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On September 11, 2001, I left my home in Hoboken to commute to my office in lower NYC. I had worked in the World Trade Center for several years prior to 9/11 and had only recently moved to a new building across the street from the Twin Towers. Like many folks working downtown, I commuted through the WTC via PATH: a train that ran under the Hudson River. Very fast and very clean, PATH sped to our final destination, the WTC, in 11 minutes. As always, we disembarked and made a mad rush to the huge escalator system underneath the Towers. It was 8:35 am. I remember vividly seeing two guys who worked at Cantor running for their elevator that would take them to the 104th floor. We waved to each other. I never saw them again. That was the last PATH train to reach the Towers.

I walked out of the WTC on the most amazingly beautiful day. The sun was already brilliant. There wasn't a cloud in the sky. I remember thinking to myself what special day for people already lining up to go to the top of the observation deck. They opened at 10 am. Or would have. It was perfect. Tourists would have seen for miles. A friend once told me “you could see forever” up there.

I walked quickly outside, grabbing a cup of coffee on the way, and made my way up to my office. Sitting on a slight grade uphill, my 32nd-floor office looked directly across at the 40 -44 floors of the WTC. The Towers were so massive that they completely blocked our view of the Hudson River. They basically took out any potential view of New Jersey. When I worked in the Towers (both North and South), I could see well past the Newark Airport on cloudless days. I always missed being able to stand at the floor-to-ceiling windows gazing out. It was a great way to take a break. We used to watch planes land and take off from the International Airport 15 miles away. Once, we watched a guy BASE jump off the top of our building- about 110 floors up. Amazing. I believe it was Thor. I could be wrong about that. But he escaped the authorities down below and lived to tell the tale.

I reached my office desk at 8:42 am, give or take a couple of minutes. It wouldn't be long before the world would change forever in the most tragic moments of modern American history. The upper levels of the North Tower exploded in front of us. Beams came out at what we thought was the 85th floor. I was on an IM to a friend up at Cantor but the line went dead immediately. We didn't see a plane hit that Tower. We were located on the opposite side and so our view was blocked. As mass confusion kicked in we scrambled to get information. Folks on the other side of NYC had seen the first plane coming down 6th avenue. So they already knew. But we were completely in the dark. For ten minutes, rumors filled our office of an RPG hitting the Tower or a small aircraft that had veered out of control. We tried to remain calm.

We called our wives hoping they would get more information off TV's or radio news services. We were searching for answers. Our phones were ringing off the hooks as friends and family members checked in on us. YeS, we were okay, but we were thinking about evacuating. It was initially uncertain whether we should leave the building. The second plane passing behind the WTC fifteen minutes later made that decision for us. Unfortunately, we stayed long enough to witness the direct hit on the South Tower. I called my wife one last time and told her I was leaving and that I would be home as soon as possible. She was crying.

We ran out to the hallways (the elevators were shut down) and began the long descent downwards to escape our building. Though we remained orderly on the way down, the panic was definitely in the air. When we reached the outside finally, there was complete pandemonium. No one knew which direction to go. Both Towers were on fire and bellowing huge smoke. People in the streets were screaming and crying. We decided to break into small groups and go our separate ways. We wished each other luck and bolted. I tried my wife again, but the cell phones were out. The cell towers had melted already on top of the WTC. I realized we had lost contact with the rest of the world. Welcome to hell, I thought. I wouldn't speak or see my wife, Barbara, again for 9 hours.
I was with two fellows who had both worked at Cantor until the previous Friday. They began with us the day before.

They knew hundreds of people up at the top of the North Tower. I knew at least thirty. We decided that we would hop the police barriers and go to the Greenwich Street side of the North Tower. From there, we thought possibly we could help or at least get some sort of possible fix on what was happening. All along, we thought the Towers would never collapse. In all the years we had worked up there, we had heard numerous times that the WTC could withstand any impact. They were wrong. The South Tower came crashing down just after 10 am. It was the most destructive sight you can possibly imagine. Death was in the air. We still watched the North tower. Then it fell as well.

Hundreds of us were just praying below that a miracle might occur. We watched as some of our friends and former co-workers jumped to get away from the burning fires and smoke above. We would have been the last thing they saw before the Angels came to carry them away. They came out in pairs. Some were good friends but I didn’t know that yet. I cried as I watched them float against the sky. I knew they were going to a far better place than what was here right now. I thought of their families, their lives- and then we turned and ran like madmen. We turned around seven blocks later to watch the second tower collapse. The world was upside down. It would never be the same.

We made our way past the Holland tunnel gathering information as we moved north. We found out that these were hijacked planes coming out of Boston, that they had followed the Hudson River down to NYC. We began to hear about other hijackings and attacks. We were directed by the local National Guard to make our way to the docked Intrepid Aircraft Carrier Museum. There would be ferries there to get us off the Island. They were right. The downtowners straggled into Midtown. You could tell who we were easily. We were dusted and had the looks of people who had seen Hell firsthand. For many of us, it was as close to combat as we may ever come.

We lost a certain innocence that day. As I waited in line for a boat (it took many hours), a woman near me received a call on her cell phone. Nobody else had a connection that I could see or hear. Her father had managed to contact her from Florida. A minor miracle. Before she hung up, I asked if her Dad might call my wife to let her know that I was safe. She said yes. A wonderful lady indeed. Barbie received that wonderful news minutes later as an older gentleman from down South called her and gave her the good news. I will always be grateful to that wonderful man. A small kindness that went so far. So many people did not get that call. It breaks my heart daily.

That night I learned that the young man living above me was missing. The fellow in the apartment directly next to me had disappeared as well. Neither ever came home. I lost thirty-five friends and former co-workers. It took weeks before I learned all of their stories. The music on this website is mine and it is theirs. I will never forget them. Maybe they can hear us singing. They are songs of love.

Tim Tuttle - New York City