I was at work that Tuesday morning and got a phone call from my husband who had just returned home. He walked in the door and turned on the Today Show just as the first plane hit. He called me since he knew our office would have no knowledge of the event. At first everyone thought it was just a terrible accident. Then the second plane hit. Shock and horror were setting in rapidly. Stunned disbelief can best describe my emotions. Then the Pentagon was hit. I knew immediately that we were at war!
Since I worked at a moving and storage warehouse, most of our crews were out on deliveries. There were no radios other than the dispatch radio in the trucks. I got on the radio and told our crews what was happening and said "We are at war!"
That night after work, we watched the towers fall over and over again, along with everyone else in the country. All of us were looking for something, anything to explain what had happened.
All air travel was grounded. My husband and I were to have gone to Germany on September 12. I wasn't afraid to fly, but there were no planes flying for several days. Finally on Saturday the
, we were allowed to board a plane for Germany. By chance we had chosen to use a German Airline originally. We had to go to Tampa to get the plane. I don't think the smaller airports, like Ft Myers, had the desired security yet. Security was so tight in Tampa that the man in front of us set off the alarm by having a foil wrapped stick of gum in his pocket. The crew on our plane had been grounded in the States for the past week and I'm sure they were very anxious to get home.
We landed in Germany on Sept 16. The Frankfurt airport was well populated with armed soldiers watching everyone. Our granddaughter Brigid didn't wait for us to get there. She arrived on Sept 14, 2001. We almost made it in time!
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