Original subtitles

I was never so proud to be a fireman as I was that day.

Our orders were to go upstairs in the North Tower

for a search and rescue.

So, we were going to pull as many people out as we could,

that's what we were gonna do.

And we got to the 27th floor when we felt and experienced

something that nobody had ever felt or experienced before.

We heard a loud noise outside, our building shook violently,

so violent that, that you had a hard time standing up,

you know, it was like you were on a ship at sea;

the South Tower had collapsed.

And, in my mind, this was the scariest part of the day for me.

I knew prior to this day a high rise building had never

collapsed after a fire, and now the sister building

to the one I was in,

that got hit after my building, was down.

I did the quick calculations in my mind and I says,

alright, if that one can go, this one can go,

it's time for us to get outta here.

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

We got to around the 20th floor and there was a woman

standing in a doorway, she was crying,

and my guy stopped and Tommy Falco,

one of my firemen, turns around and looks at me,

he says, "Hey Captain, what'd you wanna do with her?"

And she literally couldn't walk anymore,

she'd made it down from the 70s,

I think the 73rd floor.

We didn't know it at the time,

she was one week shy of her 60th birthday,

so we continued our evacuation with Josephine Harris in tow.

We were carrying her down the stairs, slowly.

We were going so slowly that a couple of times we had to step

aside because we created a log‐jam of people behind us,

so we had to let them pass.

And made it to the tenth floor,

I'm thinking, wow, we might actually get outta here.

And then Josephine Harris fell to the floor on the fourth floor.

And she starts yelling at us to leave her.

And, uh, the collapse of the North Tower starts

with us still inside.

Let's get in here!

Get away from the glass.

Oh my is out there.

My is out there.

You wanna die? Don't worry about it.

The whole building.

Watch the debris come down the street.

Don't open the door, please.

Get away from the windows.

Oh my God.

Look at the shadow of death!

Oh my God!

You're right, oh my God, you saved my life!

You saved my life!

Thank you! Thank you!

Thank you. Thank you.

Thank you, thank you!

Oh my God! Thank you.

Thank you. Thank you.

I remember looking up into the dust.

And I remember thinking to myself I'm the last person

left on the planet.

I don't hear anybody.

I don't see anybody.

I am completely alone.

I am this huge feeling of being empty.

As I'm looking around there's cars that are destroyed.

There was an ambulance on fire.

I really thought this was it, this was the end,

this was the end of the world, this was the Armageddon.

So I remember grabbing a hose line that was laying on the

floor and I actually put out the fire in the ambulance.

And the dust started to lift.

I, I couldn't believe what I was actually seeing.

Both buildings were gone.

And now it's just seven story pile of debris and garbage and

there were people in there.

And I'm thinking to myself there's no way that we're

gonna find people that survived this collapse.

The collapse started from the top down.

And every time a floor would hit another floor,

collapsing what we call, pancake fashion,

it would create a loud noise, a loud boom,

so it was boom, boom, boom, boom.

And every time a floor would hit another floor there'd be a

tremendous vibration in the building.

Whatever air was in the stairway was being compressed

and it was filled with debris, so we were getting pummeled

with debris as we were covering up and, uh, we just

waited for that big beam or that big piece of concrete to

come and get us.

And then the collapsed stopped and it didn't come.

And, uh, so I gave a shout out, I said,

"Who's still here? Who do I hear?

Who do I have?"

Turns out all my guys from Ladder 6,

Tommy Falco, Sal D'Agostino, Billy Butler and Mike Meldrom,

we had Mickey Kross, who was a Lieutenant in Engine 16.

I think it took about eight seconds for

the building to come down.

It was a tremendous noise and tremendous raw,

tremendous vibrating and within a few seconds

it was over, and it went to total, absolute silence,

no more shaking, absolutely no noise.

Having no experience being dead,

you don't know what it's like, so I thought I could possibly

be dead 'cause I couldn't feel,

I couldn't feel my body, I couldn't feel anything.

And after a few seconds I heard talking so,

I yelled out and we all got together.

It was between the third, I think,

between the third and fourth floors was still in tact.

We were in a void.

You know, it was the fact that Josephine stopped there,

you know, there weren't many voids in that building,

and we found a void because even if you made

it to the ground floor, you didn't make it.

If you made it just outside the building,

you didn't make it.

We looked around for a way out.

A couple of guys had tools and they were forcing what was

left of the stairway door, and they opened it and it was just

a wall of debris so, we realized there wasn't

a thing we could do.

We're not getting outta this.

There's no up, down, to the side, no way.

The only way we're gonna get out if somebody comes and gets us.

FIREFIGHTER We're gonna regroup on Murray Street.

Does anybody have Al Tori with them?

Jesus Christ.

Right after the collapse,

miraculously we regrouped with everybody in the company.

We realized that, um, we possibly could be like,

one of the last companies that kinda made it outta that area.

Your gonna upload it?

Yeah.

Here, take a white rag. You need a white rag?

And before it collapsed we were

coming down the B stairwell in the North Tower,

and, um, I remember speaking to, uh, Captain Jonas,

who was Captain of Six Truck.

So then it was, "Well, where is Six Truck?"

They were at least three to four floors above us.

FIREFIGHTER 247, 246.

Where are the guys?

I have no idea.

So, we were like, oh man,

gotta try to get back in there and try to find them.

You know where he is?

And then we went to go make our way back in.

But, that area that we just came from wasn't there anymore.

I'm on channel one.

Everything was like completely destroyed.

It tore a part of my heart out,

like, you just feel like you got ripped on the insides.

And you have this feeling of helplessness because

you don't know where to start.

REPORTER Live, continuing coverage here on 1010 Wins,

the horrible tragedy of the World Trade Center.

How off it looked to see those two twin towers,

so much a part of our landscape, disappear.

But then now to keep in mind there were people inside those

buildings and many did not get out.

When you have something like this you think,

well, death toll and casualties,

that's something we simply don't know because in many

respects the rescue effort is really just getting started.

1010 Wins reporter...

We were planning for the worst,

planning for a long entrapment,

maybe a couple of days, try to conserve our radio batteries,

our flashlight batteries.

I didn't want my guys to use their air masks but during

that time received a mayday from Mark Warcola

the Lieutenant from Ladder Five that we had seen on the way down,

and he said he was in the,

the B stairway on the 12th floor

he was trapped and he was hurt bad.

So Sal D'Agostino turned around and looked at me,

he says, "Hey Cap, did you get that?"

I said, "Yeah, I got it."

And I started climbing the B stairway.

And the stairways there is filled with rubble,

it was like a real bad vacant building stairway but it was there.

So, I could climb up the bannister and maneuver my way around.

And then a second mayday came in when I was on the fifth floor for him.

And again, I'm trying to maneuver my way around.

And I got to the half landing between the fifth and the

sixth floor and I couldn't move the debris anymore;

it was too heavy.

And he gave a third mayday which was more distraught and

I just said, "Sorry, Mike, I can't help you."

It was terrible.

Here's somebody we know and he's calling for our help and

we can't help him.

You know, we couldn't get to him.

And then we didn't hear from him anymore.

Yeah, finally I transmitted my own mayday.

FIREFIGHTER Go on with the mayday, go ahead.

MAN Okay, 10‐4.

When we kinda all heard them on the radio,

I remember myself, personally, I kinda just dropped down onto

one knee and kissed the metal that was around my neck.

It was a feeling of elation that,

okay, there's a chance here.

I started getting radio transmissions from other guys

that I knew, some of them were some of my best friends.

A very close friend of mine was Nick Visconti.

And he got put in charge

of the rescue effort to find us

and I talked to him on the radio and, uh...

it was great hearing his voice.

Ladder 6.

Tower one.

Stairwell B. There's also a wounded civilian and chief on the first floor.

It's the love of your fellow firemen

coming to save you.

I thought to myself, you know, there's gotta be people who

are much worse off than I am.

I'm not worthy of this.

But I had this army of firefighters coming to find me.

And it was humbling.

Take any gear we can carry,

especially First Aid stuff.

Then I heard from my neighbor, Cliff Staffner,

"Rescue Three to Ladder Six, Captain J. Jonas,

this is Cliff, I'm coming to get ya, where are ya?"

And I tell him.

And he would end every transmission by saying,

"I'm coming for ya, brother, I'm coming for ya."

STAFFNER We're coming for ya, brother,

we're coming for ya.

FIREFIGHTER Liberty, we have your command post.

FIREFIGHTER Go ahead.

REPORTER This is still very much an active scene right now.

I've seen dozens upon dozens of firefighters getting to the

World Trade Center area.

They're trying to get together and go back in there and try

to take care of the people who obviously are in serious trouble.

There's no other way to describe it.

Did you already go in?

What? Did you go in?

I was there, yeah.

Are you going back?

It's my job.

New York City firefighters have this special bond.

This level of being, of belonging.

We become a second family.

No matter what happens, if you feel threatened,

if you feel afraid in a fire, these guys will tear down the

building to get to you.

They will do everything in their power to get to you.

We don't leave a brother behind.

Oh my God, I've never seen anything like this

in my entire life.

There's debris for miles, blocks.

There could be people under here,

but again, this was a plaza...

We were gonna try to advance into this debris field

trying to locate Ladder Six.

It's the top of the building.

And when we got there it was just...

there was, there was no way to get through it,

it was just solid concrete, rebar and steel.

On top of that, while we were in there,

stuff was starting to collapse again.

MAN Come back! Come back.

Get everybody out.

You know, these piles were unstable and as you're

going into them now they're still starting to like,

have secondary and third collapses on these piles.

It was almost like standing in the ocean.

Initially, we were really optimistic.

But now we had this greater sense of how are we gonna find them?

Everybody was scared because we could hear fires

crackling outside.

And at one point,

there was an explosion nearby,

and um, it shook the stairway

and it caused some debris to fall and

it was striking us.

And Josephine, you know, started crying out that

she was scared.

And I said, "Yeah, we're all a little scared,

darling, hang in there."

But when that happened,

Mike Meldrom, my senior guy,

my chauffeur, he rolled his body on top of hers

so she wasn't being hit by any debris.

And Sal D'Agostino took his coat off and put it around her.

And they told her nothing's going to happen to you.

As long as we're here, nothing's going to happen to you.

And they took turns talking to her,

trying to keep her mind off what was an impossible situation for us,

it's definitely an impossible situation for her.

Without orders from me, they did it on their own,

they took care of this woman.

The situation was getting really bad.

And then after about three, maybe two and half to three hours,

I'm not sure, I started,

I was looking up and I saw like a flicker of light.

And then it went out.

And then it flickered up again.

And I'm looking and I'm trying to figure out what it is.

At first I thought it was an emergency light that was

hooked up and flickering on and off.

And then in a couple of minutes the light lit up and

I was, it was the sun.

And it came in, a beam of sun came in,

and it was like something from God.

It was like from heaven.

You know, that meant an opening above us.

What was happening was the smoke and dust

was clearing outside.

And we got to the point where all of a sudden you could look up

and I could see a sliver of blue sky through the rubble.

And I looked down and I could see a beam of light striking

the stairway and I'm like,

"Guys, there used to be 106 floors over our heads,

now I see blue sky."

And I said, "I think we're on top of the World Trade Center."

So, you know, we started poking around.

You know, with this added light we were able to find an

area where we could breach a hole through the rubble.

When the dust cleared away and we knew

we had an opening, we had to climb to it,

it was 20 feet above us.

So, you know, there was all criss‐cross,

bent up beams inside the area so,

those of us who were physically able were able to

climb up and get to that opening and actually

wiggle our way out.

And I poked my head out and I couldn't believe

what I was seeing.

You know, you see the façade of what's left of the World Trade Center,

and there's flame and smoke coming up from everywhere,

numbers four, five, six

World Trade Center on fire,

there's like seven story buildings.

Number Seven World Trade Center is a

high rise office building and it's on fire.

It was very eerie sticking your head out and especially

seeing the iconic façade of the World Trade Center,

the arches.

And there was nothing left of it.

We waited until we could see a fireman,

we saw a fireman off in the distance,

and we were to make contact with them.

FIREFIGHTER What's the name of the street that is on?

Thank you.

And they made their way to the stairway.

Got Josephine Harris, Engine 53 and Ladder 43 got her out.

They brought the stokes basket stretcher up.

It's almost like she took a stand,

like on the fourth floor, like,

somehow she knew.

that we have to be here, this is the spot.

One by one I was sending everybody in the stairway out.

And one by one I saw every one of my guys climb the rope and

that was a very satisfying part of the day for me to see that.

It was a wonderful feeling.

I don't have to explain that.

You think you might die in that hole and then all of a

sudden you're outside and somebody's giving you a

sandwich and a soda.

It's a pretty nice feeling, right.

We were the last people to come out

before Tower One fell.

We're sending everybody this way, towards the water.

And I evacuated with my coworker, Muzua,

who to the day is my hero.

We were coming down the stairs and I wanted to stop

because I was tired.

So, he grabbed my hand and he just pulled me down

the rest of the way.

And I'm going down like, "Please, please, let me stop."

He said, "We can't stop. We have to keep moving."

And when I came out and that smoke,

or that cloud, that scared the life outta me.

It's like a hurricane coming through and it was this air

blowing through and I saw people were caught up in the

air just blowing through.

Can you tell me what happened?

What'd you see?

We got to the...

All the way to the lobby and all of a sudden it

was this big explosion.

Mom, I just want you to know I'm alright.

I don't know what else to tell you.

We came from the 82nd floor and I don't know where

my peers are, I don't know, I hope to God they okay.

It was like a comet just hit the earth.

Like a comet? Yeah.

Look at this. Look at this.

Look at your clothes. Look at you.

Whatever this stuff is, I hope it doesn't kill ya.

Daphne, don't give up now. Daphne.

I just cried.

I remember crying a lot.

I'm just tired. I'm tired.

And I remember just being sad, I was sad.

I was like, I just couldn't understand, you know,

what happened, why it happened.

And I remember sitting there and this lady was trying to tell me.

Can you even begin to fathom the people who may have done this?

I dunno.

Can you even begin to fathom why?

Why it happened?

Why a plane hit the building?

Why a plan was hijacked and...

Excuse me.

I hope you understand,

that plane might have been high‐jacked by a terrorist.

This didn't happen by chance.

Jesus. In America?!

I don't know what to say. I don't what to say.

All I could think about was all the firefighters...

running up the stairs,

you know, going to help whoever,

you know, was up there.

And I remember this young kid running behind them with

a fire extinguisher going to help the people,

I think it was like a young kid,

right outta high school, looked like a little boy.

And he, he was going to help.

And I remember his face, he was like,

"Yeah, I'm going, I'm gonna help some people,

I'm gonna help some people."

I'm like, "Okay, alright, alright."

And when I get downstairs, you know,

get out to find out that the building collapsed.

And I'm like, this young kid trying to...

I consider him a hero.

And I'm like, I always ask myself,

I wonder if they survived?

I wonder if they made it out?

That bothered me a lot.

Some companies didn't make it out though

that were in that original fifth alarm, made it out but a lot of guys didn't.

After a while I realized that I needed

to contact my family.

I remember taking out my cell phone and I'm thinking let me

try and call my Mom, you know, and people that know me.

So I dial the phone and I call my Mom and

busy, busy, busy.

And then all of a sudden the phone picked up and it was my aunt.

And she tells me, "Oh my God, you're okay, you're okay."

I go, "Yes, I'm okay, I'm alive, I'm down here,

I'm working", I said,

"But I survived", I said, "I was in the building, I survived."

She goes, "Your Mom's here, your Mom's here."

And I remember my Mom getting on the phone and

she was panicking and crying and she's like,

"Oh my God, thank God you're alive, thank God."

She goes, "Your brother was dispatched,

he's somewhere down there."

My brother Michael was also a firefighter.

So I said, "Okay, I gotta go Ma.

I gotta go, I gotta go find Michael,

I gotta go find my brother."

And I remember getting on my radio and calling my brother's company,

and he was in Engine Company 228.

And I'm like, "Ladder Ten to Engine 228.

Come in Engine 228", a couple of times,

"Ladder Ten to Engine 228."

No response.

Then I go, "John Morabito to Michael Morabito",

like now I'm like desperate to find him.

And I see my captain, Captain Mallory,

he comes walking up to me, he's like,

"What's doing? You're okay, right?

You made it through?"

And I'm like, "Yeah, Cap", I go, "But I'm looking for my brother."

He's like, "Alright," he goes, "Let's",

he goes, "There's a command center over here, they gotta table",

he goes, "They're marking off everybody that's not accounted for."

He goes, "Let's go look at the command center."

We went over to the command center and I'm looking at the

paper that they got and they got all names written on

pieces of oak tagging and I'm spotting names of guys that I know.

I'm like, "Oh my God, he's not here."

And this was just a list of names of guys that were

unaccounted for.

And as we go down the list, my brother's name is on the list.

And he's like, "Listen, this is just an early list,

don't think about it", you know,

"Don't worry about it."

And I see all the guys in his company,

I see their names on that list,

I'm like, his whole company is gone, they're gone.

I'm like, I don't even know how I'm gonna go home,

how am I gonna go home and face my family,

knowing that my brother, who got on the job after me,

kinda followed in my footstep, he's no longer with us because

of this situation, how am I gonna do this.

I felt lost.

And I remember walking around,

and I remember seeing a fire hydrant

in the middle of the street and I was so thirsty

and I took a little bit of water.

And I'm drinking the water and I wash my face and I looked up

and my brother...

walks right in front of me, like it was meant to be.

I'm like, I grab him, I'm like, "Mike! Mike"

And he jumps up, he's like, "John",

he goes, "How are you alive?"

I go, "How are you alive?"

He goes, "I was coming out of the tunnel when I saw that

debris go, so I turned to my friend and I said,

my brother just died."

And it's just like this moment of fate where we were at the

same place, at the same time, and we needed to make contact.

And we grab each other and I said to him,

I said, "That's it, the rest of the day,

I'm not gonna lose you again", I go,

"We're staying together.

We're staying together.

We gotta go home together."

It was a tremendous relief.

We were safe.

All you wanna do at this point is get outta here,

you just wanna get away from all of this.

But we knew we needed to turn around and go back in.

There were people who were underneath the debris.

And that we couldn't give up on looking for them.

I just felt so bad.

I just felt so guilty for being alive 'cause so many was gone.

And I thought about those firemen I saw and that little boy,

and to this day, I still wonder about that.

Did they make it out?

They could move, I couldn't.

And I figured that they could run,

they could get out.

But they stayed with me.

Hello, how are you?

Hello.

There was a lot of media attention and the,

the fire department wanted to get our story out because it was one

of the few positive stories from September 11th.

Did you realize that the other tower had collapsed?

No. No, you didn't.

I wondered why you were so calm.

She trusted us a lot and we protected her.

REPORTER You've been listening to a live news conference on 1010 Wins

of Mayor Giuliani and Police Commissioner, Bernard Kerik.

Bernard Kerik's saying that there are some people alive

in the rubble of the World Trade Center.

He's confirming that there are some people alive.

REPORTER 2 Mayor Giuliani confirmed that several people in the rubble

have been calling from cell phones to family members

including a person who's been calling to family in Seattle.

REPORTER 3 Maybe there is a bit of brightness,

there is tomorrow.

Captioned by Cotter Media Group.