3rd AF UK staff sergeant shares 9/11 memories

  • Published
  • 100th Air Refueling Wing Public Affairs
RAF MILDENHALL, England --  Staff Sgt. Courtney Carroll, 3rd Air Force UK, shares his and his parents' story, remembering the day the world stood still ...

I'd lived in New York for more than 20 years, in the Bronx, and was set for delayed entry into the Air Force since April 2001, and was scheduled to leave for basic training Sept. 18.

My mom worked in Manhattan, but on that particular day - Sept. 11, 2001 - both she and my dad were headed to a meeting in Brooklyn. My little sister was in junior high school at that time.

That morning, my older brother called and told me to turn on the TV immediately, as a plane had just flown into one of the twin towers at the World Trade Center.

Everyone thought it was an accident; planes fly into tall buildings periodically. There wasn't really a cause for alarm at that point.

For my mom and dad to get to their meeting in Brooklyn, they had to take the subway from the Bronx to Manhattan. When the first plane hit, my parents were on the "5" train in Manhattan; it then stopped underground, between the Wall Street and Bowling Green stops.

After 20 minutes of waiting, the conductor told everyone that the next stop would be the last for that journey and everyone had to get off - about six blocks away from the World Trade Center. After leaving the station, my mom said they were looking around and noticed everyone else was just standing there and looking up. They looked up and saw that one of the towers was on fire!

My dad, being a very cautious person, said that they should go. He suggested they get a cab, but when he went up to a taxi driver and said, "Hey, can I get a cab to Brooklyn?," the taxi driver looked at him with a strange expression on his face, as if to say, "What? No!"

My dad told my mom to keep walking, and they would get a bus or something.

But she said, "No, I want to see how they're going to put this fire out," because the fire was at the top of the building, which was more than 100 stories high, and she knew fire ladders couldn't reach the top.

They stood there for a while, watching what was going on around them. My dad said it was pretty quiet then - nobody was running around screaming.

It was then that my dad called me and told me to get my sister out of school; the city still had cell phone connection at that point.

He then asked a lady what happened, and she said, "A plane hit - it's terrorists!"

My dad decided that they weren't going to stand around any more, and were going to continue walking away from that area and to safety. They walked towards the Brooklyn Bridge, when all of a sudden they heard a loud bang, followed by an explosion - it was the second plane hitting the other tower.

My mom said until then, it had been a beautiful, bright, sunny day, but suddenly it changed, like it had turned to dusk, as the debris started coming down.

The crowd was so thick that my parents were pushed along with it. As they were moving down the street, and the debris was falling, they suddenly saw security guard outside a bank, waving and calling to people and calling to come inside for safety.

My parents managed to get in through the revolving door, and were told to go downstairs into the basement, where it was safer. There were about 30 other people already in the basement, where it was dark since the power had gone out.

My mom said there was a lady in the basement, who was crying out, saying, "Oh my gosh - I just left my husband in the World Trade Center!" She was frantic, and kept asking if he was dead. My mom was trying to calm her down, telling her not to worry, that he was fine. She obviously didn't know if he was or not, but she wanted to comfort her.

Unbeknownst to my parents, they ducked into the bank as the first tower was falling down, and while they were in the basement, the second fell.

My dad is a diabetic, and he didn't tell my mom this at the time, but when they were in the bank, he was close to passing out. There was no air, it was really stuffy and he was having a really hard time trying to breathe.

In the basement, people starting fainting, and others were yelling, "We've got to get out of here!" My parents remember a man saying, "We're not gonna die down here - we've got to go." They decided to leave, but when they got upstairs, the air was still cloudy with debris. They saw an emergency exit sign that was lit up, and decided to go out of that door.

Then they made it outside, my mom said it was ankle-deep with debris and ash. She remembers seeing shoes and pocketbooks everywhere, as if people had just dropped what they had, and ran. She was also hit in the face with what felt like small pellets; it was little grains of sand, which made it very hard to breathe.

Firemen were rushing around, and my parents felt very disoriented - they didn't know where they were. They saw the East River in the distance, and decided to follow it; they hadn't reached the Brooklyn Bridge at that point, but were planning to cross it. My mom said there were literally thousands of people on the bridge.

My dad suddenly said, "You know what - if they're bombing us, they're gonna bomb the bridge." He was adamant about not getting on the bridge, and decided to walk along the side of the river, along with other people that were doing the same thing.

They followed the river to Bellevue Hospital (on 1st Avenue), after walking for more than four hours. By that time, the hospital had set up a triage area, and medical staff were outside, bringing people indoors.

After walking for so long, my mom's heels broke and she decided to walk barefoot. Her feet became swollen and painful, and although my parents were tired, battered and bruised by this time, they decided not to wait at the hospital to be seen by a doctor.

My mom's friend lived nearby, so they walked to her house. They stayed there until vehicles and trains started moving again and were gradually being let out of the city.

After my dad called me to go get my sister out of school, my brother then decided he was going to try and look for them, but of course, all the roads into Manhattan were blocked. We lived in the Bronx and he couldn't get into Manhattan because the bridges were blocked, so he drove to Brooklyn, to try and get there that way, but he couldn't.

It wasn't until later on in the evening that my parents were finally able to contact him, when the trains were moving again, and he was finally able to pick them up from the train station in the Bronx.

What I remember most vividly about that day is when they came home late that night - they were completely white, covered in plaster and debris, and my mom was crying. She said when she took a shower and washed her hair, the water was just black from the dirt and dust.

After seeing the Pentagon get hit on TV, we realized that America was at war.

I was scheduled to leave for the military the following week. My mom did not want me to join, especially after having witnessed a "war-like" situation. She begged me to call the recruiter and tell him I wasn't going; but my dad was very supportive. He said, "If this is what you want to do, do it."

On Sept. 17, I attended a delayed-entry program commander's call, for the people who were supposed to be leaving the following day for basic training.

The recruiter said, "I just want to let everyone know what you're getting into. You've seen what's happened over the last week; we are currently at war! If you're not serious about being in the military, you need to tell me - and you need to get out. Don't even go through with it; I'll understand."

No one left the room.

On Sept. 18, my parents drove me to the recruiting office, located in the middle of Times Square. Streets were still blocked off with yellow "Police Caution" tape everywhere; the city was still in chaos when I left for basic training.

My mom was crying when they dropped me off; she said goodbye, but I remember she wouldn't get out of the car, but my dad got out and gave me a hug.

I walked to the recruiting station, and that's how (my military career) started.

I remember somebody saying that, "If we are going to go to war, I want to be in the fight, and not a civilian in the fight - I don't want to be at home, waiting to be a victim." That was my mentality as well at the time. I'd already made the commitment in April to join the Air Force. I wanted to join, and there was no backing out as far as I was concerned.

September 11 is more personal to me, because I was actually there. I saw the smoke; from my house you could see the grey ash. I remember it had a solemn, dreary feel, and it took a little while for everybody to get over the shock of it all.

Our first week of basic training was very patriotic; every time we did push-ups, it was for America. Every single thing we did or talked about was 9/11-related. I ate, slept and drank 9/11 for months after that.

I believe that these events made not only myself, but America stronger. Before that, we had the mindset, because we had bombings and we had gone through the Gulf War in the early 1990s, but 9/11 was what actually kicked it into gear.

There was more cohesiveness and patriotism; I remember for a while, you couldn't walk down the street without seeing every single lamp post having a yellow ribbon tied to it.

When I originally signed up to join the military in April 2001, I was thinking about going to college. But after Sept. 11, my focus changed from personal to duty. Since then, I went to college and got my degree, but it became all about the mission. I've deployed three times, and experienced it.

If it hadn't been for Sept. 11, I don't know if I would still have been in - I probably would have done my four years in the Air Force and got out. Now, I definitely want to do my 20 years in the military, and during that time I plan to further my education, and become a judge advocate.

Editor's note: This story is the personal recollection of the events of Sept. 11, 2001, based on interviews with the subject. It is compiled and written by Karen Abeyasekere, 100th Air Refueling Wing Public Affairs.