re: Where were you on 9/11/01?

A genetics class at UF. Went and watched the news on tvs outside the journalism building.

Walking into 7th grade English class. Teacher had the TV on when we walked in. Ms Palermo at Slidell Junior High.

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Where were you on 9/11/01?

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I literally have no idea

Wife and I were living in Aberdeen Scotland. Had left the house about 30 minutes earlier on the way to Northern Scotland to play golf at Royal Dornoch. I had a conference call with Houston and called in on my car phone. As soon as I called in I was speaking with one of the guys in Houston and he asked me if I had heard about a small plane or something that hit one of the towers? He said there was a small fire on one of the floors. Didn't think much of it and we started the meeting.

About 10-15 minutes into the meeting I heard a lot of commotion and someone had come into the meeting room and was talking. Could tell something was going on. My boss picked up and spoke to me direct. He said another plane has hit the other tower and apparently the U.S. was under some kind of attack. We got off the phone. I u-turned and headed straight home.

We got home and were flipping back and forth between BBC and CNN International Less than 10 minutes after we got home the smoke started gushing out with high force just below the roof and the camera panned out just as the first tower collapsed. Absolutely shocking.

MY normal route back to Houston was through Newark. Wife is from NY. Our first trip back to the states was about 30 days later. I had been connecting there for years and the towers were always there. Sometimes we would stay a few nights. For the trip back to the U.S. I looked at the weather and chose seats on left side of plane and when we came in to Newark it was from the North. The entire plane was looking out the left windows and there was this trail of gray smoke coming up where the towers used to be. It was completely silent, no announcements, no talking... no nothing, which was pretty unsettling. Funeral feel to it. Will never forget it.

At a defense contractor's office building in Orlando. It was just a standard multi-story office building - no guards or anything. That changed with quickness.

Used the website "freerepublic" for information as the news sites were impossible to get on.

Long drive home that Friday.

Sophomore at LSU. I had a morning class and heard about it/saw it at LSU student union.

Had just moved and had no TV yet. Had to go to the gym to watch. I did about 40 miles on the treadmill that day. That night, our kids collected all of their piggy bank money and we drove to NOLA to donate it somewhere.

I was a senior in high school and our principal would not let the teachers turn the TVs on, even though every classroom had a television. I had a cell phone for emergency's only and I called my mom and she just said to come straight home after school. I'm ashamed to say, I didn't know what the WTC were, and she just said "Home Alone 2"...and then I knew. I always hated our principal not letting the teachers turn the tv's on, felt like I was robbed of history. I guess his reasoning was he didn't want kids freaking out, but I felt like it created more because no one really understood what was going on. I was a freshman when Columbine happened, so I had already learned that life can change in an instant, but this just shook me to my core...really felt innocence lost. Now that I'm thinking about it, my school is close to the Exxon plant in BR...strange we didn't get sent home.

ETA It makes me feel really old that some people on here were only in 2nd grade

BASF in Geismar. Working electrical construction in the plant. They blew an airhorn called us all into the tent and then told us all to go home. Was home by noon.