I got to the WTC about 8:40 for my 9:00 meeting. I got my visitor's badge (my souvenir for the trip that probably could fetch some $$$ on eBay) & went up the elevator. The floor I got off at was the floor you also needed to take the "local" elevator to floors 44-80 or something. I rode up with 8 or 9 folks. I got off & started looking for the office where the meeting was going to be held. I went west & found the side entrance but a sign indicated that one had to go in through the main entrance. I was getting torqued a bit since they didn't tell you where it was.

I was walking back towards the center of the lobby when the aircraft struck. I felt a jolt & could tell immediately that I was moving south even though I was standing still. We swayed several feet & I thought the building may have been compromised from my old weather background & I knew it wasn't an earthquake since the shaking didn't correspond to the wave motions associated with one. I could also hear the crash above me & surmised that someone was trying to blow the TV tower off. I could also hear stuff coming down the elevator shaft which made me realize that I could get singed by a fireball so I moved to the east end of the floor & found an escalator that I ran up to the 45th floor. After the building settled down I came back down to 44 & was expecting people to come out of there offices & didn't hear people stirring. I looked out the east window over the plaza & it was just one huge disturbing mess. Smoldering fires, glass bits & what I now know where parts of the airplane were strewn over the plaza. Some debris fell by the window, probably the building facade, as well as loads of paper & other office contents. I could tell something clearly catastrophic had occurred & knew it was exit time. I didn't know where the exit was so I went back up to 45 where I knew they had regular offices & heard a couple of people. I met up with a group & they seemed ready to go. One was debating about whether they should wait for an announcement or not but I told them about the sway & we were headed down out.

It was very orderly going down. We were amongst the first groups in the stairwell about a minute or 2 after the crash. The people really didn't start filing in to the stairwell until I got to about 39. There wasn't any panic & the lights were on. Air quality was a problem since smoke, dust & concrete particulates were getting in when people opened the door to go down the stairwell. Apparently a fireball came down the elevator shafts. People were using wet handkerchiefs, shirts, paper towels, anything to screen stuff out. In the WTC you can access the office areas only on every 4th floor, so when we got to a floor where we could access the floor lobby, we'd check for air quality. 2 groups of injured people were brought down from above. It looked to be about a dozen people in total. The wounds were mostly burns & smoke. I can't imagine having pain like that & walking down 50 stories. Probably got it from either a fireball in the elevator or debris crashing into another floor. I only saw one person with what looked like injuries from flying glass. The stairwell was narrow. 2 abreast & was getting warm as people started filling it up. We'd stop occasionally on the way down, I presume as people were opening the exit door to file in.

At approximately 9:00 someone found out it was an airplane crash. Basically the folks with the text messaging cellphones were able to get info. An HVAC maintenance guy in the stairwell said he had enough of this place & was never coming back to work at the WTC. Little did he know! It was interesting going down & opening the doors to the floors. You'd be opening the door on 24 or something, look in & there would still be guys talking on their cellphones & debating about evacuating. Hmmm you mean smoke drifting in from the elevator shaft, no power & a thundering herd in the stairwell isn't enough?

At 19-20 we encountered the first firemen going up. About 5 of them walking up to 80 with full packs & equipment. I also met the Port Authority K9 officer going up with them. I'm glad someone from that group was able to survive the ordeal. We met the second group of firemen going up (about 9 or so) around 9. By this time the air quality was better & when we got to 6 we got the added pleasure of water rushing into the stairwell. I'm not sure if it was the sprinkler system or whether a pipe had simply ruptured. It was wet all the way down & when we exited we were on the main floor which is a story below the plaza which you needed to get to exit the building. Well to get to the staircase to go up to the plaza level you had to walk through the shopping arcade underneath the plaza. Sure enough the sprinklers were on. As if my suit wasn't ruined enough from the smoke, it got it from the water. There was about 2"-3" of standing water & it was pouring. Here we finally encountered the police & building security. They were telling everyone how to exit & were keeping the flow moving. They didn't seem too concerned if anyone was injured.

We waded through & went up the stairs & exited East out through the plaza. The police were telling people to ignore their cellphones & to head to Broadway since the building could collapse. When I got out I looked up to make sure no one or thing was falling on me. The top of the building was shrouded in smoke & I couldn't make out the TV mast. I looked over at the South tower & it was on fire & presumed that the plane clipped the mast & also hit the other tower, unaware that it was hit earlier. The stairwells are in the building's interior so we never felt the second crash. I got out around 9:15. You never saw the carnage of the plaza on TV. It was a smoldering mess with sites that defied description.

I walked down the steps to street level from the plaza & headed east on Fulton past Broadway to Nassau. A good route to take since Broadway was clogged & I didn't want to be near a stampede if the tower started coming down. Walking down the street I observed that every window was knocked out & there was glass everywhere. Also I noticed the FBI was swarming over the place looking for debris which tipped me off that this must have had terrorists involved. I eventually made it to the subway stop near city hall & headed up to Grand Central at 9:40. I got there around 9:52-9:55 so I was well away when the first tower went down. I just missed the train up to CT so I waited around until the next one got posted. That was at 10:20 & sure enough I get on it & 2 minutes later we have to evacuate Grand Central because of a bomb threat. When I exited I found out about the tower collapsing & tried using my cellphone to call out. Naturally it was worthless. Of course the plan we have at work stinks. Unless you stand next to the tower reception is lousy. I went by the Fox News building & found out about all the other stuff going on. After wandering around Midtown for about 45 minutes I went back to Grand Central & was able to get back in after waiting several minutes & got on the first train back to Fairfield. I was lucky there because they apparently closed Grand Central again after we left. I wound up driving back to Columbus on Thu.

This is the edited version. There's a more graphic & truthful one but I figure that this conveys more than enough info for you.