09/11/2026
On this day, 9/11, twenty five years ago, Baba John was just finishing up at the gym when he saw the planes hit the towers on the locker room TV.
Gigi Amonna Sue was at home and saw the first attack on the TV. She immediately called Karen, who was across town in her new apartment, and told her to turn on the TV because Armageddon was happening!
Karen was just getting ready for a day of travel agent training…that particular training never happened because of how world travel changed after the attacks. It was surreal and I remember thinking that things would never be the same again and it hasn’t been. The travel agent industry plummeted and changed forever. TSA and other security measures weren’t something we ever thought about before that day and now it’s something that affects all of us, no matter where we live.
Cherisse was at work at ProTrader Securities in downtown Austin, Texas. She was supposed to have been in those World Trade towers that day, but a last minute change meant she didn’t get to go on a trip she had been looking forward to. The company was in the middle of a merger with Instinet and they had decided someone else was needed more. She was in the copier room when she saw it on the trading floor TV. We are forever grateful that she was spared that day.
Cherisse had put together backup files for the files that were sent to New York and at the time she thought she was overdoing it, being what we would now call “extra”. However, had she not done that, the companies would have lost all their records in the destruction of the buildings.
Brandon was a freshman in college and was in early morning classes (and this was before everyone had cell phones or push notifications came every other minute).
Laneice’s story: I was a sophomore in college and at an early morning HPE class. I noticed the TVs had breaking news on them but didn't pay close attention. I walked out and had missed calls from Chris Allen and Momma. I called her back and she told me what was happening. I walked into my dorm and went into a friend's room just in time to watch the 2nd plane hit the 2nd tower and we all literally screamed out loud. My roommate Bonnie's dad was stationed at Bolling Air Force Base and frequently went to the Pentagon so we didn't know if he was there or not. She had interned at the Pentagon that summer. We tried for hours to get though to her family. I finally got her mom on the phone and everyone was okay.
They canceled classes and we all found ourselves in the chapel before they officially announced a chapel service. We held hands in circles praying for hours.
We finally went to the cafeteria, too numb to eat. Still checking on friends from NYC, unsure what was happening.
Bonnie was glued to the news coverage and I finally forced her to turn it off at 3am.
My International Relations class with Dr B was Monday nights. The next Monday, we walked in and he said, I'm sorry you bought these textbooks because everything has changed.
The summer of 2002, I took Bonnie's old job in the Air Force Installations and Logistics Administration at the Pentagon as a summer hire (ie, paid intern). Our office was located in the corridor next to the one that was hit and there was still caution tape and plastic sheets at the end of the hallway, feet from my office, where rebuilding was underway.
My boss took me to the temporary 9/11 memorial on my first day and told me where they all were on the day it was hit. She said they heard it but didn't feel the impact, but those across the center courtyard, felt the blast like it was an earthquake- part of the incredible design of the world's largest office building.
In the Air Force, everyone has additional training and my bosses were all trained to be the folks who have to remove casualties and make official identification and reports. They ran into the burning corridors to get people out and then were part of the horrible task of identification of bodies.
My colleagues are heros and bore the scars of that day. The entire 3 months I worked there, they would visually flinch when they heard planes overhead.
Our collective sense of safety was shaken and yet our sense of unity as a country was stronger than before the attacks. We pray for all those who are dealing with the after-effects of that horrific day and that our sense of unity will be restored.
Where were you on this day 25 years ago when the Twin Towers were hit? How were you affected by the attacks?
