What were you doing, decided to do, or did do on 9/11/2001?

[onenote]

69. I was on the 8 am metroliner from DC to NY for work

We were a few minutes late getting into Baltimore and one of the passengers getting on said he had just gotten a call about a small plane hitting the WTC; he was wondering if it would effect his being able to get to a meeting in downtown NYC (he didn't know where the WTC was in relation to his meeting).

Then after we reached Wilmington around 9:30, we heard from passengers getting on the plane that it was not a small plane and that there a second plane had hit the WTC after the first plane. Clearly something major was going on.

You have to recall that 12 years ago communications were not what they are today. We didn't have smartphones that could call up instant news and video. We had flip phones that didn't work particularly well on the Amtrak northeast corridor. I spoke briefly to my wife back in the DC area but she hadn't even turned on the tv -- she was unaware of what was going on. My work colleague and I decided that going into NY was a bad idea and we decided to get off the train in Philadelphia (at around 9:45) and head back to DC. As soon as we pulled out of the station, i noticed that I had a voicemail from my wife. All I heard was her voice, sounding almost otherworldly, saying "They've hit the Pentagon. Please be safe." Just about that time, the conductor announced that the train was stopping in Wilmington DE (the next stop) and everyone had to get out.

It was a spectacularly beautiful day and we walked from the station to a restaurant and it was there, sometime around 11:30 that we saw, for the first time, video of the planes hitting the WTC. We found a hotel and checked in. We didn't know if we would be there for a few hours, overnight, or for days. Rumors were rampant. The clerk at the counter in the hotel we checked into told us another plane had crashed into EPCOT in Florida. Meanwhile, I was desparately trying to find out about some friends and relatives who work in and around the WTC and Pentagon. For all we knew at that point, the number of dead might be in the tens of thousands.

We checked with Amtrak ever half hour or so to see if the trains were going to start running again. Finally, late in the afternoon, we were told the trains were running. I called my wife to tell her and she said the news was saying AMTRAK was still shut down. We didn't check out of the hotel in case we had to come back and went to the train station. A train pulled in and we got on it, hoping it was the right thing to do. An hour and a half later (it was still daylight) we arrived back in DC. A much different DC than the one we had left in the morning. It seemed deserted other than armed snipers on the roofs of the buildings. As we pulled out of the station parking garage, a fighter jet screamed overhead. My colleague lives less than a mile from the Pentagon and as we drove home, we were surprised that we could drive right past the building. Smoke was still wafting across the highway.

I got home and gave my wife a hug.