September 11th - Patriot Day

[aceman67]

In the United States, Patriot Day occurs on September 11 of each year, designated in memory of those who died in the September 11, 2001 attacks. However, the name does not seem to have caught on in the American vernacular; most people still refer to the day as "September 11" or some variation thereof. Excluding the 19 hijackers, a confirmed 2,973 people died and another 24 remain listed as missing as a result of these attacks.

It would seem that every generation has something that happens that you remember where you were, and what you were doing. For my mother, it was the assination of JFK (She was in her 4th period Biology Class in high school), for my grandmother, it was Perl Harbour (Though, it would be kind of hard for her not to remember it, she was there when it happened, along with my grandfather, who was a Flight Lieutenant with the US Air Force).

For me, I know exactly where I was when the events of that tragic day happened. I was on my way to school, taking the 66 Grant Transit Bus in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada listening to the radio (The song was Enter Sandman by Metalica), when the DJ interupted the song to announce that a jet liner had just hit one of the twin towers.

Do you remember where you were?

Wikipedia Entry: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Septemb...C_2001_attacks

[Naegling]

'Tis truly rather hard to forget that day.

I was in class when the the planes hit. At that time, few at my school seemed to know about it. When I first found out about it, I was hanging on some of my schools gym equipment watching TV while waiting for my gym class to start. Needless to say it never happened, as we were all awstruck by what going on in New York. I may have caught the news too late to see the planes hit the towers but I remember seeing them fall. I remember at the time it seemed rather far away, despite only being 3 hours north of the city. It hit me later when all the students were gathered in the dining halls of their respective campuses how close to home this was for so many. Close to 1/4 - 1/3 of that school is either from Manhattan or has close to ties someone who was.

Those were indeed odd times. They still are...

[KiraRin]

I was in a hardware store when I heard the news. I didn't really understand it, I mean, nothing like that happens in the civilised world.

When I got home, I put on Sky News, and saw the pictures. The sight of the planes flying into the sides of those buiildings was more like something out of the movies. Something you really will never be able to get out of your head.

I watched the news for 5 straight hours, waiting for updates. I'm not an American, and I have no family or friends out there, but it was still the thought of all of those innocent people trapped both inside the structure, and the aircraft.

Anyone who has lost family or friends in the attrocity, you have my condolances. The same goes to the victims of the 7/7 attacks (the London bombings, that always seem to take a back seat to 9/11).

Working in the aviation industry, I know how strict the measures have become to stop something similar happening again. Still doesn't stop me getting nervous when I see someone who looks muslim getting on the train at the same time as me. Something I hate myself for doing.

H.

[aceman67]

My father, who's in the Canadian Military was imeditly called into the Winnipeg International air port to take over the Civilian air traffic controlling (He has training in the field and used to control the air space for search and rescue on the eastern seaboard of canada up to the quebec and ontario boarder) and helped guid all the planes that were diverted to winnipeg that day. I remember sitting out on the schools front feild eating lunch with my girlfriend, watching jet after jet fly over head. He didn't come home for 3 days, after that, they had him doing security on the base within the city (which is now closed and moved 200 miles west to CFB Shilo). This came as a shock to alot of people in the city. There hadn't been an armed guard at the gates of Kapyong barricks since the close of the Koren War. it was quite chilling to see armd soldiers in the middle of a major metropolis.

well i was on my way to work which is about 3 blocks away from ground zero, i always make it early to work but that particular day, don't ask how but i was going in late.
i overslept so i was almost there, it was close to 8:45 am which would have given me about 5 minutes to make it in with no issues, my train stopped and we were stuck for about 10 minutes, then we started rolling back.
plp were a bit surprised but no type of info was being given. by the time i left the train, still no info, just that there were no trains running to manhattan. got home and turned on the tv and the rest yall know....

I always looked at it as a brilliant display of the American mentality, with people chanting "You are dead, you are dead" at the 'terrorists' while standing on the rubble. In GWBs speech about it when he got there, the quote was something along the lines of "we will find the people that did this and make them pay". And it wasn't even an eye for an eye, it was a massacre for an eye; I think more civilians are estimated to have died in Afghanistan in the first 5 days of the bombing than in all of 9/11.
And it seems people remember this more than the boxing day tsunami, in which many more people died, and it was a perfect example of nature > man. Yet it seems to be comparatively ignored.
Contrast this with Europe or the rest of the world when they get bombed; there were no new invasions after the London bombings, or the Bali bombings, or the various other bombings in Europe since 9/11. Sorry if I sound uncaring, I'm not, I think it was a tragedy, but I think it says more about American mentality towards violence and revenge than about what terrorists are willing to do to 'end our freedom'. Goddamn, they hate our freedom don't they? Let's build a motherfucking freedom tower just to spite them.