Horror 'was up close, personal'

By Rose Hooper and Carey Phillips

For Jackson County native Dan Killian, a 1967 Cullowhee High graduate, the horror was up close and personal. A regional manager for Standard and Poor's, Killian's Manhattan office is on the 43rd floor at 55 Water between Broad and Wall, about 10 blocks from the World Trade Center site, where he remained until about 11 a.m. on Tuesday, Sept. 11, when the air conditioning was turned off and he was forced to leave.

Killian had arrived in Manhattan that morning by ferry from Weehauken, N.J., about 9 a.m.

"As I tried to cross the street underneath the FDR Drive on my normal walk to work, two unmarked police cars came racing by with sirens wailing," he said. "It was Election Day in New York, and I thought they were part of that. On the same street I pass a little fire station each day. Unlike most days when nothing happens there, a pumper was parked out front with its engine racing. Men came running out of the station. As soon as it was loaded up, they were gone."

He later learned that the station lost 15-20 members when the World Trade Center collapsed.

"As I went into my building, several people came running by saying the World Trade Center had been hit by a plane," he said. "I assumed it was some sort of freak accident and went up to my floor. In the lobby of that floor was a crowd waiting to go down. I thought they were just looking for an excuse to get out of work."

Killian went about his business until someone yelled that the second tower had been hit.

"I went out to look from the opposite side of our building, and you could see both towers billowing smoke," he said. "There is a TV in our lobby with business news always on. As I walked by there they were showing closer images of the towers, including the pictures of people jumping. I couldn't handle that, so I went back to my desk thinking I would wait it out. With so many people on the street rushing around, I thought this was the safest place."

After hearing a crash, Killian went to his window, which looks north toward the Brooklyn Bridge, uptown toward the Chrysler Building, and closer by down on Wall Street. He saw a huge cloud of dust from that direction and thought the Stock Exchange had been hit. He said the dust cloud got larger, and the sky, even as high as the 43rd floor, turned "black as night."

"I walked over to the other side of the building, which looks at the Statue of Liberty and up the west side of lower Manhattan toward the World Trade Center site," Killian said. "Given the dust, I thought it better to let it settle before venturing out. At about this time, there was a tremendous shock wave that shook our building and raised another cloud of dust and debris. I actually watched as the second tower came down."

After the dust settled somewhat, Killian walked out with a wet towel over his mouth. He said there was no transportation available, and the air was thick with dust even a half hour after the collapse of the second tower. He reported a pungent, acrid smell. The only positive he noted was that the wind kept the dust in a small section below the Brooklyn Bridge.

Killian walked up a deserted Wall Street, past the Stock Exchange, which had not been hit, and Trinity Church and over to Greenwich and Rector streets, which lead to the World Trade Center. Here the dust was about an inch thick.

"There were office papers everywhere," he said. "I know there are orders lost and payments unaccounted for that will never be sorted out.

"Perhaps the most dramatic part of this was the arm I stepped on," he said. "The force of the blast had been so strong that there were body parts mixed in the dust, even at a distance of about four blocks. That was as close as I could get given the increasing police cordons. It was about as close as I cared to get."

Killian reported feeling numb as he walked up town along Broadway realizing that several thousand people probably had died.

"As I walked past the Brooklyn Bridge and City Hall up Broadway to Union Square and on up to Herald Square, it was clear that the city was in a state of shock," he said. "All business had been shut, and there was no transportation (from Manhattan). Thousands of people had to walk across the bridges and then take public transportation from Brooklyn. The smoke rose behind me. I kept meeting people hungry for news of loved ones who worked in the Towers but who could not get through the barricades."

Eventually Killian made it the 5 miles to the West Side ferries, which took him home to New Jersey. Riding the ferry from New Jersey on the Monday following the tragedy, Killian went directly past the site of the crashes and saw smoke still rising from the site. An FBI agent was on the boat, and National Guard troops were stationed around his building questioning every passerby. Killian found no traffic on the streets other than emergency vehicles, and a series of false bomb threats sent people running out of buildings during the day.

"The air here is still filled with that acrid, dusty smoke, both inside and outside the building," he said. "We won't be open officially until Wednesday (Sept. 19). Standard and Poor's was lucky because we lost no employees."

However, Killian was personally touched by the tragedy. Five members of his small church died, and two of his friends with offices in the World Trade Center are as yet unaccounted for.

"Everyone is shocked and numb, but Patrick, my son, (almost 7) put it in perspective," Killian said. "When I picked him up at school on that first day he ran up to me and said, ŒDad, I thought you were dead! I'm so glad you're not dead.' I gave him the best hug of my life, not just for me, but for everyone who could no longer give hugs."

Children safe

Nancy Bugby of Tuckasegee believes somebody was looking after her children that fateful Sept. 11.

Her daughter, 31-year-old Maureen Thomas of New York, had been employed at Deloitt-Tuesch Accounting, with offices in the World Trade Center. Friday, Sept. 7, was her last day on the job. Monday, Sept. 10, she started a new position as controller for the Metropolitan Opera.

"It was the job of a lifetime for Maureen; and it saved her life," said Bugby. "Five of her fellow accountants from Deloitt-Tuesch are still missing."

Meanwhile, Bugby's son, Patrick Lanahan, a 41-year-old attorney, was on a 9 a.m. flight from New Albany, Ohio, to Washington, D.C., that morning.

"Flight 77 crashed into the Pentagon at 9:43 a.m. When Patrick's plane came into D.C. - landing at Reagan National Airport next to the Pentagon - his pilot slammed on the brakes and told the passengers to run for their lives because nobody knew what might happen next," said Bugby. "All they could see was smoke; they had no idea where they were running."

Bugby was amazed how both of her children, one in New York and one in Washington, D.C., narrowly escaped the related tragedies.

Washington accounts

Cherokee Principal Chief Leon Jones was staying at the Hyatt Hotel in Washington when the hijacked American Airlines Flight 77 with 64 people aboard crashed into the Pentagon.

On Tribal business with Tribal Attorney General David Nash, Jones hit the streets as crowds evacuated.

"Law enforcement personnel acted admirably, the way they were helping people evacuate," Jones said of the chaos.

"When David and I realized what was happening and that we wouldn't be getting a flight out, we headed straight to the nearest car rental agency. A lady in line ahead of us had just gotten the last car, and she asked if anybody needed a ride to North Carolina. David and I jumped forward; so did a doctor from Chapel Hill.

"All four of us were able to pile into that Subaru Outback, even with all our luggage. I thought she was one brave lady to take on three men," Jones said. "Turns out she is a professional dog trainer from Raleigh, so I learned a lot about dog training on the trip."

Bill Johnson of Cullowhee was in a Washington hotel some 3 miles from the Pentagon. He was unaware of the tragedies until going downstairs and seeing a man talking on the phone with a "deer-in-the-headlights look" on his face and hearing him say "they just hit the Pentagon, too."

Johnson, who was on a business trip for his Denver-based company, Micromedex, said the hardest part was not being able to get in touch with his family to let them know he was O.K. He returned home the next day in a rental car.

Real life lesson

Western Carolina University political science instructor Fred Fisher said his freshman class sat in awe, gazing at the television screen and watching the events as they unfolded that Sept. 11 morning.

"Many of them didn't understand how or why, but they knew their world had changed," said Fisher. "For many it was their first time away from home, and I could feel that some of them wanted to rush home to that security.

"I completely changed the format of class and opened it up for discussion," he said. "These students needed someone to talk to. For them, political science took on a whole new personal meaning that day."

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