" If you got out, you were lucky." "If you were trapped in the building, you died." " In the heat of the battle you've got to make decisions with imperfect information, not knowing how one of your actions will turn out." " Everybody who ran left died." "Everybody ran straight back died." "For no reason," "I ran to the right." " There were constant threats of attacks." "There were warnings the planes were headed for New York." " There were lines and lines of ambulances for days, but no patients." " Most New Yorkers were virtually certain another attack would occur." "We seemed so vulnerable." " When an attack like that takes place, it's a shock to the system, because it makes you understand how fragile life is." " The challenge when you have an airplane headed straight at us:" "What do you do?" "You take it out." " The phrase "fog of war"" "I think probably is not a bad one." "It takes a period for information to be gathered." "It takes a period for communication to take place." " It's now close to 15 years, and we still don't have the full information." " None of us really believed that a war could come to our shores." "And then 9/11 happened." "male narrator: 15 years after September 11, 2001, we asked 60 Americans who lived through the day to share their unknown stories, revealing new information and never-before-seen images and recordings, these are stories that can only be told" "15 Septembers later." "On the morning of September 11th, 2001, cellular networks in the United States are overwhelmed due to the attacks in New York and Washington, DC." "But more than half a million text messages are sent, not from cell phones but from two-way pagers." " Back in 2001 we used pagers kind of like we use texting today." "One of the interesting things about the paging network, it was designed to work in areas where cell phone signals couldn't reach." "Because of the terrorist attack, the cellular networks became very quickly saturated, the pager network carried messages for people who were there, for people who were trying to figure out what was going on, and for their loved ones." "narrator:" "Fifteen years after the attacks, we now know these text messages were intercepted and archived by the U.S. government." "In 2009 they were released by WikiLeaks." " In this archive we see through these very short, truncated text messages what it was like to be a human being on that day." " I think when you read things like these texts it takes you a little closer to them, because it's impossible for us to know what that was like." "And we want to be able to connect to them in some way." " When I read those texts I get it, I understand it." "I think it was a much bigger event than anybody realized." "narrator:" "The New York City fire departments' response to the attacks begins moments after the first plane is flown into the north tower." "But the size of the operation isn't fully appreciated for years." " In September of 2001 I was battalion chief in the first battalion in lower Manhattan." "Somewhere around--oh, I guess around 7:30 that morning, we got a call for a gas leak in the street." " I was the chauffeur of the engine." "We responded." "And while we were checking out the location, that's when the first plane flew over." " You could feel it, it was so low." "And you could feel the pressure of it right above our heads." " We saw the fireball." " Holy !" " And then we heard the sound." " All of us knew at that moment what our job was, and that was to go to the Trade Center." "I got on the radio." "narrator:" "In just minutes, over 200 FDNY companies from throughout the five boroughs began arriving at the World Trade Center, in what is now known as the largest emergency response in American history." " When we talk about alarms, we're talking about the amount of resources we bring to the scene." "That morning we transmitted multiple fifth alarms." "Hundreds of units into one location." "There was almost a thousand firefighters before I even got there." "One of the fire lieutenants that came into the building was my brother Kevin." "And I thought he was going to be off that day." "And we stood there for maybe two seconds just worrying about each other." "And I gave him orders to go upstairs." "It was the last time I saw him." " We have a breaking news story... narrator:" "As news reports of the scene are broadcast, other city agencies respond." "And the NYPD mobilizes over 800 police officers to the World Trade Center." " I was the police commissioner for the City of New York." "I looked up at that television and I could see the damage to the tower." "And I realized that this was nothing like we had ever seen in this country before." "I called the mayor." "The mayor was on the way downtown." " I told Bernie, you set up about two blocks away a police department command post with hard lines so we weren't subject to the vagaries of cell phones." "Remember now, we're talking 15 years ago." " And I was actually talking to my staff about that move, waiting for the mayor when I heard this enormous explosion." "I didn't hear the second plane." "I didn't see the second plane." "All I saw was this enormous fireball blowing out the north side of the tower." " Police Commissioner Kerik told me that a second plane had now hit." "And of course now I knew it was a terrorist attack." " We were directly underneath it." "It didn't dawn on me initially in that first few seconds that all the stuff was going to come down around us." "My security personnel had grabbed me by the jacket, and we were running up the street." "One of my bodyguards was hit in the back of the leg with something that had came from the wheel of one of the planes." " We had a protocol for just about every kind of emergency." "And most of it involved my going to the scene." "As I was approaching the police were telling me to look up, because things were falling down and they were hitting people." "And I realized that I was watching a man on the 101st, 102nd floor making a decision as to whether to throw himself out." "I froze." "I watched him come all the way down." "It's a memory that's with me almost every day." " On September 11th, 2001," "I was the fire commissioner for the New York City Fire Department." "Mayor Giuliani was a hands-on boss, and he always wanted his leaders-- the police commissioner, the fire commissioner, buildings, you name it-- he wanted them with him." " The chief grabbed my arm and he said," ""Mayor, my guys are in the building." ""They're at least halfway up already." "We will save everybody below the fire."" "My heart sunk when he said that." "He said it in a nice way, a somewhat euphemistic way, but what wasn't he telling me?" "Every human life you see up there is, in a few minutes, not going to be with us." "narrator:" "Back in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing," "NYPD helicopters rescued people form the rooftops of the towers." "On September 11th, helicopters are sent again." " I'm retired from the New York City Police Department as a helicopter pilot with the aviation unit." "We got the helicopter out, started it up, and in about 10 minutes we were up at the scene." "We were up there for about 15 to 20 minutes, and then the second plane hit." "We did not see it or hear it coming in." "The plane had just missed one of our helicopters." "He came by at about 500 knots and just whizzed right by them." "He missed them by about 3 or 400 feet." "I'm amazed that they weren't affected by the aircraft." "I looked over, and there was a ball of flame going in the air." "I had a camera onboard, and it was just take the pictures." "narrator:" "Not released until 2010, the photos and videos shot from the NYPD helicopter provide a rare view of the day's events." " I was a helicopter pilot on 9/11." "I wasn't flying that day, but after they realized what was going on they dragged out the helicopter." "Flying around, you were able to see a mass of smoke." "It was still burning." "You could smell it out in the helicopters." "and directly above that aircraft were people trapped." " I know those buildings are big." "I knew this plane was big." "But I was just amazed at the size of the hole." "You know, you could actually see where the fuselage was." "And then it tapered off in either direction where the wings went through the building." "But you really didn't think about it, because you were focusing on the situation at hand." "You know, you're trying to see if people made it to the roof." "If we could have gotten one person off there it would have been at least some type of satisfaction." "We would have taken down anybody that came to the roof." "But we did not see anybody make it up there." "narrator:" "After 9/11, reports circulate that the people trapped on the upper floors tried to reach the rooftop." "The reason they are not rescued, revealed five years later, is heartbreaking." " From what I understand, the doors were locked shut with chains." "They were just worried about people getting up there, committing suicide or any other kinds of acts of violence." "So they were sealed shut." " You know, we had the training, we had the equipment, we had the experience." "But it's just that nobody made it up there." "You know, it's... it's disheartening, really, because it's sad that they didn't have a chance." " This does seem to be surreal, but in fact it is real." " What was unusual about that day," "I've said on many occasions, for a journalist and for those of us who have to be involved in these events as they unfold is that we had no idea what would happen next." "narrator:" "Fifty-one minutes after the World Trade Center is attacked in New York," "American Airline Flight 77 is flown into the Pentagon." " I was in the Pentagon discussing the intelligence threats that the President had received, and the building shook." "You could tell immediately that the Pentagon had been attacked as well." "I felt a need to better understand what had hit, so I went down the hall until the smoke was such that it was important to go downstairs and get outside." "We could see the fire and the smoke, pieces of the aircraft spread across the grassy area outside the building." "I can remember at that stage there were no medical people or no firemen of policemen that had arrived to assist." "And it was basically people who worked in the Pentagon who were going in and helping people come out." " I remember the President being very frustrated, because he was trying to reach Secretary Rumsfeld at the Defense Department, and it turns out that was when the Pentagon had been attacked." " I was not able to get him, and it turns out one reason why is that he was becoming a first responder at the Pentagon." "He was helping rescue people." "narrator:" "This rare footage of Donald Rumsfeld helping at the scene is discovered years after the attacks." " I've known Don Rumsfeld for a long time." "He's a tough guy." "I was not surprised that that was his first response, to go out there and try to help people." "narrator:" "While images of the Pentagon are broadcast around the world, it's not until five years later that the government releases surveillance video of Flight 77 striking the building." " I think when the Pentagon was struck it didn't change my sense of the day's events." "It confirmed my sense of the day's events." "And by that I mean that what had happened in New York was not the end of something, it was the beginning of something." " 9/11 brought about a profound change for the entire country." "For the U.S. military, it ushered in an era of war that is still ongoing." " I returned to my office and began to accumulate information." "And part of the information that received during that period was that there were other aircrafts hijacked." " We have this as a major development." "The Federal Aviation Administration has shut down all air traffic nationwide." "narrator:" "After the Pentagon is attacked, the FAA orders an unprecedented grounding of all aircraft in the United States." "At the time, the decision is attributed to the Secretary of Transportation." "But in the 15 years since, a different story has emerged." " On 9/11, 2001," "I was the national operations manager at the Federal Aviation Administration air traffic control system command center." "I've been in air traffic control since the '60s." "But on 9/11, that was my first day in that position as national operations manager." "narrator:" "His first day of the job, and without authorization from the Secretary of Transportation," "Ben Sliney gives the order to ground every plane in the country." " My charge on 9/11 was the safe and efficient air operation of the National Airspace System." "It was entirely within my purview to do whatever I felt was necessary to make that a reality." "At that point there were well over 5,000 aircraft in the sky." "When American 77 struck the Pentagon," "I issued the order to land all aircraft at the nearest airport." "narrator:" "In just hours, nearly every aircraft in America is landed at the neatest airport." "September 11th is the first and, to this day, only time the order to clear the skies has ever been given." " We put up the map, and you could see the lights beginning to blink off as planes were landing throughout the United States." "When I look back on it, that was a very astonishing piece of excellent work." " I remember even 41, the President's father, was on an airplane over Michigan or Minnesota." "And they were ordered to the ground just like everybody else." " I did not know who was friend or who was foe." "By landing everyone, those that were left would be the ones that we would have to deal with." " There was a report that there was an airplane headed for the White House." "Shortly after that, the President and I talked." " The two major decisions on 9/11 was to ground the airplanes, and then any airplane that was flying in the sky without proper transponder signal would be identified and shot down." " The hijacked aircraft, even if it's got lots of Americans onboard, is a weapon in the hands of the enemy." "I knew what the President approved already: take it out." "I knew what the President approved already: take it out." "narrator:" "By 10:00 on 9/11, three hijacked planes have already been flown into their targets." "A fourth is heading for Washington, DC." "F-16 fighter jets are scrambled to intercept the plane, but one F-16 is already in the air." " My name is William F. Hutchison III." "I was a fighter pilot back in September of 2001," "I was on a training mission down to the Southern portion of North Carolina, and I get the radio call that says we need you to investigate an airplane." "It wasn't following instructions." "It was not squawking." "And it was coming from Pennsylvania." "They asked us to get back as fast as we could." "We came back at Mach 1, flying to the limits of the airplane." "I'm then told to use whatever force necessary to prevent that airplane from reaching Washington, DC." "I don't even know why this is all happening." "I'm just going on the instructions of those that I trust." "So I'm climbing to 50,000 feet to get a good look, and I can see through my heads-up display off in the distance this airplane or this target." "All the while I'm running out of gas rapidly." "From that moment on everything becomes rushed." "I turn my aircraft back to Andrew's Air Force Base." "I didn't know if I would be able to get the airplane on the ground, just because I had run myself completely out of fuel." "Fortunately for me," "I was able to land the aircraft safely back on the ground." "narrator:" "With the plane still heading towards Washington, a second fighter pilot is preparing to take off." " My name is Heather Penney." "In September of 2001 I was a first lieutenant in the DC Air National Guard." "When the first airline hit the first World Trade Center, we thought that it was an accident." "It wasn't until the second aircraft hit that we realized that our world had suddenly changed." "When you're getting ready to go into the meat of the mission, everything is tensed and your teeth get sharp." "Got my G suit, got my vest, got my helmet." "But a lot of people don't realize that the weapons are not all put together." "They have to actually put together the guidance package, the fuse, the explosives." "They have to build it up." "So we know it's going to take time, but we didn't have time." "We had to do everything we could to get into the air as quickly as we could." " We had the authorization to take down an aircraft that we deemed was hostile." "narrator:" "While the mission is reported after 9/11, one fact is not released to the public for almost a decade." " We didn't have any weapons on the jets." "After the fall of the Soviet Union, we were living in a time of peace." "We were the only super power in the world." "We simply started to stand down all of our air defense units." " It was a situation where, from the standpoint of our defensive capability, we were totally flat-footed." "Because we weren't prepared to scramble we had to improvise." "Without missiles, we would have to ram the aircraft." "In the blur and the haze and the speed of everything that happened that day, perhaps I missed it, but I don't think anyone ordered us to ram the aircraft." "I think it was just simply understood, because that was all that we had." "I knew that I would take the tail." "When you lost the tail, the airplane just went straight down." "The thought occurred to me:" "would I have the time or the opportunity to eject?" "But immediately that didn't make sense, because what if I missed?" "So the thought of saving myself was never an element of what happened that day." "I just had a job to do." "And if there was any point in my life where what I did mattered, now was it." "We went up the river west-northwest to search for that aircraft, and we never found anything." "Which later we discovered was Flight 93." "We didn't know that it had already crashed." "Whether or not we took Flight 93 down would not have changed that outcome or saved their lives." " Looking back 15 years, I guess in retrospect," "I possibly was the last person to have seen Flight 93 before being forced to land." "I watched off in the distance this target." "It rapidly descended, and it flew to the ground." "narrator:" "When United 93 crashes in a Pennsylvania field on September 11th, the full story is known." "But then in 2011, audio recordings are declassified." "One of the recordings captures a frenzied commotion in the cockpit." " You just try to imagine what it was like in that plane." "The chaos in that cockpit was beyond imagination." "They realize that the plane has been hijacked." "Now they're able to get out cell phone calls and they realize what's going on out there." "narrator:" "In addition to the cockpit audio, voicemail messages left by United 93 passengers and family members have been released in the past 15 years." "For 30 minutes, the passengers put together a plan and then rushed the cockpit." "In the struggle for control of the plane, it turns upside down and crashes." " Because of the courage of those passengers, that plane didn't go into the capital, it didn't go into the White House." " I'm sure there are many people alive today and possibly even me, because of what those passengers did on 93." "They sacrificed themselves rather than let the terrorists strike another target." " I swore an oath to protect and defend." "But these were just average everyday people that stood up to the plate." "As far as I'm concerned, we weren't the heroes." "The passengers on Flight 93 are the real heroes." "children:" "Seal." " What words?" "children:" "Seal." " Yes, seal." "narrator:" "When he learns of the attacks in New York..." " Get ready." "children:" "Play!" "narrator:" "President George W. Bush is at an elementary school in Florida." " I was sitting in a classroom in Florida listening to a child read." "I had known the first plane hit the tower." "I thought it was an accident." " The President doesn't know when he'll have to deal with challenges, and it's up to the chief of staff to anticipate those challenges." "I don't think he knew I was there until I was almost at his ear." "All I said to him was," ""A second plane hit the second tower." "America is under attack."" "And then I stood back from him so he couldn't ask me a question." " The first rule of a leader in a crisis is to project calm, so I waited for the appropriate moment to leave the classroom." "narrator:" "In 2016, over 1000 previously unseen photographs are declassified." "Taken by White House photographer Eric Draper, the images give a moment-by-moment account of President Bush's movements as the attacks unfolded 15 years ago." " Watching President Bush's face change after Andy Card whispered in his ear," "I knew something was wrong." "Instantly, my focus turned to the President." "I said, okay, I can't let the President out of my sight." " The President came back into the holding room." "What's the first thing that he says?" ""Get the FBI director on the phone."" " He went right to work." "He picked up a notepad and started writing his first statement to the nation and to the world." "And I captured that image of President Bush turning to see a video of the south tower getting hit." " My comment were something along the lines of," ""We're under attack and we'll deal with it."" "We didn't know what "it" meant at the time." "Two airplanes have crashed into the World Trade Centre in an apparent terrorist attack on our country." " At that point in time I proceeded to tell people what to do." "Get the crew back on Air Force One." "We're going to have to get out of here." " May God bless the victims, their families and America." "Thank you very much." " By the time I was able to start reflecting," "I was hustled into a limo, and we were speeding toward Air Force One." "And my national security advisor said a plane has hit the Pentagon." "And that's when I realized I had become a wartime president." "And I said, "I'm getting on Air Force One, and I'm going to be in Washington pretty soon."" "And it turns out it took me seven hours to get back." " And as we walked onto Air Force One," "I remember the President saying," ""Okay, boys, this is what they pay us for."" " The engines on Air Force One were running." "That's a protocol no-no." "The engines don't start until the President is safely on the plane." "So I said the pilot must really want to get out of here." "As the door was coming shut, the plane started to roll almost before we had a chance to go take our seats." "Turns out the Secret Service had overheard the word "angel" used, which is the code name for Air Force One." "Potentially Air Force One could be a target." "And then we made a very steep incline, flying in a serpentine way." "And then I'm being asked by the pilot, "Where are we going?"" "narrator:" "For the rest of the day, the President's location is a closely guarded secret." "The whole story would not be fully reported to the public for years." " We wanted a long runway where the President could be secure." "Ideally on a military base." "And I said we're going to Barsksdale Air Force Base." " I followed President Bush and Andy Card into his private cabin, which no one's allowed in this area." "I witnessed the two of them having a very intense discussion about returning to Washington." " Andy recommended me not going as we took off from Florida." " And the President says, "I'm ordering you, we're going back to Washington, DC."" "He would say it;" "I wouldn't say he couldn't do it." "I just kind of refused to implement it." "He kept getting more and more angry." " Being the commander in chief, you want to be in the center of the action." "I needed to give an address to the nation, and I damn sure wasn't going to give it from a bunker." " We didn't think anyone knew where we were, but then local TV broke in and said Air Force One spotted over Barksdale Air Force Base in Louisiana." "And we watched ourselves land on live TV." " I found out weeks later that a cameraman happened to be driving by, and recorded history that he shouldn't have had a chance to record." " Andy and I landed in Barksdale." "And there's a general that meets us." "He had a gun strapped on, which I thought was unusual." " We piled into Humvees, and I remember the sergeant was driving like a bat out of hell." " I said, "Man, slow this thing down."" "You know, this is probably the greatest danger" "I'll have all day." " President Bush was on the phone almost constantly with the Vice President, but he was also focused on what plans there were, where do we go, when do we get back to Washington, DC?" " What we were doing was avoiding having a situation where you could decapitate the federal government by having the President back in Washington, and then another strike." "I can remember recommending a good location for him would be Offutt, outside Omaha." "narrator:" "Offutt Air Force Base is the home of U.S. strategic command, and is designed to withstand a nuclear war." " I remember being whisked very, very quickly to an elevator that took us deep, deep down underground." " I followed the President into a bunker." "This huge "Star Wars"-looking conference room." "I was kicked out." "But I was able to make an image of the Secret Service agent standing post." " The strategic air command, it's got tremendous facilities deep underground, a lot of communications capability." "It's one of the safest place in the country." "We were able to do a video conference." " The video conference call gave me a chance to talk to my national security team." "And they realized that we had a tough task at hand." "But Vice President Cheney was very calm and steady." "He's a man who does not get rattled easily." "narrator:" "On September 11th, the American public is left unaware of Vice President Cheney's location." "The whole story is not fully reported for the next 14 years." " I was in my West Wing office." "And my secretary called in and reported that an airplane had struck the Trade Center." "At that point, I turned on my television set in time to see the second aircraft come in and strike." "That was the-- sort of the first notion that there was a fundamental problem." "A Secret Service agent stationed outside my door of my office burst in." "He said, "Sir, we have to leave now."" "Put his left hand on my left shoulder, grabbed the back of my belt with his right hand and just lifted me out of the chair and propelled me out of the room." "There was no question I was going to go where he wanted me to go." "narrator:" "In 2015, the National Archives declassifies 350 never-before-seen photographs taken on 9/11 inside the secret bunker six stories under the White House, called the Presidential Emergency Operation Center." "These are the only photographs of the PEOC that have ever been publicly released." " When I first arrived, there was a lot going on." "They opened up lockers down there, passed out weapons, gas masks." "Nobody knew what was going to happen." "Just that the word had come in that the White House might be a target" "PEOC goes back to World War II days." "There were times when calls were dropped, times when you'd try to get through to somebody and it didn't connect." "So our capacity to function wasn't ideal." "But it's what we had at the time." "narrator:" "At 4:30 p.m.," "Air Force One returns to Washington." " We had arranged for fighter jets to accompany Air Force One." "And it was quite traumatic to have fighter jets so close to us that you could actually see the faces of the pilots." " They got closer and closer and closer to the wing." "You can literally recognize faces." "You know, the President and the staff were looking out of the side of the plane, seeing the fighter jet." "And on the other side of the plane, you can see the plume of smoke still rising from the Pentagon." " To my left, the Pentagon was smoldering." "But what I distinctly remember was the streets were empty except for checkpoints." "I'd left a bustling city and came back to a city that was locked down." " When the President walked in, there wasn't any doubt in anybody's mind that he was the guy in charge." "He went and delivered the address to the nation from the Oval Office." "And I always thought he handled it very well." " The search is underway for those who are behind these evils acts." "I've directed the full resources of our intelligence and law enforcement communities to find those responsible and to bring them to justice." "We will make no distinction between the terrorist who committed these acts and those who harbor them." "I made a lot of tough decisions, some of which were highly criticized." "But people need to know that every decision I made was to keep the little girl who was reading to me in the classroom safe, and her country safe as well." " This is WINS, New York." "If you are a New York City fire department member, you are to report to your firehouse immediately." "Obviously they need all the help they can get... narrator:" "In New York, the Twin Towers are burning, and a massive rescue operation is underway." "Mayor Rudolph Giuliani and Police Commissioner Bernard Kerik are at a temporary command center just two blocks away." " I grabbed the police commissioner's arm, the deputy police commissioner's arm." "I got them all around me and I said," ""This is much worse than any attack we've ever faced before."" " My staff had secured an office at Barclay and West Broadway." "And the mayor wanted to contact the White House." "He was actually waiting for the Vice President to come to the phone." " I was told that the Pentagon had been attacked." "We're evacuating the White House." " Before I even had time to get my mind around what he said, the building we were in started to shake and rumble, like a freight train was coming through the side of it." " My desk started to shake like an earthquake." "Looked outside." "All my people had gone under their desks and they were getting hit be debris." "narrator:" "At 9:59 a.m., the south tower of the World Trade Center collapses." "In less than 10 seconds, a billion pounds of material falls to the ground" "Hundreds are trapped in the rubble, including Mayor Giuliani." " Uh, yes, we are trying to locate where the mayor is." "He would be down at the Office of Emergency Management, which is down at the World Trade Center." "We cannot find him right now." " The first building fell down." "Knocked out all our power and trapped us for about 20 to 30 minutes, which is why there were some reports that I was dead." "narrator:" "A rare NYPD distress call is broadcast." "But this story is not fully revealed for years." " I kept reminding myself of what my dad taught me." "Remain calm." "Even if you're not calm, pretend you are." " I remember hearing one of my bodyguards yelling "code black" into the radio, and I was like," "I didn't even know what the hell code black was." "But it was like a call sign if the mayor or the police commissioner's in distress." "The whole entire office we were in was flooded with this smoke and debris." "I can remember thinking that" "I'm gonna wind up suffocating in this office, because we couldn't breathe." "Every door was locked." "We were basically trapped." "When all of a sudden a door opened, and these two maintenance guys led us over into Church Street." " We got out through an adjoining building going down through a second basement." "When we got outside into the lobby," "I wondered if we hadn't gone from bad to worse, because the outside looked like a nuclear cloud." "People were coming into the building badly wounded." "And we had to make a choice." "Do I stay in the building?" "As we discussed it we thought might collapse, killing all of us." "Or do we go outside and take the risk that some of us will be killed by the debris we could see hitting people." "And I decided we would go outside, because we had a better chance of at least a large number of people surviving." "And I took one reporter with me and I said, "Come with me."" " I'm ready, Mayor." " Everyone in the city should remain calm." "The very best thing to do right now would be to remain home." "And that's when I first said the fire department and the police department have responded 100%." "They're in charge of it." "This is a terrible tragedy." "The best way we're going to get through this is if we remain calm." " I think it was Rudy Giuliani's finest moment as a public official and as a human being." " You shouldn't panic." "You shouldn't worry." " Mayor Rudolph Giuliani had established a tone of leadership." "He was the voice of confidence." "The voice of "I am the mayor." "I am in charge."" "Unquestionably, he did many of the things that you expect a leader to do in a crisis." "narrator:" "When the first plane hits the north tower, up to a million people are stranded in Lower Manhattan." "But with the bridges and tunnels closed to traffic, the only place to go is to the water's edge." " On September 11, my position was a captain on the Staten Island Ferry." "And as we approached Governor's Island, we noticed another plane coming up alongside us." "And then we watched him go right into the building." "He just... the building swallowed him up." " On September 11th, 2001," "I was piloting the ferry boat "Henry Hudson."" "My ferry was about a mile north of the World Trade Center." "But when the second plane hit the second tower," "I immediately turned south." "Basically, I stole the ferry." "Some impulse just took over." "I just turned the wheel hard to port, and I headed south at full speed." "I don't remember ever telling anybody on the radio what I was doing or where I was going." " In reality, Manhattan was being bombed." "And these people wanted to get out of there any way they could." "The coast guard made a call for all available boats to evacuate everybody from Manhattan." " I saw a flotilla of tugboats, ferries, sailboats." "Anything that could float was coming northbound towards Lower Manhattan." " It was like a sea of boats." "It was unbelievable." " There was a flood of humanity just pouring over the steel rails." " We started loading." "And we just kept loading and loading." "These people were coming and coming and coming." " "Henry Hudson" is a class of ferry that holds 400 people." "But I liken it to being that last lifeboat on the RMS "Titanic."" "The lifeboat might be rated for 36, but if you could fit 38, 40, 50... if these people might die before your very eyes, you do what you have to do." " As we were backing out, there was a guy come running and jumped to the boat." "And the crew got him and said, "What are you doing?" "You know, you could have killed yourself?"" "He said, "I'm jumping for my life."" "So, you know, you couldn't argue with him then." " You didn't know what was going to happen next." "Nobody knew if another plane was going to hit another building." " We know there's planes up there, but we can't see anything coming at us." "The ferry, you know, we carry 6,000 people." "We're a big target." "So we went around Governor's Island trying to, you know, not follow our regular route." " Literally, we're just a few hundred yards from the burning buildings." "Then the tower collapsed." " When this dust cloud hit us there was no visibility." "You couldn't see anything." " We saw a police boat within three feet of us, at about 40 miles an hour." "Never even saw us." " My eyes are burning and I'm choking." "And at one point there was this white stuff coming down." "And it almost seemed like snow." "Eventually, off the south end of Governor's Island, we came through the smoke." "And that boat was registered for 6,600 people." "You know, that day we had that many people on." "narrator:" "For the next 9 hours, the boat captains on 9/11, acting on their own, evacuate over half a million people off the island of Manhattan." "In what is now known as the greatest maritime evacuation in world history." " That many boats evacuating that many people in that short a time." "What an enormous effort this was." "It took a lot of bravery to affect that evacuation." " One of the survivors of the World Trade Center, his family was over in New Jersey." "They knew what building he was working in." "They watched all morning They didn't hear from him." "They were gathering, trying to decide how they were going to deal emotionally and otherwise with his loss." "At about 1:30 in the afternoon, he walked through the door." "He'd come home on a ferry boat." " There was a guy who worked at the ferry probably 10, 15 years with me." "Never said anything to me." "But after that day, he came up and said, you know, we did a good job." "narrator:" "Amid the rubble, 1,000 emergency responders searched for life." "Only 18 people are ever found, the majority in the first hours." "But what we now know is that the last two men are pulled from the rubble nearly a day later by a group of rescuers and two Marines who traveled to Ground Zero to help." " My name is Will Jimeno." "September of 2001," "I was a Port Authority police officer assigned to the Port Authority bus terminal in Midtown Manhattan." "We commandeered a bus on 9th Avenue, and we were flying down there." "Talk about fear." "It looked like Armageddon." "It looked like a war zone." "The street is full of debris." "Windows were shattered." "There's pieces of plane." "There's unfortunately human remains." "narrator:" "Will Jimeno and his partner," "John McLoughlin, make it to an underground concourse between the towers." " One of the things we told each other right then and there was we do not leave each other, no matter what happens." "That's when I saw a humongous fireball." "I mean, the size of my house." "Tower two is coming down." "It's coming toward us." "That's when something humongous just picked me up and started slamming me down." "I ended up on my back in a 45-degree angle." "And the next thing you know, we're just getting bombarded with concrete." "And it's coming down on us." "And then all of a sudden it just went" "Everything just stopped." "I find myself in this dark hole." "And Sergeant McLoughlin now was yelling, because he was actually being crushed." "And then I see this big piece of concrete on me, and that's when the pain started to come in." "My whole left side was crushed." "I wanted to die." " My name is Jason Thomas." "I joined the Marine Corps in 1996." "On the morning of September 11th," "I was at my mother's house." "She informed me a plane just flew into the World Trade Center." "I ran to my trunk of my car, grabbed my military uniform and hustled to Ground Zero." "I ran to another Marine." "He introduced himself as Staff Sergeant Karnes." "And then we decided that, you know, we were going to conduct a search and rescue." " My name's David Karnes." "I had 19 1/2 years in the Corps." "I served in Desert Storm, so I had some combat experience leading up before 9/11." "That morning I was in Wilton, Connecticut." "I went down there as a Marine in uniform." "I put the pedal to the metal." "Don't know how fast I was going." "But I went through the checkpoints." "The cops could see a Marine and fresh utilities, squared-away haircut with all my rappelling gear and stuff." "that I was a first responder, and they just waved me through." "narrator:" "Due to the severe danger at Ground Zero, the Marines are told to stay off the wreckage." " There was like, maybe, 20 FDNY firemen." "I said, "Can you tell me if anybody's been in the epicenter of the debris field conducting search and rescue?"" "And he goes, "No, Marine." "If you go in there you're going to die."" "narrator:" "But against orders, they go in anyway." "Jason Thomas takes these never-before-seen photographs at Ground Zero." " I mean, Sergeant Thomas and I walked along a pile." "I didn't know how bad it was." "I thought there could be 10, 20,000 people under these beams that we're walking on." " And we just continued to yell down in every hole." ""Is anyone down there?" "This is United States Marines."" ""Is anyone here?" "If you can hear us, yell or tap on the steel."" "And then we would listen." "Nothing." " We did this for what seemed to be hours." "And I heard a voice." " We'd listen." "And maybe about 30 yards ahead we heard some muffled cries for help." " And I said, "Please don't leave us." ""We have men down." "My sergeant and I are hurt real badly." "We've been here for a long time."" " I assured him." "I says, "Look, this is the Marine Corps." "Consider yourself rescued." "We're not going anywhere."" "narrator:" "Jimeno and McLoughlin had made it to a freight elevator as the tower was collapsing." "With the protection of the elevator, they had access to enough oxygen to keep them alive while the rescue specialists dug them out." " First name is Scott." "Last name is Strauss." "On September 11th, 2001," "I was assigned to the New York City Police Department's" "Emergency Service Unit, truck one." "I jumped down into this hole." "It was about 6 to 8 feet deep." "About 3 feet wide." "We could see Port Authority police officer Will Jimeno." "The opening was just so small you had to crawl in on your side with your hands above your head." "And we had to literally scrape away at him to start the free him." " And it took us three hours working together." "And we finally got Will Jimeno out." " I remember making my way out of the hole, drenched water all over my face, and that sort of thing." "And I remember sitting there for about 5 or 10 minutes." "And from that point on, I got up and headed back to my car and drove home." " Jason Thomas and Sergeant Karnes, they found Will and John." "Literally the needle in the haystack." "People were trying to find out who Jason Thomas was." "Dave Karnes stuck around." "And nobody could find Jason Thomas." "Nobody knew who he was." "narrator:" "For the next five years, authorities conduct a nationwide search for Jason Thomas." "But with just his last name to go on, they were unable to find him." "What we know now is that Jason Thomas chose to stay out of the limelight and told no one his story, not even his family." "In 2006, after seeing a trailer for a film about the rescue, he decides to come forward." " And that was--that was-- it just-- just couldn't believe it." " The producers of the movie called me up and they said," ""We have somebody who's claiming to be the real Jason Thomas." "You know, is there any way you could talk to him?"" "And I asked Jason a couple of questions that I knew that only he could answer." "And I said, "Wow, that's you, Jason."" " The movie came out, and I had the honor to meet him." "And I felt complete at that point, that I was able to say thank you." "So I'm grateful that both Thomas and Karnes had the courage and I guess the craziness to find survivors." "And they found us." " My mother always told me, "You are your brother's keeper." "Never leave your brother behind."" "I felt I could never leave someone behind knowing-- knowing, just knowing that they needed help." "narrator:" "The rescue operation at Ground Zero lasts 18 days and becomes one of the longest and largest search-and-rescue efforts in history." "While the last survivor is found after 27 hours, the workers search in vain for 17 days." "Due to the conditions, morale is low." "A little-known program is launched to raise spirits among the responders." " I got a call from the U.S. Marshals." "They had made a list of who they thought would help raise morale if they came down." "She goes, "You're going to talk to some of these guys" ""and, you know, they're not the type of men" ""that cry on people's shoulders." ""You know, there's military guys there" ""and there's firefighters that have been doing it for a long time."" "She said, "So it's going to be difficult to get them to talk to you, but that's the idea."" "And I said, "Yes." And the next thing I knew, I got picked up." "It was--Debra Winger was in the car, and Arliss Howard, and Matthew Modine." "And the four of us, we-- they took us straight down to Ground Zero." " The Creative Coalition put together a group of actors, and brought us down to the Trade Center." "And then all of a sudden it got very quiet, because we looked over and there was the site." "And we just stopped breathing and stopped talking." " One of the images that's still in my mind was the glow, the red glow." "I remember this woman, it said "FBI" on her jacket, she said, "You're staring at it for too long."" "She goes, "You don't want to stare that long."" "She goes, "So turn with me and let's walk away."" "And so I did." "And I realized, you know, when she said that that she was right." "I was kind of, you know, stuck." "And that must have been going on a lot." " They were still looking for people and remains." " We started to talk to people and let them get it out." "And there's a lot of tears and there's a lot of guilt." "They were meeting people on the way down that were not alive anymore, and some of them they knew." " Their stories, I really feel, are sacred." "What they went through and what they were going through." " Everywhere you looked on the way out as we were passing, you could see these images that you knew were going to be in your mind for the rest of your life." "And... nobody spoke." " We went as sort of, I don't know, maybe ambassadors for the city, because not everyone in the city could go there and say thank you for putting your life on the line and coming here and-- and doing this work." "And I could look them in the eye and say thank you." "narrator:" "The cleanup and recovery effort at Ground Zero will continue for the next nine months and include responders from all 50 states." "Immediate estimates are that 12,000 bodies are buried in the rubble." "For the workers, the emotional toll is devastating." " September 11th, I was governor." "And the days after I was down there constantly, talking to the firefighters, talking to the construction workers." "And the sense of loss was huge." "After a few days," "I could sense that the morale was wearing out." "So I called the White House, and the next day the President came." " I wasn't sure what to expect with what it was like at Ground Zero." "It was like hell." "My senses were on high alert." "I was sloshing through water." "It was kind of a foggy debris mist." "I walked down the stairs into the pit and there were a lot of first responders there." "A lot." "I shook hands with as many as I could." "I'm looking in the eyes of men and women who have rushed into buildings to save their loved ones or their buddies." "Deep bloodshot eyes." "And they were exhausted." " I was a fireman there 30 years in New York City Fire Department." "And when I seen what happened on 9/11," "I went to the help on the bucket brigade, feeding the buckets." "And some guy comes up and he says," ""The President is here."" "And there was a crushed fire truck in the rubble." "So I saw nobody's standing on it, so I jumped up on it." "He comes to the corner and I see him," "And he comes right in front of me and puts his arm up." "I said, "Oh, my God."" "I pull him up," "I turn him around on this little spot next to me and I say, "You okay, Mr. President?"" "He said, "Yeah."" "So I start to get down." "He said, "Where are you going?"" " Thank you all." " Go get 'em, George!" " I want you all to know..." " Louder!" " It can't go any louder." " There was a mountain of guys on the left." "They were saying, "We can't hear you."" "And then he said..." " I can hear you." " I can hear you." "The rest of the world hears you." "And the people" " And the people who knocked these buildings down will hear all of us soon." " When the President made that statement, the place went crazy." " USA!" "USA!" "USA!" "USA!" "USA!" "USA!" "USA!" " President Bush's visit to Ground Zero was beyond symbolic." "It showed that he was the President." "He was the commander in chief." " It presented the image in the picture of a strong and determined leader." " President Bush's ratings went to an all-time high." "History can second-guess every move that the President made, but I think George W. Bush will go down in history as having been a good leader in that time." "narrator:" "On September 11th, 50,000 people were working at the World Trade Center for over 400 companies." "No company lost more people than finance firm Cantor Fitzgerald." " On September 13th you went on national television and effectively told these families," ""Don't worry, we will take care of you."" "On September 15th you cut their salaries." "What kind of reassurance is that?" " I wish I could, but I cannot." "My company cannot." "narrator:" "In the days after the attacks," "CEO Howard Lutnick is criticized for cutting salaries to families of his lost employees." " For Mr. Lutnick to turn around and say," ""Here's your last paycheck"" "was such a disgrace." " A slap." " It was just a slap." "narrator:" "But what we didn't know in 2001 was that he'd spend the next 15 years making his plan to help the families a reality." " September 11th was my oldest son Kyle-- it was his first day of kindergarten." "And an administrator came into the classroom and told me, "Mr. Lutnick, they're trying to reach you." "A plane has hit the building."" "When I got to the building, we stood at the doorway as people were coming out." "We were grabbing them, asking them what floor they were on." "I was hoping for one person from my floor walking out, because I knew once I had one then we'd have hundreds." "And then I heard this sound." "It was this huge sort of bending steel sound, and a roar." "So we started running." "What had happened:" "the south tower had collapsed, and I was standing 25 feet from it." "Everybody who ran left died." "Everybody who ran straight back died." "For no reason, I ran to the right." " My name is Edie Lutnick." "My two brothers and I were extraordinarily close." "My office was on the 101st floor." "My brother Gary's office was on the 104th." "On the morning of September the 11th," "I answered the phone, and it was Gary." "And I said, "Gary, you know, thank God you're not there."" "And he said, "But, Edie, I am here."" " He told my sister they can't get out." "Then he called her to tell her he loved her, and told her to tell me that he loved me, but that he was going to die." " And then he stopped talking." "And there was silence." "And that was the end of any world as if I had known it." " You know, I knew." "I knew right then that everybody was gone, that everybody was dead." "I knew it in my heart." "I knew it is my soul that they were all gone." "You know, and in the beginning I was trying to find every hospital and every hospital bed to see who had survived who worked for us, but there were unfortunately very few people." " On the morning of September 11th," "I had just arrived and was in an elevator of the north tower, on the way up to my office." "When the plane hit my elevator suddenly rocked." "And it began to plummet." "And it burst into flames." "Shortly after, a fireball came through the gap between the elevator doors and the side of the elevator that hit me flush in the face." "I woke up in a hospital bed." "Howard Lutnick, our CEO, came to pay a visit." "And Howard said, "Harry, if you can hear me, raise your arm."" "And I'm told my arm went up." "I have absolutely no memory of that." "I was told that by my wife." "narrator:" "Three days after September 11th, the Lutnicks launch a foundation as part of a long-range plan to save the company and raise funds for the families of their lost employees." " I promised all the families that I would give them at least 100,000 in cash each." "So that's 658 families." "That's 65 million bucks." "They 900-odd kids, and pay for their health care." "I said I'd pay for it for 10 years, and I estimate that would be at least another 65 million bucks." " The anger lasted for a while, and then people started realizing that this man was living up to all of his promises." " So on September 11th I had 960 New York employees." "Lost 658 people." "So now, 15 years later, we've got just under 3,900 in New York and just about 10,000 around the world." "We've come back." "On September 11th we ask all of our employees to waive their days' pay, and we donate all revenues that come into the company." "And so we raised $12 million for 150 different charities." "And we've been doing that every year." "narrator:" "After the attacks, 18,000 businesses in New York were destroyed or displaced and it's estimated that the economic impact to the city could reach $105 billion." "Mayor Rudolph Giuliani starts a campaign to stimulate the economy." " If you like to go out and spend money," "I would encourage that." "It's always a good thing." "You might actually have a better chance at getting tickets to "The Producers" now, if you want to come here and see it." " "The Producers" opened in April, and we were right at the flush of success when September 11th happened." "We really didn't know how long it was going to take till things got any kind of normal." "It felt like maybe there's no such thing as people being willing to sit in a chair and watch a fake show and laugh, and maybe that just doesn't exist anymore." "But then, two days later, the mayor's office called." "Mayor Giuliani wanted New York to get back to normal, so everybody got back to work as best they could." "That first show back was very emotional, and I'll never forget it." "It was a great relief to hear people laugh." "And at the end of the show we were-- everybody sang "God Bless America."" "And there were people with tears streaming down their face." "And it was very, very moving." " Human beings have that ability to recover." "Some take a little longer." "A handful of them never recover." "But most people, they sort of combine having a future with remembering the past." " You know, television coverage of 9/11 was constant." "Twenty-four hours a day for days on end." "And regularly scheduled programming went out the window." "And the David Letterman program had been off the air." " This is our first show on the air since New York and Washington were attacked." " Somebody from the David Letterman program called and said, "Dave would like to have you be a guest of his."" "It was a different environment for me, so I started to quote a favorite stanza of mine from "America the Beautiful."" "Who can sing now with the same meaning we had before," ""O beautiful for patriot dream" ""It sees beyond the years" ""Thine alabaster cities gleam" "Undimmed by human tears."" "We can never sing that song again that way." " The moment that I remember was when Dan Rather got choked up and David Letterman reached over." "And it was just a moment of quiet and connection there." "And it was-- that was all of us." " David, you've been terrific to have me on tonight." " I'm so sorry for this." " You did fine, Dan." "Fine." " You know, the hour grows late." " Yeah, you're fine." "You know, you're a professional, but good Christ you're a human being, and my God, to not" " Thank you." " You never apologize for grief." "Even the best of people can only hold it in for so long." " Having that permission to acknowledge that that is part of being a person and it's all right to do that was very, very helpful and very, um, very profound." "narrator:" "After 9/11, the families of the victims demand answers, and the National Commission is established to investigate the attacks." " There is no question that the 9/11 Commission never would have existed were it not for the concerted action of the families of those lost in the towers." "The families descended on Congress, they stood outside of congressman's doors." "They just felt the full story was not going to be told by any administration, and that they needed an independent commission to really learn what happened to their loved ones." " When something so devastating happens, you want to know everything, everything." "And the 9/11 Commission was intended to be a bipartisan non-political look at what was wrong." " After 9/11, what has to be done is to determine how did this take place?" "Who is behind this?" "What's the return address, if you will?" " We hired a staff of 82 people and we interviewed, I think," "1,250 people." "And we had over a million top-secret classified documents." "Much of the really enlightening facts that we uncovered were not classified, but that's why we have had such a debate over the famous 28 pages." "narrator:" "The 9/11 Commission publishes its report in 2004." "Since then, many of the documents the commission examined during the course of its investigation have been released to the public, except for 28 pages." " The 28 pages, or a chapter in the final report of the congressional inquiry, that report was of some 840 or so pages." "Most of it was made available to the public." "But there was one chapter that fully censored, and that was 28 pages on the question who financed 9/11." " The automatic default position of all government agencies is to keep everything classified, and most of what's in those 28 pages should not be classified." " If there is information that can help the American people better understand why it happened, who was responsible," "I think in a democracy it's important to be able to be as transparent as possible." "narrator:" "In July of 2016, the 28 pages are finally declassified." " The 28 pages focus on the role of Saudi Arabia." "Fifteen of the 19 hijackers were Saudi Arabians." "We did not find, nor did those 28 pages find, that the Saudi government planned or participated or assisted in the 9/11 attacks." "But the story that's contained in that 28 pages would embarrass the Saudi government." "narrator:" "Among the revelations, the 28 pages detail a network of Saudi nationals living in the United States who may have aided the 9/11 hijackers." " Summer 2001, the 19 hijackers live for extended periods in places like Falls Church, Virginia." "Delray Beach, Florida." "Paterson, New Jersey." "But the investigative reports about what actually happened while those hijackers were living in those communities has never been released." "narrator:" "During its investigation into the attacks, the FBI compiled 80,000 documents about the hijackers." "As of 2016, that information has been turned over to a federal judge in Florida." "But it may never be made public." " Those 80,000 pages may give us another clue as to who was in the community that was providing them assistance, how were their bills being paid?" "In my opinion, 19 people, most of whom could not speak English, most of whom never had been in the United States before, many of them were very limited in their education could not have carried out such a sophisticated plot." "narrator:" "Of the 1.5 million tons of debris salvaged from the wreckage at Ground Zero, 200,000 tons are structural steel." "This steel has been recycled to build fire boats for the FDNY and a transport ship for the U.S. navy." "But other remnants of the World Trade Center steel have had a life of their own." " The formal World Trade Center steel program began in 2008." "In 2009 the program really took off." "When the recovery crews started to pull apart the pile, they were pulling out pieces of steel." "Many of them were mangled from the impact of the collapse." "Others were virtually intact." "We received about 2,000 requests for steel, and the vast majority of the requests came from firehouses." " I've been a firefighter since 1983 in Westerville, Ohio." "The steel, I believe, in the minds of a lot of people was hallowed ground." "We did not have a firefighter memorial in the city of Westerville." "Whenever a firefighter dies, no matter where it is," "I mean, it touches home." "So I just thought, this would be a good opportunity to try to get one started." "And it just seemed appropriate to honor and remember 343 firefighters who were killed." "narrator:" "The fragment Tom Ullom selects, catalogued as C-40, is a critical piece of evidence in the investigation into the collapse of the towers." "This remnant proves the steel expanded triggering the progressive collapse that brought the buildings down." " We know exactly where it stood on the towers." "It spanned the 98th to the 101st floors." "It was right above the impact of the first plane." " It took seven years, but this piece of steel is being turned over to the Westerville firefighters memorial." "It was just an overwhelming of emotions that came over me, much like the day the towers collapsed." "narrator:" "Fifteen years after 9/11, the steel from the World Trade Center has been distributed to hundreds of memorials in every state in America." " Those memorials allows people to personally connect." "It's a way of saying we'll never forget, but we're moving forward." " It wasn't just a New York event." "Small towns were tied to what happened in New York that day, because it was an American event." " Steel is a strong thing." "New York was strong." "America was strong." "There may have been moments where people doubted the future of New York or of the country right after 9/11, but that steel is still there as a reminder." "It's not just a symbol of what happened." "It's a symbol of the strength of the future." " This was really sacred ground." "We weren't going to just rebuild what was there." "We were going to do it right." "And we're going to do it not just for today, but for future generations." "One of the things that really captured me leaving the voids where the towers had stood, having the space where the memorial and the museum now stand." "But the other was the spiring tower, culminating in a tower 1,776 feet tall." "The year that we declared our independence, and the tallest building ever built in the western hemisphere." "And that building, it's a symbol of our freedom, of our independence." " Right after September 11, it was hard to get anybody to go back there." "Now, it's one of the most vital, one of the most productive, and one of the fastest growing parts of New York." " People say, how can you have laughter ever again on a site that was such a tragedy?" "I would turn that around and say how can you not have laughter?" "That would let the terrorists win twice, and that's one thing you don't want to do." " After 9/11, we knew as a country, we knew as a people, that we were going to be different and the world was going to be different, that the reverberations, the historical echoes of 9/11," "were going to last for a very long time." " I worry so much that we've forgotten the human cost of 9/11." "The 3,000 people who died weren't anonymous." "We should know each and every one of them, because if we don't, we don't really appreciate what we lost." " What I've done every year is visit my brother's firehouse, and say that..." "that I'm proud of you." "You did what was important that day." "You saved lives." " Fifteen years later, 9/11 is a clear reminder that in life, things will happen to you that you don't want to have happen." "The question is, when they do happen how do you deal with them?" "And I gave it my best shot." "I did what I thought was right for the country." " I have an almost spiritual sense that we went through this together." " When you go to that memorial, you confront the reality of that attack." "It's quite a profound experience." " It is a vivid reminder of vulnerability of free people." " Fifteen years later, 9/11 is still a searing memory." "It's like it happened yesterday." "But at the same time, it gives us faith in the future, because we bounced back," "New York bounced back, and America bounced back."