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Periscope by Niall O'Dowd

The 9/11 images that seared my soul

Posted on Friday, September 10, 2010 at 11:31 PM
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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.


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40 comments

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seanomelbourne | Sep 15, 2010, 07:28 PM EDT
Watchman I have read pieces in the press by McKittrick surely you cannot see him as an impartial observer in Irish affairs. Are you fudging figures? if you extrapolate army,police and other armed government entities your 1824 figure is rather spurious.And what deaths are removed to give you 900. Given that over 3000 people perished your figure do not add up.

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hancock | Sep 15, 2010, 02:57 PM EDT
So what?

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Watchman | Sep 15, 2010, 02:44 PM EDT
hancock: No, but the recent Troubles did.

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hancock | Sep 15, 2010, 12:56 PM EDT
Watchman killing in Ireland didn't start in 1969.

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Watchman | Sep 15, 2010, 11:01 AM EDT
seanomelbourne: I'm sorry to hear that you think I lack credibility and am out to excuse "British murder in Ireland". I didn't say the killings by loyalists were "irrelevant". I was making the point that neither the loyalists nor Crown forces killed the most people, or even the most non-combatants. That particular palm goes to the Provisional IRA and other republican groups. I think I know the book you're talking about: Lost Lives, edited by my good friend David McKittrick, with whom I'm having dinner in Belfast next week. If you consult it carefully, you will find the number of deaths attributed to each organisation clearly listed. I'm in France at the moment and don't have my copy to hand, but according to the reputable Cain archive, quoting independent research, the IRA was responsible for the deaths of 1,824 people between July 1969 and December 2001 (with others since by spinoff groups), during which time it lost approximately 275 of its own members. Over much the same period, loyalist groups are estimated, between them, to have murdered some 900 people, the majority of them innocent Catholics. I don't seek to justify loyalist violence any more than I seek to justify unwarranted killings by the British Army and the RUC, both of which bodies in their time have placed me under arrest. But discredit where discredit is due. Oh, and by the way, you need to look up the word extrapolate. It means to apply one set of facts or one line of argument to another, unresolved, debate.

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Monsoonman | Sep 14, 2010, 11:18 PM EDT
I look at what corrupt leaders of my country have done to it, especially the ones that fixed the mortgage and banking system to make it a liberal wet dream, where everyone deserved a loan from the banks even if they didn't have a job and could never repay the loan....it was the only "fair" thing to do, it was the liberal thing to do. BTW: I have always been a proponent of American taxpayer dollars being spent for American infrastructure be open to bid for only American firms. Private enterprise is an entirely different story.

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seanomelbourne | Sep 14, 2010, 09:02 PM EDT
Monsoonman you're doing it again you cannot be a free marketeer and be a bleeding heart when some international company(ies)wins a contract. We have that problem here with Chinese,Japanese,American and other groups win contracts.It is only when an economy is in dire straits that the populace notice these anomalies and if isolationism is your new mantra it would further destroy your economy. You cannot preach Reaganomics(open market)no rules and hide behind trade barriers when you feel threatened. By the way look what Reaganomics and greed did to your financial system 2 yrs ago and still suffering.You can easy sidekick that bone blame Obama. One would think he had been in office for 10 yrs with all the GOP garbage and innuendo he has endured.

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maloney | Sep 14, 2010, 03:25 PM EDT
Infrastructure is another attempt to find ways to sink the country a little lower & make the people think he is doing something good. Monsoon hit the nail on the head. If passed it will cost 100 times more than it should like everything else he touches.

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Monsoonman | Sep 14, 2010, 10:44 AM EDT
Infrastructure lad is what you need a government for, that and national defense, if anything those are the key ingredients....Everything else is vote buying fluff and nanny state politics. I have no bone to pick with real infrastructure expenditures. I do have a problem with obamas politicization of those infrastrure improvements. Forcing the builders of them to be a certain race or color, or sex, or sexual orientation. Requiring them to pay union dues and hiring only union workers, who in turn with their benefits and dues donate directly to the democrat party. Yes I do have a problem with some of it lad. The work should go to the lowest qualified U.S. company bidding on those projects...You do know red chinese government owned construction companies are doing some of this infrastucture work in the USA?

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seanomelbourne | Sep 13, 2010, 08:02 PM EDT
Moonsoonman Obama wishes to spend more money on aging infrastructure and you have chastised him in past blogs for big spending. Your mantra of "small government and less spending" seems rather shallow now that you are face to face with a local problem.

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seanomelbourne | Sep 13, 2010, 07:55 PM EDT
Watchman I don't understand your logic you extrapolate the bombing of bars and attacks on the nationalist population by pro British terrorist groups as if their deaths were irrelevant in the scheme of things I do possess a book listing every death and who was at fault (over 3000). Are you looking for an excuse to justify British murder in Ireland. Your piece lacks credibility.

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Monsoonman | Sep 13, 2010, 11:29 AM EDT
Sean me boy...Yes I am fine, thank you for the concern. Investigators are looking at a 30" natural gas line at 300 psi. The line is made of steel, is 50 y.o., wrapped I am sure, but under constant bombardment by electrolysis in the soil(no not the hair removal type). The investigation will show the explosion came as a result of a spark. Our infrastructure is aging and needs the capital expenditures to replace the failing pieces...We also need money for the illegal aliens healthcare, housing and benefits too? What to do?...Another explosion like that could kill illegal aliens! Obama will make the right decision and replace any aging gas lines that happen to be near illegal alien abodes.

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hancock | Sep 13, 2010, 11:24 AM EDT
The English are the cause. The army "behaved badly", I could see you almost choking those words out on your keyboard. P.S. Ireland's trouble with England didn't start in 1969.

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Watchman | Sep 13, 2010, 04:22 AM EDT
Seanomelbourne: I don't have the stats to hand, but, excluding the toxic contribution of the UDA, UFF, UVF etc, I'd be prepared to bet that more innocents were killed by the IRA, INLA, dissident IRAs etc, than ever fell victim to the British Army or the RUC. Whenever there were fatalities as the result of an IRA bomb, in most instances it was non-combatants who died. The number killed must run into the hundreds. In fact, if we leave out obvious incidents like Bloody Sunday (and there were only ever a tiny handful of these), nearly of those shot dead by the Army and police over the 30 years of the Troubles were armed Republicans, or, in some cases, armed Loyalists. The number of IRA funerals is evidence of this. After a shooting, the volunteers would be buried with full military honours, including shots fired over the graves. This was because they were considered soldiers who had died in action. the "disappeared," murdered by the Provos, received no burial at all. Women and children killed in bomb attacks, as at Claudy and Omagh, were buried by their families, with the IRA (real or realer) denying responsibility. Of course the loyalist organisations did despicable things. They were pure evil. And on occasions the Army and the RUC behaved badly and killed innocent people, usually – but not always – in error. That said, the balance sheet is clear. The Provisional IRA was the number one agent of terror throughout the Troubles, and was backed throughout by Irish America. The judgement of history may be that the campaign of violence was a necessary evil, but that doesn't mean that it wasn't evil.

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DennisQ | Sep 13, 2010, 12:58 AM EDT
Let's leave wishful thinking out of it, Ajreaper. Take a look at the video.

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