|
Eyewitness tells story of fear, tragedy in N.Y.
From sarpytimes.com EDITOR’S NOTE: Mary Lou Alter is a friend and relative of the reporter.
By Patricia Sindelar NEW YORK– When Mary Lou Alter got off the train at 9 a.m., Tuesday, she could smell something burning, but didn’t know what it was. The Maplewood, N.J., resident takes the Port Authority Trans-Hudson train every day from New Jersey into New York City where she works as an IT consultant at CMX Group. "I got off the PATH train and I arrived at the World Trade Center right after the first explosion," Alter said. "PATH is way underground and I could smell something burning. Someone yelled ‘Fire!’ And you have to run up about 100 steps to get to the concourse – the ground level. "When I got to the World Trade Center, it was a ghost town. I mean, there was nobody there. Everybody just dropped whatever they were doing and ran. "I didn’t have any idea what happened. I thought there was a tunnel fire or something. "Finally, I got out of the building and saw the whole north tower on fire. People were just standing around watching it burn. I thought, ‘This isn’t good.’ So I just kept on going to Broadway." CMX group is at 65 Broadway, about three blocks from the World Trade Center twin towers, Alter said. "Broadway looked like there had just been a ticker tape parade," she said. "That was how much paper there was just laying around. "I had just gone about a half a block, and I didn’t see the plane because I was going the other way. I just heard it. I thought, ‘It’s over.’ At this point, I was about two blocks away and I thought it’s just the end. All those people just standing around happily watching." Alter said she went past the twin towers to Battery Park where people had congregated. "There were people sitting there just shaking," she said. "Somebody had a Walkman and we heard for the first time that it was a hijacked plane. We thought it was a helicopter that just crashed into the building – we weren’t scared for any other reason. It wasn’t until after the second explosion that we realized it was something more. And then we later heard the Pentagon had been hit, too." While in Battery Park, Alter said she spoke with others who had seen the crash. "There was a man sitting next to me who could see the 90th floor," she said. "He works on the 92nd floor, I think, just next to the World Trade Center. He said he could see the second plane flying into and through the building. He said he saw bodies – people jumping. People were just not willing to let the fire get to them. I guess they wanted to die on their own terms. And not just a few bodies – there were many, many bodies. He was telling me sadly. He said he could barely even continue." Despite the massive destruction to the towers, most people, including Alter, thought the buildings would not crumble. "We were sitting there, saying how we thought the steel girders of the Trade Center could support it. It may be unstable, but at least it wouldn’t topple," she said. "Just as we were coming to that conclusion, what happens? I mean, just that crunch, that image. From Battery Park you can see the building pretty well." Within seconds of the first tower crumbling, a cloud of thick, choking smoke enveloped Battery Park and its temporary residents, Alter said. "There was this huge mushroom cloud – orange and gray smoke," she said. "You couldn’t see, you couldn’t breathe. A bazillion people were heading toward the water, panicking, running over other people. They were heading toward the Staten Island Ferry." As they reached the ferry, the second tower toppled, Alter said, but people didn’t know where the noise was coming from. "They were yelling, ‘They’re shooting at us, they’re shooting at us,’" she said. "I didn’t think anyone was shooting, but I wasn’t about to test the theory, so we just hunched down by this restaurant. Somebody broke in and got all the linens they could and we got them wet and passed them out. "I had just gotten back from a company meeting so I had all these T-shirts in my bag, so we ripped them up and got them wet and passed them out. We put them over our mouths so we could breathe. Whatever was in the air was so acrid – it was awful. My throat still hurts. We later learned that was the last big building filled with asbestos, so we all have to go get checked out by our doctors." Alter said the experience wasn’t something she’ll easily forget, nor something she could easily escape. "It was such a horrific experience. I was just trying to figure out, ‘What do you do to get off this island?’" she said. "The New York Waterways called all the ferries into action and had them docking anywhere they could. They just tied them to railings and tried to get people out. They were just evacuating everyone. They got all the sick and asthmatic people out first and took them to their command posts. Needless to say, I didn’t make it into my office that morning." The ferries carried people back to New Jersey, Alter said. "On the Jersey City side, there was no World Trade Center anymore," she said. "It looked like all of New York City was on fire. The smoke had spread so much, it just looked like the whole city was on fire. I suspected it wasn’t true, but it was an absolutely awful experience." Alter said she feels there was time for the Port Authority to reroute trains coming into Lower Manhattan where the twin towers stood. She said she was put in danger because the Port Authority didn’t stop her train. "I’m still mad at the Port Authority for letting that train arrive," she said. "I was either in New Jersey or under the Hudson when that first plane hit. They can stop that train or make it go in reverse, but they let me go into the city where I could have died. "A lot worse could have happened." At the end of the day Tuesday, Alter was in good spirits, though tired and suffering a sore throat. "I’m exhausted," she said. "Absolutely exhausted. My throat still hurts from that dust. "It was a day to forget."
|
9/15/2001 