20-year anniversary
Just as we welcome new solutions to both local and global challenges, we open ourselves to fresh life stories, and in doing so peruse narratives of the recent past. The apostle Peter would say we reflect with thankfulness in setting an informed future course of action “so that your faith and hope are in God” (1 Peter 1:21).
Countries have important events as do individuals, planned and unplanned. After our country survived the terrorist attack of 2001, the American vocabulary changed in phrases of “pre and post 9/11.” At a time when individuals and governments were reminded that “black swan” events can occur, sending life out of our control, a paradigm occurred with Americans viewing:
life (“we have enemies”)
travel (“safety isn’t promised”) and
future (“the economy is fragile.”)
NARRATIVES
Events of 9/11/01 are deeply embedded in the collective consciousness of our American nation. One highlight is the discovery of the 37-step “survivor staircase,” the only above-ground remnant that emerged from the dust to lead people to safety that day and is now showcased at New York City’s 9/11 Memorial. In the logs of 9/11 narratives is the story of Patty Clark and Kayla Bergeson, longtime Port Authority workers. Ms. Clark, senior advisor to the aviation director at Port Authority, New York and New Jersey recounts: “I didn’t know the plane struck, but when it happened the building shook, it moved, and I heard a loud boom but didn’t know what it was. I had the sensation that I was never going to see my little boy again. I had listened to people who were in the 1993 attack who had mentioned the darkness and smoke. I just decided I would be out of the building before my husband woke up in California and before my son and his nanny went for a walk. Because of our practice escape drills, I didn’t have to think about where to go or what to do.” She said that when she got into the stairwell it was light, and a colleague with a pager said it was an airplane.
Terrorism wasn’t in our lexicon at that moment, she explained. “When you realize this chaos is not a mistake, it takes on a different sense of reality.” She had been running late that morning, had tucked her open-toed sandals into her bag and fortunately had not changed out of her sturdy close-toed shoes. It wasn’t until she reached the high 30th floors when the building shook again. There Patty’s group stepped to the side of the stairway for the severe burn victims who firemen brought down past them. “You have a job, you’re scared and in pain, no choice, but for your loved ones watching it, it’s a lot more difficult.”
At the 23rd floor, it was so smoky she couldn’t read the words on the nameplate of the law firm; in the 20’s she was relieved to see the NYPD Chief of Police. Then on the 4th floor a rumbling, a shaking resumed-not a pendulum like before-but a violence, a vibration. Lights went off, the rumbling and violence went on, as the lights went back on Patty thought “I didn’t like that.” Neither did the others. All talking stopped.
The staircase became impassable. Two towers collapsing was not in the realm of their thinking-a rush of water, building debris, mudslide, and gravity taking it down 110 stories. The little pod comprised of co-workers Patty, Charlie, and Kayla now clung together with Kayla grasping onto the back of Patty’s clothing.
One at a time the firefighter guided them to the locker place below. He told them to place something over their mouths as they were breathing in pulverized concrete. “All you want to do is get out fast, yet you can’t move out fast,” Patty said. “I remembered it was my late father’s birthday, and I said to the group that ‘my dad’s taking care of us’.” Water was up to our eyes and rising, wires were hanging down so we yelled ‘don’t touch them, they might be live!’ At the 3rd floor it was pitch black, as we were feeling our way, a guy at the end of the locker space said, “I’m going to open the door. Just keep going.”
Patty thought everything appeared surreal when they got out of the building. In her disoriented vision, Patty thought coworker Charlie looked like a spirit, his human shape obscured by layers of pulverized concrete on top of him. Confused she said, “oh, we didn’t make it.” She immediately had a wonderful sensation of peace. Later she told those who’d lost loved ones to not fear, that they’d probably passed peacefully. Behind them, the door opening was being metered, and people began yelling, “where do we go?” At that point a man said to “go this way” and directed them toward the plaza. The group was dismayed at not seeing any other victims emerging.
A man in street clothes, maybe an undercover policeman, said to go across the plaza debris, stay under the eaves of the building, and they walked over the remains of the first tower’s implosion. Patty remembers the ground being so gray in color that she was shocked to see a contrasting green folder on the ground. They checked the 5th floor customs and the 6th floor daycare-both still somewhat intact, leading them to hope the best for the employees and children-but the 7th floor command center where Kayla was supposed to meet someone was devastated. On the top of the stairs, their pod ran into others including a man clutching his chest who Patty comforted until a policeman came to his rescue (which Patty observed saved the policeman’s life because it stopped him from running back into the doomed building.) “Come over this way,” said a man standing in the dust and debris on the corner of Church and Vesey, vaguely waving them up.
They took the first step on the inoperable escalator, the 37-step Vesey Street “survivor” staircase, and kept going.
“Are you still together? out of the building?” A text came in on Kayla’s Blackberry from Patty’s husband (exactly seven minutes before the second tower came down.)
“Yes,” they replied and immediately regretted it, because they were together but not out of danger. Nothing was making sense to them. Where were the emerging professionals? Where were people escaping?
They looked back to see the top of their tower on fire, set against a brilliant orange-red sky.
“We heard a rumble and ran. We knew what it was this time.” People on the street ahead ran.
Near Washington Park a father with young children ran away from them. They ran 16 blocks to the Holland Tunnel. “We were pretty scary looking. It took someone else on the street to tell us that something happened. . . a purposeful act of violence. . . we had come out of the building at 10:21 a.m. Minutes before the tower collapsed.”
***
In another area of the WTC, Tom Canavan, a Union Bank security specialist, made his way down from the 47th floor of the north tower stairs. He walked down to the lobby concourse after the first plane struck, then emerged from the tower only to be inundated with debris. Tunneling out of the ash and rubble almost burying him, he heard the WTC’s south tower collapse. A stunning ray of gold awning that led him down the stairs to a nearby street. Minutes later the north tower collapsed.
“I just looked to the left and remembered here was the escalator going down to Vesey Street. I made my way over there and two Port Authority employees waved me over and I ended up going down those steps.” Possibly the last person to make it down to the stairs as Tower 2 collapsed, Tom Canavan walked toward Church Street, but saw the side of the plaza had caved in. In order to escape raining dust and particles, Canavan walked toward Church Street. Ironically, the place of worship on Church Street, in existence since George Washington was inaugurated as the nation’s first President, sustained no major damage even though it took a full year of work to remove debris from the church structure and historical landmarks.
***
Lee Ielpi, 26-year veteran of FDNY 288 lost son Brenden on active duty for only 6 months, who was sent to the WTC when the crisis occurred. He recalls the “horrendous cloud” and the image of “the North Walkway collapsed over six fire trucks,” and closer to WTC “a couple of Haz Mat trucks pounded still running, with flashing reflectors still in the fog”. He recognized that the buildings didn’t fall to the side but building 7 came straight down not off-to-the-side. . . it was burning and in 15 minutes came down”. He said he saw “the hand of the good Lord” in that more people were not killed/injured on adjacent roadways speeding, trying to reach the WTC site.
***
At South Tower, a Boston College alumnus helped as many people as he could possibly help down the stairs near the 70th floor. Reports of a “good Samaritan” with a red kerchief came from the survivors who tumbled out of the mouth of the shattered cave of a building.
***
Jim Geiger recalled getting out of the building from the 51st floor within 5 minutes of the time it collapsed and took the “survivor’s staircase” to safety.
***
The 37-step staircase was commemorated in the reopening of the WTC complex, and after years of profiling this construct along with the stories surrounding it, I viewed it in 2014 at the 9/11 Memorial. The WTC Survivors Network uses anachronism “WE REMEMBER.”
WITNESS
ESCAPE
RESILIENCY
ENDURANCE
MEMORIAL
EDUCATION
MOVING
BRAVERY
EMOTION
REMEMBER
Several years before when my family and I arrived to stay in the New York financial district, I tried to see the survivor’s stairway in the ground’s remains, yet it had been moved underground to bedrock for reconditioning then repositioning with the memorial landmarks.
***
While working through losses of our own unforgettable family members, and I shared the 37-step staircase story with a tug to connect it to Psalm 37, my mother Faith earnestly opened the Word with me and underlined the phrases she thought provided solid steps for the believer. In the simple underlining of Faith, she leaves to us:
Don’t worry
Trust
Commit
Be still
Stop anger
The Lord directs the steps of the godly, though they stumble, they will never fall for the Lord holds them by the hand.
***
CONNECTIONS
In Psalm 37 David writes as a counselor, providing wise steps to take as you face crises and decisions. Whenever you feel the presence of competition or the compulsion to perform:
Trust in the Lord, do what is right despite what others do (vs 3)
Cultivate faithfulness and don’t move too quickly; don’t rush anything (vs 3)
Prioritize God and His values. He will reward you and satisfy you in the end (vs 4)
37 steps to freedom in the Lord:
WE REMEMBER
WITNESS
ESCAPE
RESILIENCY
ENDURANCE
MEMORIAL
EDUCATION
MOVING
BRAVERY
EMOTION
REMEMBER
GOD’S FAITHFULNESS
GRACE
ODEDIENCE
DEVOTION
SALVATION
FAITH
ADORATION
INSIGHT
TRUST
HOLY SPIRIT
FIRSTFRUITS
UNITY
LISTEN
NECESSITY
ELEVATION
STILLNESS
SATISFIED
LOVE
LORD
OVERTURN
VIRTUE
EVOCATION
MERCIES
MIRACLE
ENCOURAGEMENT
RIGHTEOUS
COUNSEL
INCLUSION
EDIFY
SHARING
