9:30 a.m., Tacoma, Wash.: I was on a business trip to Tacoma, Washington, from Rhode Island, for a week of training. I was watching the Today show and I vividly remember seeing the first tower fall — I worked at 2 World Trade Center in the late 1980s. I had to call family and friends at home and in New York, which was almost impossible. I finally walked to the office and we collectively decided to continue with the training as no one could get home. Given that I had worked on the 102nd floor of 2 WTC, I will forever remember people jumping from those windows. I stood at those windows many times while working for Shearson Lehman and I am still pained by how desperate they must have felt. The sadness is the same 25 years later.
— Pamela Rotondo
9:35 a.m., New York: After I had finished being, yes, a victim of the collapse of Tower Two, I realized there was a lot of carnage around me. I figured the best thing I could do was to get to the nearest hospital. I can suture up a knee, probably with both hands tied behind my back and blindfolded, so to speak. So I went to Beekman Hospital. I identified myself because I didn’t work there and they gave me a fourth floor conference room. I started to sew people back together again, just trying to stop the bleeding. But that day, it was so surreal. I’m standing over a patient, trying to sew them together, and I remember how difficult it was to even pass a suture through the tissue because my mind wasn’t really focused.
— Dr. Gordon Huie
