What do you remember about 9/11?

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NASA Remembers

Click here for image

"The world changed today. What I say or do is very minor compared to the significance of what happened to our country today when it was attacked." So said Expedition 3 Commander Frank L. Culbertson, upon learning of the Sept. 11, 2001, attack on the World Trade Center.

This image is one of a series taken that day of metropolitan New York City by the International Space Station's Expedition 3 crew that shows a plume of smoke rising from the Manhattan skyline.

Upon further reflection, Commander Culbertson said, "It's horrible to see smoke pouring from wounds in your own country from such a fantastic vantage point. The dichotomy of being on a spacecraft dedicated to improving life on the earth and watching life being destroyed by such willful, terrible acts is jolting to the psyche, no matter who you are."

Image credit: NASA

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So what do you remember? What stands out in your memory?

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For me, I remember the radio DJ announcing how it was such "a beautiful day." The local news anchor (Baltimore) and national news anchor (in New York) also were exclaiming how it was such a "beautiful day." When I went outside myself to head for my Calculus class, I agreed that it was indeed a very beautiful day.

High was to be in the 70's, the humidity was low, The sun was out with picturesque clouds (the perfect postcard day).

I just still find it odd as to how it was a noteworthy gorgeous day that day. I mean, how often to you hear several newscasters commenting on how it is a beautiful day?

Then tragedy hit....

[Guest HIS girl]

Turned the TV on to watch the morning news - the image on screen was a plane hitting high rise..in my muddled state I thought it was a movie....if only...

[traveller]

I watched the 2nd plane hit then had to leave for work. I tuned my television in at my desk and watched all day long. I remember leaving my office to walk to the building next door and one of the shop employees came running out to tell me the pentagon had just been hit. I'll never forget the look on his face when he said, "I think we're at war."

[Laura]

I was watching the Today Show, back in Ohio where I lived at the time. All of a sudden, there was a "break" in the news, that something had hit a building.

That was the beginning of a very bad movie that never ended. I saw the first building burning, and a bit later, the second building being hit by a plane. From there was Washington and then Pennsylvania. The entire sequence of events still "seemed" like a bad movie, never ending.

I guess I watched almost continously from that point for many days. That evening, there was a special prayer meeting at church. We all know the events for many months, the loss of so many lives, the changes in lives of those rescued and saved, the testimonies of many Christians and their impact on victims of that terrible day.

On Friday, September 14th, 2001, after watching a "Memorial", I developed a "Memory" bookmark, which I still make until this day. One side is The Pledge of Allegiance, and the other in memory of those that were lost.

The changes in us shall remain (those in the USA). The tragedies of that day, impacted so many lives, and families, and many have not recovered emotionally.

Remembering the victims whose lives were lost and their families on September 11th, 2001. God bless America!

[~pearl]

My daughter was 18 months old or so and she had been going through a sleep-late in the morning stage. A blessing for me because I like to sleep in. But that morning I couldnt sleep past 6 am. When I turned on the news the first plane had hit and I thought what a horrible accident and I said a prayer for the victims loved ones. Then the second plane hit, after a moment of confusion I realized this was no accident we were under attack. I just started crying and didnt stop until I went to bed that night.

Its strange how we can remember our thoughts, the weather, our feelings like it was yesterday.

[Northern lass]

In the UK I was working in a hospital. Someone came out of the hospital's filing room who had heard it on the radio. We had no idea what was happening. When I went home I saw it on the news and cried. My grown up daughter phoned me in a state of shock asking if it was real. I still feel those emotions now when I think of it!

[mead]

I was at work, about to leave to go workout when I saw it on the news. Immediatley I felt a great deal of sorrow.

[Guest ktn4eg]

Since I was working a 1600-2400 CDT (that's 4:00 p.m. to midnight for you people who've never been in the military) shift for the phone company at the time, I was just waking up when the news started coming on through my clock radio.

Once I halfway figured out that something bad was coming down, I got up and turned on Fox News Channel just in time to see the second plane hit the WTC.

A little after that occurred I got a phone call from my branch chief at the Tennessee Air National Guard informing me that our ANG wing had been put on Forcecom Delta alert status. That means we need to stay near by our base at the airport just in case we were activated for state or federal use.

As it turned out our ANG wing wasn't immediately activated, but eventually we first went on a voluntary activation status, and then in February 2003 we went on an involuntary & mandatory federal activation status for deployment to Saudi Arabia in support of the early stages of Operation Iraqi Freedom.

In between my initial notification of the possibility of being activated and then actually being activated, I decided to drive home to PA to visit my mother who was in a nursing home. While on the way home, I decided to take a side trip to visit the crash site of United Flight 93 outside of Shanksville, PA.

While visiting the crash site, I had the opportunity to talk with some of the volunteers who helped maintain the temporary memorial for the victims of Flight 93. One of the things they told me was that had that plane crashed just a few seconds before it did, computer simulations determined that the plane would have crashed right into the local public school where about 500 K-12 students were in their classes at the time.

The fact that Flight 93 did not crash into that school building and kill all of those children leads me to believe that there was in reality someone else in control of that plane when it crashed. It certainly wasn't the terrorists, and the passengers hadn't yet wrested the plane's controls from them.

Now, who else could have been in control of that plane? Hmmm.

Another thing that struck me while visiting that temporary memorial that was located on a lonely hillside just outside of Shanksville was this large cross that someone had placed there to commemorate the brave passengers aboard Flight 93, all of whom died in attempt to strike back at the forces of evil that were personified by these terrorists.

When I saw that cross standing on that lonely hillside, my mind immediately raced back to another cross on another lonely hillside where some 2,000 years ago Jesus Christ died and shed His blood so that we could be free from the clutches of the very source of all evil--Satan himself.

[Guest savedandhappy1]

I was watching Court TV, don't remember what case was being tried, when they broke in to say a small plane had hit one of the towers. I went to CNN immediately and like so many when I saw the hole I knew it wasn't a small plane.

I then sit there and watch the second plane hit, the towers fall, and for over a week I continued to watch and pray as it all unfolded.

I remember trying to get ahold of my sister when the second plane hit. We both live in small rural towns, but she didn't answer her phone. She didn't have a cell phone at the time, but her husband runs a rural water station and has a pager. We never use the pager if it isn't an emergency, but I page them. She called me back and my first question was where are you? She said in Joplin, Mo., I told her what was happening and then told her to get out of Joplin now, because it was a big enough town that I was afraid it could get hit. I was on the phone with her when the word came that the Pentagon had been hit.

She said ok but you could tell she wasn't really understanding what I was telling her. She called me later to say she thought I was overreactioning until they got to her husbands office and turned on the TV, then it became so real.

I remember watching and praying without ceasing, and how thankful I was that the place my son and husband were working at let them come home at noon, because of the events, and the unknown as to what could happen next. I was home alone when it started and was so happy to have my family with me as part of me was praising the Lord that we were at that time safe in His arms, and then the other part of me so sad for all those people that wouldn't be coming home to their families.

May we never forget, and may we remember that the first thing we did was return to the Lord. Oh, that we would have all stayed with the Lord instead of returning to the world after the shock wore off.