World Trade Center & 9/11 - 15 Year Anniversay

11:48 AM mssoellegant 0 Comments

On an almost achingly beautiful late summer morning, life in America, as well as most of the world, was changed irrevocably in the space of less than two hours. I have lived in Louisville all my life along with most of my family. I can remember on this specific day, I was 10 years old, sitting in my social studies class at Westport middle school. Around 8:45 in the morning, our principle came over the loud speaker, telling all faculty to stop class and turn on our classroom televisions.

This Tuesday, September 11 2001, the two Twin Towers of the WTC in New York City, and the Pentagon in Washington D.C, were struck by airplanes that were hijacked by terrorists. The attacks were part of a strategic plan of the terrorist group al-Qaeda, a global militant Islamist organization founded by Osama bin Laden in Pakistan around 1988.

I will tell you about the World Trade Centers as they used to be on and before September 11, 2001, the events of the 9/11 attacks, as well as the aftermath from this tragic occurrence.

In the year 1959 the Downtown Lower Manhattan Association was created by real estate developer David Rockefeller, to revitalize lower Manhattan and begins to promote the idea of a "world trade and finance center" in New York City. In March 1966 the construction began. The two towers were surrounded by five other buildings that comprised the complex. At 110 stories each, WTC 1, the North Tower, and WTC 2, the South Tower, provided nearly 10 million square feet of office space for 50,000 employees and 430 companies. They were the tallest buildings in the world until the construction of Chicago’s Sears Tower. They attracted roughly 70,000 tourists and 150,000 subway commuters every day. The towers contained 239 elevators and had 43,600 windows. Each floor was an acre in size and the complex even had its own zip code. The core of the towers housed the elevator, utility shafts, restrooms, three stairwells, and other support spaces.

They were a tube within a tube structure, made of the outer walls, and the inner core. The cores of those towers were not reinforced concrete, or concrete at all. They were 2 layers of 2 inch thick GYPSOME BOARD, also known as sheetrock. The tube frame design created a relatively lightweight structure that would sway more in response to the wind compared to traditional structures such as the Empire State Building. The core of the towers housed the elevator and utility shafts, restrooms, three stairwells, and other support spaces.

On February 26 1993, terrorists detonate 1,500 pounds of explosives in a van parked in the underground public parking lot of the WTC, two levels below the North Tower. The attack kills six people, including a pregnant woman, injures more than 1,000 people and creates a five-story crater beneath the towers. The WTC reopens for business on March 19 and The Port Authority of New York implements a $250 million upgrade plan focusing on life safety and security. 1994 The WTC is designated one of the "Seven Wonders of the Modern World" by the American Society of Civil Engineers.

The morning of 9/11, 19 terrorists hijacked four fuel-loaded commercial airline jets bound for west coast destinations, the two that hit the twin towers out of Boston, Massachusetts. American Airlines flight 11 hit the WTC north building at approximately 8:46 AM between floors 94 and 98. Seventeen minutes later, at 9:03 AM, United Airlines Flight 175 struck the south tower between floors 78 and 84. 1,200 people were trapped above the point of impact and almost 200 people jumped to a certain death. The heroic efforts of the city’s fire and police departments and other emergency responders helped 25,000 people escape from the site before the unthinkable occurred. The South tower gave way first, crumbling to the ground in nearly 10 seconds at 9:59 a.m., 56 minutes after being hit. The north tower collapsed less than a half hour later, at 10:28 a.m, 102 minutes after impact. The other buildings in the complex were severely damaged by the collapse of the twin towers, and their ruins eventually collapsed or were demolished.

There are 2,749 people known to have been killed at the World Trade Center site, only 58 percent, are identified by recovered physical remains, of the rest, none have been found. On September 12, 2001 the last survivor was rescued from the ruble, from then on their search for survivors turned into a restoration effort, and finally on May 30, 2002, the WTC recovery ended with a public Last Column Ceremony, removing the last debris from the site. I had the pleasure to visit NYC and the WTC complex last December (2013) and was blessed to see what was born from the ashes. In place of the two twin towers now, are 2 memorial water fall pools with the names of every person who died in the terrorist attacks of the WTC, inscribed in bronze. There is a pear tree in the courtyard of the towers, called “The Survivor Tree”. Not without much damage, it survived the collapse. In the northwest corner of the WTC complex, stands the new primary building, One World Trade Center, also called “Freedom Tower”, and is the tallest skyscraper in the western hemisphere. It stands at 1,776 feet, in reference to the year of the United States Declaration of Independence. The other buildings of the complex as well as the 9/11 museum are still under construction. Lastly, in my humble opinion, the 9/11 Tribute Center around the corner on Liberty St. has to be the best dedication to what was endured. During my visit to the center no words were spoken, it was somber, and a place of respect, learning and understanding. The center displays missing person’s flyers, 911 phone calls, firefighter radio communication, family’s voicemails and testimonies, farewell and I love you cards and letters, lost ones pictures, items found in the rubble, and letters from people across the world. It is a shrine and to me really lets you sink in the raw emotion that, still to this day, can and was felt. 

So I took you through the growth of the Twin Towers, the events of 9/11, and how far many have come from the tragedy. Many innocent people were killed, and also American heroes. The type of heroes that each and every one of us see every day but never stop to thank them for devoting their lives to saving others. Not only fire men, police men, and military but also those friends, colleagues, and random strangers who out of their own kindness aided those in need. In my eyes, I not only wrote this speech to inform, but to also honor all of the lives that were lost.

Until next time. - D💋

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Bibliography

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_Trade_Center

http://www.911memorial.org/world-trade-center-history

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/September_11_attacks

http://www.cnn.com/2013/07/27/us/september-11-anniversary-fast-facts/

https://www.nysm.nysed.gov/wtc/about/facts.html