9/11

[motto (RIP)]

Wow Tony. I had never thought of how the event may have affected those of an unstable mind. It was difficult enough for folk in full command of their faculties to come to grips with.
I was rostered off that day and was alerted to what was happening by a phone call from my father in law who lived across the road. For the next several hours the family was glued to the TV as events unfolded.
I tried to reconcile what we were looking at with footage we have all seen of Japanese Kamikaze attacks during WW2 but this was different. The planes were civilian airliners of a type I made my living maintaining so carefully and were fully loaded with passengers. The target was unsuspecting ordinary people going about their daily business.
Even now I find the utter, cold blooded contempt for human life displayed for everyone to see impossible to comprehend. The realisation that such hatred exists has changed the world and has added to a sense of unease as we are forced into a position of eternal vigilance.
It aint over yet. It will never be over.

David

[hrpearce]

Without going out to the shed to look through my diary for 2001 I can't say what I did that day.
I remember turning on the tv as usual as I entered the lounge room and can still see the images clearly in my mind. I sat in the lounge for ages watching the news updates finding it hard to believe.

[maple_leaf_eh]

My job was in the response mapping section at work. We all finished up our jobs, and stood by for new work. Nothing came. I suggested we needed to do something - anything, like start a map of airports in Canada. The chain did not see things my way. Oh well. It might have been helpful in later days.

Later in the day, one of the staff officers showed up with a disk of images he wanted plotted 'for the US embassy downtown'. Right away, boss. I opened the disk and loaded glossy photopaper in the plotters. For about an hour I plotted no classification stated high resolution oblique satellite shots of downtown Manhattan. The bird was slicking away from the target, and the camera was slewed backwards. The detail was incredible, and I won't say anything more than that. The photopaper takes a little time for the ink to set, so the sheets had to sit uncovered on the floor. I ended up with a mosaic of a dozen square yards of shots. The staff officer came back, we bundled everything up, and he disappeared. I like to think that I informed the US Ambassador and the Embassy that day. Friends help friends.

[jack neville]

At that time I was working at a location in the World Trade Centre in Flinders Street , Melbourne.
I was on night shift and just arrived at work after the first tower was hit. Watched the whole thing unfold in similar disbelief.
I rang my wife at 0300 to tell her that planes had been flown into the World Trade Centre and to turn on the TV.
I never ever referred to my work location as the World Trade Centre and didn't realise the significance of what I had just told her.
She told me later that when she turned on the TV she couldn't work out why all the fuss was in New York when such a disaster had occurred in Melbourne.
Just a little personal quirk on an event that has reshaped all our lives for a very long time.