Battalion Chief Larry Stack and Brian O’Flaherty were working the Father’s Day investigation. I had the investigation for the firefighter from Staten Island who died of a heart attack, and an apparatus accident. I had to file a lot of interviews.
Larry Stack was on the road. Brian was in there already and somebody yelled into the office look at the tower. I have a perfect view from my office. I looked at the tower. Now I start hearing the radio pick up and I hear Pat Brown saying, 3 Truck, we’re available for that. He takes it in. I hear Orio Palmer talking about the crossband repeater. Joe Callan is asking what alarm’s been transmitted?
With that, Larry Stack walked into the kitchen and he said, everybody get dressed. I called everybody in from Safety, left messages on everybody’s machine to come into quarters. We loaded up the car with all our gear and it was Brian Meyers, who is Larry’s aide, Larry Stack, Brian O’Flaherty and myself in the car. We drove across the Manhattan Bridge. We parked on Church and Vesey by the back of St. Paul’s Church.
I got dressed first real fast. Larry called up his wife and told her he had a real bad job going on and it could be a long day. I sized up the building. I said to Larry, I count a minimum of five completely involved floors in 1 World Trade Center, and I said there are two to three in the south tower. I said that’s what I could see, fully involved. Then I turned to him and said, you got over a 50-minute burn time now on the steel.
At that point, we started heading over. I said to Larry, what’s our game plan? He said we have to get up to the command post. We have to get radios from Field Comm. We have to get some lights, some masks and the only thing we’re concerned about is the structural stability. I said OK. We walked down the escalator stairs into the concourse level. There were three sprinkler heads going off and there was about two inches of water on the floor. And I remember telling him, why are sprinkler heads going off here, there’s no fire damage here whatsoever, there’s no reason for sprinkler heads to be going off.
We saw Special Operations Battalion Chief John Pailillo, Deputy Chief Galvin and 22 Truck. We headed right past them. As soon as 22 Truck came through the doors, we went into the lobby of the Marriott and then walked in maybe 50, 100 feet and all of a sudden, we heard an explosion. We stopped dead in our tracks and Brian goes, ooh, that doesn’t sound good. And there was a second of nothing. Then you felt a heavy vibration like an earthquake, then you start hearing the pancaking collapse.
Brian said it’s coming down, and we all just scattered. I just looked around the room and I thought I have to get next to something and I saw the biggest column. I just threw my arms around it. As soon as I did, I got whacked on the head. It laid me out. I lost my helmet. Then I just went to the fetal position and I’m saying, you’re going to die here today. And then we rode it out. There was no visibility, it was completely black. I remember several times having to make myself throw up just to get this stuff out of my throat so I can inhale.
Visibility was still next to nil about a minute later. I thought for a while I was the only survivor and then I heard somebody yell out an eerie scream, help me, I’m trapped and then I heard Larry call out and Brian Meyers and I yelled out Larry, who’s that? It’s Mike, I’m all right. I’ve got Brian here, and we were all within four or five feet.
In a few minutes, we saw a flashlight. We started looking for a way out. I remember running into Brian O’Flaherty coming out of a room. I said Brian, I already did that. Everything was a dead end, we weren’t finding any way out.
Certain portions of the lobby had a lean-to collapse, but there was enough to walk around. I never found my helmet; that was weird. I ended up with another chief’s helmet. I just found a helmet on the floor, threw it on my head.
I yelled out, does anybody know this building? One guy had blood from head to toe. He was standing next to a guy with an Achilles tendon injury. I said you’re going to have to walk. I said to him, where are the stairs, get me to set a stairs. And I remember thinking this thing can’t hold the weight, it’s going to pancake, it’s going to come down more, let’s get lower so we don’t get crushed on this level if it comes down a second time, and settles down.
He took me over some debris to a set of stairs, and a sweet smell was coming out of it. I got into a mask. What are we going to do, we’ve got to try and find it. I shot down to the bottom of the stairs and found an electrical room that was completely collapsed, pancaked. Two of the rooms I couldn’t even push the doors open in. I couldn’t get in there and everything else was a hallway. It was a dead end so I came back up. I said where are there any other stairs? He said there’s another set deeper. Let’s go, take me to it. The floors were collapsed. I remember holding onto, sliding on a BX cable electrical line. I was hand over hand on a water pipe at one point.
We went over all of this stuff and I got to the stairs. I went down two complete levels, return stairs, twice down so I assumed it was two levels. And when I came out, it was into the garage area. There was debris down there, some parts were completely collapsed on cars. There were other parts that were rubble, but the cars were intact. I went through there maybe 50 feet, then I saw the ramp going up to the street and I noticed the four-foot rolldown that prevents trucks from driving in. I saw the top of that and I saw a little light, daylight at the top of it. Oh, the nicest thing I ever saw in my life was that daylight.
I said stay here, I’m going to go up. I went up to the top and said, come on, let’s go. Brian and those guys were following. I must have taken about 10 or 12 civilians with me and they were just following me. I was moving fast. They followed me the whole way. One of the firemen didn’t have a flashlight and he lost the civilian in front of him. I just found that out from Brian Meyers. He said he didn’t know which way they went, then he saw an exit sign. They found a way out through the wall right out to West Street. This is where I saw them.
So I came up. I climbed on top of the four-foot ramp and I climbed up on the top of the debris pile. I yelled at them. They followed me up and I waited and I gave it 30 seconds. I saw some debris coming down and I just started heading out on West Street. I thought I was on Liberty at that time. I headed about halfway, 100 feet or so, and I turned around and I looked up and I see the tower’s gone. I see the collapsed debris. I’m looking down at the roof of the Suburban to see the rigs. I looked down, there wasn’t a soul there. I saw no firemen, nobody. Everybody’s gone out here too.
With that, I continued out and they started calling me – the people, fireman, fireman, help me. I turned around. I said come on, let’s go. I said you’re ambulatory, come on, you got to help yourself now. As I crossed over, I got to where the command post was. I ran into First Deputy Commissioner Bill Feehan and Chief of Department Pete Ganci standing there. They’re both completely, completely gray ashen, there’s soot to their eyes. And I turn to them and I said to them – I said, Brian, Larry and our aide didn’t follow me out. I said, I just got out, they didn’t follow me out, they have no radios.
Captain Al Fuentes comes over with Chief of Rescue Services Ray Downey. And the two of them, they don’t look like Pete and Bill do. They weren’t talking. They were just looking up at the building. I told Ray the same thing. I go, Ray, Brian O’Flaherty, Larry Stack and the aide didn’t follow me out. Now I look over. I had lost my glasses in the collapse, but I’m looking over and I think I see Larry. I found out from Brian Meyers later on that in the original collapse Larry’s coat was pinned against something and he had to get himself out of his coat and he left his coat, so that was Larry’s profile I see. I tell Ray Downey and Ray goes right there. I’m showing him the thing. I start going with him. He goes, no stay here, Mike. I go right there, you see the ramp right there where those people are, that’s where I came out of. So Ray and Al start heading over there.
I was hobbling. My foot was killing me. I’m heading up West Street. I kept walking up, walking up, and then two firemen grabbed me under my arms and we were all heading up. I remember a news guy coming over trying to say something.
Then we heard the explosion of the second one, which was the same sound I heard when I was down in the lobby. I remember turning around and looking at the north bridge. I remember looking over my shoulder and going oh, and I saw you’re on your own. The guys dropped me, and I don’t blame them, you had to run for your life. The cloud was coming. And I kept heading up West Street. I kept going, kept going. Another guy helped me, a captain from Brooklyn. I kept going up to the first ambulance. A couple of people helped me and I jumped into the first ambulance. I went to Columbia Presbyterian.
