Where were you 8 Years ago today?

[redhawk61]

Where were you when the world stop spinning?

I was in Junior High, 8th grade, and the principle was going around room by room to tell the teachers what had happened and then proceed to explain it to us. It was strange cause I had never heard of the WTCs before and really did not understand the scope of the situation. The teachers were all crying while the students had no clue, we were just glad to be given the rest of the day off. It wasn't until I got home and turned on the the TV that it started to set in. Seeing planes crashing into buildings and people running around covered in debris really begin to hit me hard. I got so angry that if I had been 18 at the time, there is no measure to how fast I would have joined up.

So thats my story, how about you?

[Reds Freak]

Spanish class, sophomore year of high school. Principal made an announcement over the loud speaker when the first plane hit. We watched the rest of day on TV in every class. I remember the confusion and eerie feeling in the halls of the school that day in my typically rowdy high school..

[macro]

It's hard to realize that there are teenagers who don't remember this event. 13-year-olds were 5-year-olds that day. I know that I have no memory of world events when I was five.

[NJReds]

Midtown Manhattan. 41st floor. Put my coffee down, heard a plane fly by. Looked out the window and saw its shadow as it crossed Madison Square Garden. Said to my co-worker "that one sounded low." Didn't think anything of it until someone from the south side of our building told us that it hit the WTC.

We proceeded to watch the rest of the events unfold in front of us. Horrifying. Especially because at the time we weren't sure that it was over. We kept waiting for the next attack.

[camisadelgolf]

I was 18 years old and sleeping in my room when my friend called me and said, "Turn on the TV. You won't believe this." He knew that I was boycotting television (aside from sporting events) because I hated the media for instilling so much paranoia in people. Still, I trusted his judgment and turned on the TV for the first time in several months and with a hangover, I said, "You woke me up before 10:00 for this?"

I was already angry at the media for the paranoia it was instilling in people, and the way the media handled 9/11 only increased that. Because I'm so out of touch with pop culture, it's still very hard for me to grasp where all this ranks in terms of historical importance, but it's pretty clear to me that my generation will be remembered as the generation that went through 9/11.

[nate]

I was at my house in Southern California. Fell asleep the night before with the TV on and woke up in a daze to the news. I thought it was a movie of some Tom Clancy novel. I think I stayed in bed pretty much all day just watching the news.

Oddly, 9/11 is also my Mom's birthday.

[RollyInRaleigh]

On a sales call in Spotsylvania, VA. Listening to the radio. Ran by my house after the call to see the second plane crash into the World Trade Center. Was really scary that night as the airways had been shut down. We lived in Fredericksburg, VA, about 50 miles from DC and the military planes were buzzing over our house all night long, some close enough to make the roof shake. It was a very scary and strange night.

[OldRightHander]

I had gotten married ten days earlier. We were living in Colorado then and I was working at a Wells Fargo office near Garden of the Gods. I was on the way to work, passing by Fort Carson, when the radio DJ came on and said that a small plane had hit the WTC. They joked on the radio about what kind of idiot would fly into a building. I got to the office in time to see the second plane hit. We didn't get much work done the rest of the day.

[Roy Tucker]

I was in a job interview. One of those where they put you in a conference room and people come and go interviewing you. As each person came in, they'd say "have you heard what's going on?...". So I got the news piece-meal as I was trying to stay focused on the task at-hand, i.e. getting a job.

The interviews were supposed to last 8am-12pm. Probably around 11, the main guy said "you might as well go home, things are too crazy around here". I went out to my car in the parking lot, turned on WLW, and sat there for about 30 minutes going OMG.

They offered me the job but I turned it down.

[GIDP]

Sitting in drafting class watching it on a TV that gets terrible reception.

[redsmetz]

I was at work, sitting right where I am now. An email came over from a listserve I'm on mentioning the first report that a small plane had crashed into the World Trade Center. CNN's website, I think, was swamped, but gradually another report came in and the additional planes crashed and the scope of the events became clearer.

My wife that day had gone to a workshop for folks looking for a new career and another attendee came in late and that's how she heard. My oldest daughter was a freshman at Dayton and she heard Air Force jets throughout the day coming and going from Wright Pat. I don't think my son knew until the end of the day since his school decided not to tell the kids (I think he would have been about 7th grade) and our younger daughter heard while at school at McAuley.

[flyer85]

I was at work ... not much got accomplished by anyone the rest of the day.

[GIDP]

I remember watching planes fly over my house all night long. Ive never seen planes fly so fast.

[RichRed]

I was at work in Fletcher, NC, near Asheville when a woman from the office came in to tell us "We're under attack!" Spent the rest of the day numbly following the story online. I suddenly had a strong need to hear my parents' voices so I called my dad at home in Virginia Beach. The shakiness in his voice as we talked about what happened was something I had never heard from him before. Never forget it.

[MrCinatit]

I had to go to work that night, so I was at home. The night before, I saw a special that included a bit about a military plane that had accidentally crashed into the Empire State Building right after WWII.
That morning, I clicked onto my news page, that had a little blurb about a small plane that had just hit one of the WTC buildings. I turned on the television in time to see the second hit, and knew it was no mistake.
I remember there was a lot of confusion for a while on the news about exactly how many planes were still out there and unaccounted for - for a while, I think the number of potentials ran in the 20s. Of course, two others of those turned into the real thing.
When I went to work, it was rather quiet (it was at Ames Department Store). A scare was thrown into some when a middle Eastern gentleman came into the store (he was actually Indian). When I got home, there was a line in front of the gas station at the end of my block leading to the end of the other block.