All language subtitles for 911.One.Day.In.America.S01E02.1080p.HULU.WEB-DL.DDP5.1.H.264-WELP.en

You see the plane, he
gonna make a maneuver.

The next thing I know, bam.

We stood right in
front of the elevator.

Delise and I and 18 other
people from my office.

These were all big shots.

The head of human resources,
the General Manager.

All these big shots just
standing up right there.

Not a word is said.

The elevator doors
open, we got in.

As I'm getting out of the door,

the security guard
looks at me and says,

"Where are you going?"

I said, "I'm going home.

I saw fireballs falling
from the other building."

He said, "Your
building is safe."

It's secure. Go
back to your office.

You can hear the
whoop-whoop signals.

Your building is safe.

It's secure. Go
back to your office.

"Nobody else is coming out."

Delise stepped
out, and she said,

"Stan, I'm scared.
I wanna go home."

I said, "Well, go, go, go.
Take the rest of the day off."

I had that choice to go
back into that elevator

at that point or go home.

So, I don't know what to do.

The doors are about to close and Jack
Andriaccio is holding on to one end.

And Manny Gomez is holding
on to the other end.

"Come on, Stan the Man."

You're not scared to go back up.

"Come on, Stan, we don't
have all day here."

And I walked back
in that elevator.

And all I was doing was
being faithful to authority.

They said go back.

All right, so we go back.

The door closes and I can
still remember the look on

the faces of everybody
in that elevator.

Because I was the last
one who stepped in,

and everybody is
looking at me, like,

"Why did you take so long?
We were waiting on you."

Not realizing I would
never see them again.

We saw a lot of things that
day that no one should see.

To this day,

I still have my times when
I can't take it anymore,

you know, when I
still think about it.

There were times when I would
go over the Brooklyn Bridge

going into work,

and it just got me so bad that I, I
couldn't take it anymore and there was,

as I was driving
over the bridge,

I actually felt myself
almost trying to jerk

the wheel off the side to just
drive off the edge of the bridge,

just so I didn't have
to deal with it anymore.

You know, and every time
I did that, I was, like,

you can't do this, you know,

just keep going.

Just keep going;
You can do this.

I've worked as an emergency
medical technician.

I was young.

21-year-old kid.

And we were driving down to the
Trade Center to help people.

As we pull up, we see hundreds
of people just running out to us.

And you're just looking through
and you don't know where to go,

because there's just
so much chaos going on.

Oh, man, man!

Oh my god!

Oh, boy.

And I remember as I was grabbing my
equipment to go see what we were gonna do,

some people kept on
running up to me and, like,

"You gotta help my friend!
You gotta help my friend!"

I'm, like, "Okay."
I'm, like, "Calm down."

I'm like, "Where is your
friend? What happened?"

"They jumped."

I'm, like, "From where?"

"From the 30th floor.
From up there."

I'm, like, "They're dead.
The bridge is that way.

Just run."

And I remember we just grabbed the
first four or five people that we saw

that had blood on them,

and we ran into the
back of our ambulance.

The rules almost went
out the window that day.

You did what you could
for who you could.

Deploy North. Gotta go
people let's go, let's go.

Get to the end of the street.

I'm on the 81st floor
in the South Tower,

in a huge glass-enclosed office.

The phone is ringing.

I pick up the phone,

it's a young lady from
Chicago on the other end.

"Stan, get out."

"Why do I have to get out?"

With the phone in my
hand, I'm standing up,

not looking in any
particular direction.

But something caught my
attention looking towards

the direction of the
Statue of Liberty, south.

What I saw was a tiny little
spec first of a plane.

And within the split second, it's
getting larger and larger and larger.

Oh my god, it's
coming towards me.

It's coming for me!

Eye-level eye contact.

And as I'm watching,
within split seconds,

I can see this
plane start tilting.

Very gradually.

And I'm watching this plane
like being hypnotized.

Can't move my eyes away.

And I can hear this revving
sound this engine is making.

Like when the plane takes off,

that sound it's making,

well, multiply that by 1,000.

And this plane is
coming towards me.

And my mind is reacting so fast
and I don't know what to do.

And the next thing I remember saying
and I don't know why I said it.

I said, "Lord, I can't
do this. You take over."

Dropped the phone, screamed,
dove under the desk.

Come on, get up, get
up, get up, get up.

Get up, now. Get up!

Oh my god. Oh my god!

Jesus Christ.

A second airplane, a 727,
just rammed into the building.

Where do I go? Do I go home?

It's a US Airway
jet slammed into it.

I saw it.

Hello, Gerald?

Yo, I'm gonna get
outta the city, yo.

I ain't staying here.

Look! Look at the
second building!

When the plane hit, I got
blown out of my shoes,

and I hit the marble
wall in front of me

with my upper body.

And then my strong will or
my obstinance kicked in.

I'm, like, "Oh, no way.

I am not orphaning my
kids in this building.

I am getting out of here."

We got into the stairwells
and we stumbled across

this odd gentleman who
had artificial legs.

And he sat down and said,
"I can't go anymore."

The two men just said, "No
way. Not on our watch."

And they picked him up and they
just started carrying him down.

I encountered a woman on the stairwell
who was having an asthma attack.

And in my pocketbook
I had an inhaler.

And I handed it to her.

I said, "Here. Just use it."

And she was using
it, and she said,

"Oh my god, I can breathe,"

and she started down.

So, you just did,

everybody was just doing what
they needed to do to help.

It was a constant
very quick flow,

but people were
kind to each other.

We were, like, right
in the path of all

the debris from the second
plane and from the building,

and it was just shot right
towards our ambulance.

All the patients, they were
all huddled on the floor,

all crunched together with
their hands over their heads.

And we were just
kinda on top of them.

We were scared in there.

I mean, at least I know I
can't speak for anybody else,

but I can speak for myself.

I was terrified.

I looked at my partner
and I said, you know,

"We need to get outta here."

When we pulled outta there,

I hear him scream
through the front,

"I'm getting flagged.
I'm being flagged."

So, I open up the
back door, I said,

I'm, like, "What's going on?"

He's, like, "This guy jumped
in front of the ambulance.

He said we need to
help this lady."

So, I'm, like, "All right."

So, we jump out and
we see this one lady.

She was lying half
on the street,

half on the sidewalk.

Orlando and I were able to just move
her over to the side a little bit,

and we saw that her whole back side
looked like it was just torn off.

From her shoulder blades
all the way down to, like,

the top of her thigh.

Looked like everything
was just ripped right off.

We didn't know it at the time,

but we found out later on
that she was hit by the

landing gear of
the second plane.

And it went right down and
ripped off half her back.

As we're driving, she was
screaming out in agony.

I remember seeing the three or four
other patients in the ambulance.

You know, and you can see them,

that they're scared.

They were all crying, they
were all looking round.

Like, and, they're
looking at me.

And here I am, 21-year-old kid.

What do I know?

And I remember the
woman on the stretcher,

I go down and she's awake
and she's looking at me

and she's screaming.

She's, like, "It hurts.

I'm hurt. Help me!
Somebody please help me."

And I remember just
getting down on my knee and

just holding her hand
and getting close to her.

I'm, like, "It's all right.
It's okay. We got you."

I'm, like, "I'm here now.

I'm gonna get you
to the hospital."

You know, "We're gonna, we're
gonna take care of you."

There was a bunch of doctors
just waiting for us at the door.

And they start grabbing some
of the other patients that we

brought in and other people.

And we're, like, "No,
no, no, forget those.

I'm, like, this one.

You gotta take this
one in, right here."

You know, you just
handing the patient over

it's, like, okay,
I've done my part.

I did my part, I did the
best that I could for her.

And I brought her to people that
can help her a lot more than I can.

I really thought I'd died.

Here I am alive.

This is not possible.

Upon impact, a large chunk
of that plane was stuck

in the office doorway.

The air pressure was so great,
it was sucking everything out.

It looks like a demolition crew came in
and just ripped the entire floor apart.

Every wall is flattened.

Every piece of
furniture is mangled.

I'm hiding under the desk.

It looks like somebody took a giant
bag of cement and threw it in the air.

The jet fuel is
smelling so profusely.

The sound was so deafening
that my ears pop.

I got temporarily deaf.

All the cables that were
hanging in the ceiling dropped.

And they're short-circuiting.

The sprinkler system came on.

And part of the floor collapsed.

And it's hovering like
this, right over the desk.

If I don't get burned, well,
then, I'll get electrocuted.

If I don't get electrocuted
and burned, well, then,

the floor is gonna collapse.

I'm gonna die. I'm
gonna get crushed.

And if the three of
them miss me, well,

then I'm gonna get sucked
out by the air pressure.

One way or the other, I'm gone.

And I started to scream.

When the second tower got hit,
that was a terrifying moment.

Of course, now you realize,
this is no accident.

This is intentional.

And that changes your whole perception
of what you're dealing with now.

One of my thoughts was going
through my head, is stay calm.

You know.

You have to make,

I knew I was gonna be having to
make some very serious decisions

involving people's lives.

Which is my job,

which I'm trained for,

and I'm trained very well
for on the Fire Department.

And I wanted to make it
as clear ahead as I could.

So, I had to avoid that little panicky
thing that you go through at first.

I was climbing the stairs
in the North Tower.

And our orders were to
report to the 23rd floor.

So, I'm walking
around the floor,

I'm looking for this chief
I'm supposed to report to.

And I hear chatter.

I hear people talking.

And, of course, I'm curious.
Nobody's supposed to be there.

And I open the door and there's
two people inside the stairway.

It was an injured secretary,

a woman and her boss
stayed with her.

This is an incredibly
heroic guy.

I wish I can remember his name.

But he stayed and took his in,

trying to get his injured
secretary out of the building.

And they were in stairway C.

Now, they were alone;

There was nobody else in stairway
C, and I was worried about them.

So, I told them,
"Go to stairway B.

The Fire Department's in
stairway B; They will help you."

And they were frozen;
They couldn't move.

They just froze.

And then I yelled at them.

I felt bad, but
I yelled at them.

I just, "Get!"

You know, "Stairway B!"

I'm not gonna tell you
again," you know, like that.

But I had to do it, you
know, 'cause I had to

startle them to get
'em out of that.

They were in, like, a
funk, you know what I mean?

And finally they listened to
me and went over to stairway B.

And they survived.

They got out. That was good.

Calm down, we're the fire
department she's gonna be fine.

To help anybody, you've
gotta start triaging.

You try to determine the injury
at a second in the moment.

So that the unit coming behind you
can immediately treat that person.

Green tag for minor injuries,
you understand everything.

Then you have the, uh,
red tag for immediate.

And then when we
get to the deceased,

that means no care needed.

At this time, this
person is presumed dead.

I was underneath the towers,
going from area to area.

I did not see any living
person on the ground.

Everybody was deceased.

So, going past, you just rip the
tags off and left deceased, deceased.

Until I ran into
that one person.

I put deceased, which
is the black tag.

And then she says,

"I'm not dead.
Call my daughter."

But she didn't know what I knew,
and she didn't see what I'd seen.

Her head did not hit the ground,
or I couldn't see that the head,

'cause the hair
was still intact.

She looked like an
office personnel.

She looked like maybe a
woman that was on the plane.

And the makeup.

But what I saw
below the torso was

complete crushed disfigurement.

This lady must have
came down feet first.

You can't take, "Stop!
Stop! I'm not dead!"

I could have done something
immediately to help her.

But I was panicking myself.

I was dealing with death myself.

Even though I did not fear death,
or I wasn't thinking about death.

But I saw death, and I saw death,
and I saw death, and I saw death.

She would not survive
another couple of minutes.

So I lied.

And said, "You're okay."

This is preliminary.

This is just, I meant to make,
I tore the wrong thing off.

Relax.

They're coming, they're
coming, they're coming.

"Don't worry about
what I just did."

I had a guilty conscience
about what I was saying,

and that I was lying.

But I wasn't lying in the
fact of her condition.

I was lying in the fact that
I did think she was dead.

And that black tag
stayed with me.

It took me three years to push it
back or from this cortex part of my

brain to the frontal part
of my brain, the memory.

Or put it somewhere with the
psychiatrist and the clinician

to help me move her
around so that she's not

in the mind's eye in the
daytime or in the night-time.

Or at any time.

The human body or the human
mind is not positioned,

or the brain can
never be positioned to

deal with tragedy of
another human being.

It just reminds you that
this could be your mother.

This is your father,
this is your family.

This is a human being.

You don't lie to the dying.

I came out on the 44th floor, 'cause
that's where our stairwell ends.

And there was panic and
bedlam, and it was pitch black.

And then all of a sudden in
this darkness is this voice.

He was singing,

and I think the singing distracted
everybody that they were,

they stopped in their tracks
to see why he was singing,

or where he was singing from.

And it calmed everybody down.

And then he said these words.

He said, "Today is a proud
day to be an American."

It was Rick Rescorla,
our head of security.

Rick was so concerned
for many years about

the security and
safety of everybody

in the World Trade Center.

It had been attacked before,

and he was certain it
would happen again.

He did predict that
they would come.

If they came again, that
they would come from the air.

And it's very hard to protect
people when they come from the air.

So, the only protection would
be to teach them how to get out

in case a catastrophe happened.

Rick had them redo the
stairwells, repaint them,

make sure there was lighting

so everybody could see
where we were going.

And four times a year,

we walked from 70 all the
way down to the sky lobby

to get out of the building.

You know, at first people would
just assume this is over the top,

it was exaggerated.

Do we really need to do this?

I mean, in my mind,

my favorite line was,

"Lightning never strikes
the same place twice."

So, after '93, I didn't even think
about it because I was, like,

no one's ever gonna attack
the same building again.

That day, things were on fire.

You know, things
were blowing up,

and he really was able to
refocus everybody pretty

quickly and disperse the crowds
to their proper stairwells to get

them out of there.

So, seeing Rick was probably like seeing
your guardian angel when I saw him on 44.

I wasn't nervous at that point.

I really wasn't.

Hey, Kim.

Look at his big camera.
Look at his big camera.

He'll tell your
grandchildren you were there.

We were there.

I wasn't emotional on that day.

I was not frozen in fear,

I wasn't thinking
horrible thoughts.

My mind, thankfully, protected
me from absorbing any carnage.

You know, my mind blocked anything that
might have been really ugly out there,

I don't remember.

Other than this grayness.

Others died and I didn't.

I wasn't having any of
that in my mind yet.

Again, I cannot explain why.

Um, and I keep wondering.

You know, well, am I, you
know, am I cold-hearted?

I don't...

I don't think so.

I think I'm tender and
compassionate when I need to be.

Odd.

I was stuck in the 81st floor.

I crawled the entire length
of the loans department to the

lounge and the computer room
and the communication room.

And that's the farthest
I could have gone.

Because one lousy sheet
rock wall stood firm.

Just one wall.

That period of waiting was the most
painful thing you would ever imagine.

That period of just waiting, hoping
that somebody is gonna come to get you.

And I'm crying out to this invisible
God that I've hurt so much.

From the 84th floor, I led a
group of people down the stairs.

And we arrived on the 81st
floor, me in the lead.

As I arrive there, a heavyset
woman came up and stopped me.

"We've just come off a floor in flames
and smoke, and we've gotta go higher."

And, of course, I'm stopped
now and I can't get past her,

and bumping behind me comes the
rest of my team, if you like.

So, now there's
this group of us.

Nine, ten people, on
the 81st floor landing,

who are now beginning
to debate listening

to her and starting to discuss,
well, do we go up, do we go down?

What do we do now?

I'm behind of a wall
and I'm crying out,

"Wait for me. Don't
leave me to die."

What I heard was something like,

"Help! Help! I'm buried. Is
anyone there? I can't breathe."

Kind of again
sobered up and said,

"Okay, I've got a
job to do here."

And my flashlight back on again.

And as I squeezed onto that
floor sideways, I have this very,

very clear memory of everybody
on that landing turning around

and starting to
go up the stairs.

So, I started toward
the stranger's voice.

I can only hear
that voice faintly.

I had my hand through that hole,

and I'm trying, "Please,
please, my hand is here!

Turn to your left!"

As I hear a little bit,
his voice is walking away.

His voice is moving
away from me.

"No, no, no!

Come back, come back
towards your right.

Come back, come back
towards your left.

Come straight,
straight-straight now."

As I can hear this
voice closer, closer.

Sharper.

"Look down! Look
down, look down."

There I am, with my
hand waving towards him.

When that light flashed on
my hand, all hope was there.

Somebody, this person with
this flashlight, whoever it is,

somebody is gonna rescue me.

I'm gonna live.

It was that hope.

That feeling of knowing
that, you know what?

I'm gonna live.

That feeling of knowing
that you're gonna live,

that somebody is here
to take you home.

I'm gonna get to see
my children again.

I'm gonna be reconciled
with my wife again.

I'm gonna live.

They left me here to die,
but I'm gonna go home.

And this man really did that.

Rescued me so I could go home.

"Hallelujah, I've
been saved!" he said.

"Do you know Jesus Christ?"

That was a very strange
thing to hear at that time,

and I wasn't ready for a
philosophical discussion,

so I stammered out a
rather pathetic reply.

"I go to church every Sunday."

That was the best I could
do to that question.

And, "Come on, we
got work to do here."

So, there was a lot of debris
to the right and debris

to the left of me, and this
immovable wall between us.

And I told him the only way out of
there is for you to come up this wall.

So, he tried once,
and I missed him.

I said, "You must do this."

And over the wall he came and
then his weight on me pushed

the desk over.

We fell back onto a pile of
debris, and he gave me a big kiss.

And he got up and he says,
"Well, what are you doing?"

Fixed his jacket and his tie.

And he stretched his hand.

He says, "Brian Clark." I
said, "Stanley Praimnath."

And he said, "I'm Stanley."

He said, "We'll be
brothers for life."

And I said, "Well,
I have no siblings."

I said, "We can be brothers."

And then I noticed I had a
puncture wound on my right palm.

And Stanley also had a
puncture wound on his palm.

And I'm the one who did it.

I put our hands
together and said,

"We'll be blood
brothers for life."

And we made our way off
the floor back to the

81st floor landing.

I shone the light
down and I took that.

I didn't see flames.

I saw some smoke coming up.

And I took that gratefully, took
that fateful first step down.

And we continued on down.

Based on the woman
telling us that we

needed to go up because
down below was on fire,

we started to climb.

I guess we got to about
the 91st floor and realized

there was no exiting.

The smoke was getting thicker,

and people were
starting to drift off.

It was like going
into a peaceful sleep.

I wanted to see my wife and
my four beautiful kids again.

As we were fading in and
out of consciousness,

I had heard a voice.

Some who are religious may
believe it's God or an angel.

Others, maybe it was my
adrenaline-fueled synapses.

I'm not sure, but
it was a very cool,

calm voice telling me to
get up and come this way.

And I followed the voice right
into the thickest of the smoke

and the fire.

And I pushed back on the wall

and I revealed the
staircase below.

And then I ran through
three flights of stairs

that were on fire.

I had burns on 60% of my body.

My contact lenses were
melted to my eyes.

But I was alive.

When we got down to
about the 22nd floor,

the integrity of the
building was really

starting to deteriorate.

And then there was cracks
starting in the walls.

And, you know, we were, like,

"Holy crap, we have
to get out of here."

And we really started
to pick up the pace,

like, almost running.

And all I kept thinking is,

"This building is not taking me.

I'm going home to my kids."

So, I kept going and going.

And when we got to the
bottom floor we were yelling,

"We're here, we're here!"

And some people were clapping.

And they're, like, "All right,
we're right behind you."

When we emerged
out of the building

there was a sense of
relief that we were safe.

MAN Keep it moving, folks
The danger is not over!

They ushered us
across the street.

My little group, we
sat down on the curb.

And they were triaging
right behind us.

They were carrying very wounded
people behind us, laying them down,

trying to triage
what they could do.

When we looked up and saw
the burning on our building,

my first thought was,

"This is coming down."

I'm not gonna die
here on the street.

I just got out of that building;
I have to get out of here.

You gotta keep going.

Sir, are you gonna stay behind?

Come on.

Please keep moving.
Please keep moving.

Some of the people we
work with encountered Rick

on one of the lower floors

as they were leaving
the building.

Rick was heading up the stairs.

And they said,
"Rick, come with us."

And he's, like, "No, no.

I have to do one more sweep to
make sure all our people are safe."

He could have gotten out.

But he chose to go back up.

All I knew that Rick was doing
what Rick was destined to do,

and that was get everybody
out of that building.

And knowing Rick, you knew he wasn't
leaving until that last person was out.

Got the helicopter out. Yeah.

Oh, (bleep)!

It's coming down,
it's coming down!

The ash filled the air
and blocked the sun.

And, very strangely, as
we went down Broadway,

and it wasn't densely populated.

All of a sudden,
Stanley was gone.

I'm, I'm, I'm looking around
wondering where he is.

And this feeling washed
over me, like, oh!

Did I just imagine this?

Was Stanley some sort
of a guardian angel?

Like, I had real confused doubts
about what had just transpired.

I learned later from Stanley
that he had commandeered

a guy in a pickup
truck and told him,

"You drive me to Brooklyn."

Apparently, the guy did.

Brian said to me later on, had he
made the choice to go back up like

the others, he would have died.

But there was something in that
scream that held him to help me.

So, every time I tell this man,

"Brian, thank you
for saving my life."

He says, "No, no,
Stan. Thank you.

Had you not screamed, I
would have gone back up.

I would have died."

Being as young as
I was at the time,

that day, um,
definitely changed me.

You know, there are things that I
live with to this day that still

haunt my dreams from it.

You know, when I start thinking
about how bad it could be,

I keep thinking of that
patient that we picked up.

The woman on the stretcher.

We didn't think that she was
gonna make it through at all.

But we found out a couple of weeks
later that she was still alive.

This is Mag for Magnificent.

I got him last night from
a friend of my fiancé's.

He is so much fun.

I, normally there's little
white blankets here.

And then I got Mag
last night, too.

It made me realize that color's
been absent in my environment.

And it showed up when it
really needed to be there.

And I found out later
on her name was Debbie.

And I remember going to
the hospital to go see her.

And they brought us over to her room
and she was still intubated at the time,

but she was sitting up and
conscious, and she's looking at us.

And she, see her moving her
hand and she's, like, it's them.

It's them.

And she was pointing to us.

And all the people that we walked by
in the waiting room was her parents,

her fiancé and the
rest of her family.

They came over to us and
they were just hugging us.

You know, it became, it was very
emotional for Orlando and I.

And Frank Puma was the one,

the guy who drove the
EMT truck that allowed

me to get on it.

The few times that I was able
to see her in the hospital,

she was always upbeat.

She's, like, "Don't worry,
I'm gonna get better."

And throughout my time,

she has been an inspiration for me
to get me out of my dark places.

Knowing the fact that I gave
someone back their family.

I helped bring that
person back home.

Our orders were to go
upstairs in the North Tower

for search and rescue.

And, uh, we heard a
loud noise outside.

And I see Billy Burke
walking towards me.

He's got a funny
look on his face.

And I look at him and I said,

"Is that what I thought it was?"

Looking at a piece of
our building fell off.

And he just looks
at me and he says,

"The South Tower
has just collapsed."

Knowing what that meant,

that right next door to us,

thousands of people
were just killed.

Some of our friends, too.

And I did the quick calculation
in my mind and I says,

"All right. If that one
can go, this one can go.

It's time for us
to get outta here."

And my guys didn't
react. They balked.

They didn't wanna leave.

And I said, "Let's
go. It's time to go."

So, we start our retreat down the
B stairway of the North Tower.

And I'd just be whispering
it to Billy Butler's ears.

"Billy, can you move
a little faster?"

And the, uh, collapse of the North
Tower starts with us still inside.

Captioned by Cotter Media Group.