerie prediction that they would try again.

Idiotically wondering whether I'd be able to publish our newspaper Irish Voice that day.

A feeling unlike any except the time I was in an earthquake in San Francisco and the very ground seemed to open and rumble at my feet.

Knowing at that moment of the second plane's impact all bets were off. Someone was out to kill us all.

Crying as I lined up with thousands outside a firehouse on the Upper East Side and seeing the stricken firemen return from another futile day seeking their comrades.

Reading the hundreds of flyers pasted everywhere of families desperately seeking loved ones.

Being so proud that Ireland alone of any country, announced a day of national mourning.

Realizing with shock that I had stood for photographs at the WTC at our Wall Street 50 event in July with two men who were later killed on 9/11.

Interviewing the widows and parents of so many for my book 'Fire in the Morning' about the Irish on that day and being so impressed with their poise and grace under such awful pressure.

Three days later standing close to where the buildings once stood and realizing for the first time what their absence would always mean to our wounded city.

Realizing how incredible it was to be a New Yorker, given their reaction to that awful day and their determination to carry on.

Originally published on September 10, 2010.

Nster.com

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billie061 | Sep 12, 2012, 10:15 PM EDT

I had just returned home from work at Dublin airport ironically having welcomed 50 odd U.S./Canadian tourists to Dublin, I had 52 due to leave the next morn. Having started work at 4-30 am that morn, went to bed where I turned on sky news (always fall asleep to that channel). Cut a long story short 52 got stuck with me for extra week (still in touch with some) While the horror of those who witnessed it first hand, it did change some of us forever, inc me far as away as we were. God bless to all.

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bobby | Sep 11, 2012, 08:02 PM EDT

I will never forget this day. I was working in Dublin and it was on the news. I couldn't believe what i was seeing. A very sad day.

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bob40wil | Sep 11, 2012, 05:32 PM EDT

aloistmartin, you seem to have a lot of time on your hands, you've written the same BS on every thread concerning 9/11.

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aloistmartin | Sep 11, 2012, 03:31 PM EDT

Not another Excuse, for the Right Wing Bourgeoisie, to ask for Federal Assistance, and Social Confidence, from the Disenchanted Masses, at the Cake Eating end, of Fire hose`s, and Barricades, of wildly swinging misanthropic Batons ! What Drone Warfare, and Bailout Austerity, are really all about, Indeed ! ... The Bull Stops at Ground Zero ! ... Support Solidarity for all International Republican Socialist, Green, Communist, Cause ! .... Support Jerry White of the Socialist Equality Party for President of the United States of America !

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kennedy23 | Sep 11, 2012, 02:06 PM EDT

I remember this very sad day as i was leaving work in IBM Dublin people telling us to turn the radio on in the cars .Not until i got home and seen the evil act on TV and the look of horror on the faces of my kids that's my memory. .Just to say to all who lost loved ones this sad day may god bless you and your loved ones who died.May they all rest in peace .

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Gordan Duggan | Sep 11, 2012, 12:15 PM EDT

Niall, I remember dining in the restaurant two years before and saying to my Irish American relatives who had come up from Albany, that I felt uneasy being so high up (it was not vertigo, but a dreadful feeling I can't still explain).I was watching the Irish television news when newscaster Brian Dobson broke in to tell us a plane had attacked one of the twin towers, as he said this, I watched in horror as another plane approached the other tower. My heart stood still as I realised the number of people who were going to die that dreadful day including possibly my young cousin Simon who had started work there two months before (luckily he walked out of the tower just five minutes on an errand before the first plane hit). He spent the rest of the day trying to phone his parents and siblings from a basement down the street. The horror of that dreadful day will live with us forever. I can still see "the falling man" and wonder who he was and what he thought at that moment. Terrorists must NEVER WIN. GOD BLESS ALL THOSE SOULS.

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McNamara31 | Sep 11, 2012, 09:55 AM EDT

We all know this was an act of hate inflicted on the innocent of New York. Some were direct victims, just going to work that day; never knowing their last day had come. The other story, always to be remembered, was that of the firemen who stared into the flames of the massive crumbling towers and chose to make the "lives of others" more important than their very own. They walked into towers by choice, knowing it was probably their last day. God Bless the very brave men and women of the FDNY and the Irish traditions at its foundations. New Yorker's will never forget.

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