9/11

Somehow I've always manage to ignore that this is now "Patriot Day".  I'm not saying this shouldn't have a 'day', but patriot seems to me to be the wrong name for a day memorializing 3000 civilians murdered for simply going to work.  "Patriot" seems to require a more specific work on the part of those remembered.

So I will continue to just think of this as 9/11, sort of like Pearl Harbor.  I can't use the place name, since it was multiple places.

I had started work at my new job earlier that year, and had signed up to take "Management of Aggressive Behaviour", a two day workshop/seminar on 9/11 and 9/13.  It was held in what was at that time the hospital auditorium, next to the waiting rooms for diagnostic imaging.  We started at 8am, and must have had our first break sometime around 9.  We ended up watching one of the TVs in the waiting area and I'm pretty sure about the break, because when we started watching only one building had been hit.

We continued with the class for the rest of the day, but took rather more breaks than they usually do, and were glued to the TVs during them.

The instructors told us that they had offered their classes to the airlines for years and never been taken up on them, because the airlines never felt the need to train their people to deal with folks with knives.

Here is last year's post.

I'm doing a bit of YouTube hunting, and have found several videos I'm putting here.  The comments are often disgusting, and interestingly enough, I'm allowed to upvote, but not down vote them.

This one is just footage of the events as they happened, from someone living near the Twin Towers.  Commentary, but amazingly no profanity.  They were obviously home with their child, since you can here childrens' TV music in the background of the initial footage.

Here's more footage, with much less nasty comments.

In spite of the clip's name, it doesn't have the actual falling man footage, but it still looks at the people rather than building.

Another video.

Let's not forget that it wasn't just New York.

More footage, paired with very appropriate music.




And to finish off, the story of Rick Rescorla, "the man who predicted 9-11". (http://www.blackfive.net/main/2013/09/the-last-known-sighting-of-an-american-hero.html has a good round up of info.)