‘I was burning alive’: Survivors of 9/11 attacks describe how they narrowly avoided being killed
It’s almost 20 years since the September 11 attacks but for many survivors, the pain and trauma are still raw.
Some were left with life-changing physical injuries, while many still struggle with the mental torment caused by the events of that day.
One of the most severely injured survivors, Lauren Manning, suffered burns to more than 80% of her body.
“By any medical standard, I should have died,” she tells Sky News.
Lauren had just entered the World Trade Center’s North Tower when the first hijacked plane crashed into the building, sending a fireball hurtling down a lift shaft and into the lobby.
The first hijacked plane hit the North Tower of the World Trade Center
“There was this incredibly loud, piercing, whistling sound and an instant later I was engulfed in flames,” she says.
“The pain was incalculable, crushing, penetrating deeper and deeper.
“I was burning alive. There are no other words for it.”
As Lauren fought against the flames, she ran outside and across a road before dropping and rolling on a grass embankment where a man tried to help her.
“I didn’t fall down and die in a heap of flames – I struggled against them,” she says.
“I was screaming to him: ‘Get me the hell out of here!'”
As she lay severely injured, Lauren watched in horror as terrorists smashed a second plane into the World Trade Center’s South Tower.
Nearly 3,000 people died in the 9/11 attacks. Pic: AP
She saw people fall from the skyscrapers, knowing that her colleagues from financial firm Cantor Fitzgerald were trapped on the upper floors.
All of the company’s 658 employees in the office on September 11 were killed that day.
On the ground, Lauren – who had previously escaped the 1993 bombing of the World Trade Center – managed to find an ambulance but her chances of survival were slim.
“The burns were extraordinary,” she says.
“It burnt 82.5% (of my body), most of it third-degree.
“More than 20% was fourth or fifth degree, which means you lose the muscle or the bone – so various amputations (were needed) on fingers on both hands.”
• ‘I was so afraid my son would not recognise me’
Lauren spent six months in hospital after suffering burns to more than 80% of her body. Pic: Lauren Manning
Lauren was rushed to hospital and eventually placed in an induced coma before being moved to a specialist burns centre.
Over three months while she was in a coma, her husband Greg would read Robert Burns poems and play music from their dating days.
“Perhaps it had an impact on me, knowing I was loved,” she says.
“My parents drove hours and hours expecting me to be dead – and they were there every day.”
Several days after waking from her coma, Lauren’s then one-year-old son Tyler visited her for the first time since the attack.
Lauren was reunited with her son about three months after 9/11 attack. Pic: Lauren Manning
“I was so afraid that he would not recognise me,” she says.
“He came down the hall and there he was walking. A beautiful little soul.
“He did not recognise me at first…. but he came back towards me and he recognised me, I guess through the eyes and the voice.
“That was everything I needed.”
Lauren spent more than six months in hospital but her recovery – which involved several operations – took nearly 10 years.
“You get burned – which is probably the most sadistic form of human torture – and it takes years and years,” she says.
Lauren pictured with her husband Greg and their two sons Jagger and Tyler. Pic: Lauren Manning
Lauren, whose second son Jagger was born in 2009, still has contact numbers listed in her phone for many of her colleagues who died on 11 September 2001.
“The notion of the murders and the terror and the death are never far away,” she adds.
• The fire official who narrowly escaped Twin Tower collapse
Lynn Tierney arrived at the World Trade Center after both planes had hit the Twin Towers.
The deputy commissioner at New York City’s fire department had been due to attend a job interview on the 68th floor of the North Tower that morning – but her plans had been drastically changed by the terror attacks.
Lynn Tierney was a deputy commissioner at New York City Fire Department. Pic: NYC Fire Department
“It was a horrific scene outside,” she says.
“Both towers were burning… it was engulfing the upper floors.
“But in addition to the flames, the worst thing was there were people jumping (from the towers).
“I saw a couple jump with their hands together. That was unbelievable.
“It continued the whole time we were in the lobby. You could hear it. It was a terrible sound.
“I can’t imagine the choice they were faced with. I was just thinking about their families. It was just horrific.”
People watch smoke billow from the Twin Towers. Pic: AP
Lynn had travelled to the scene with 12 firefighters from two different units – all of whom later died during the rescue effort.
She walked into the lobby of the North Tower through a window after the exploding jet fuel had blown out the glass.
But at that point, fire chiefs had already determined they wouldn’t be able to put out the flames.
“The mission became purely rescue, to try to go up and get out as many people as possible,” she says.
Lynn was working to help coordinate the rescue effort from the north side of the North Tower when suddenly the South Tower collapsed.
• ‘The dust was so thick you could almost chew it’
People flee after the collapse of one of the towers. Pic: AP
She says she “ran like hell” and jumped into a loading dock about 80 yards away.
“The dust was so thick you could almost chew it,” she says.
“It was gritty so you couldn’t take a breath up your nose or anything.
“I was having trouble breathing. Everybody was.”
After entering the loading dock, Lynn says a police inspector tried to shield her with his body.
“That’s the only time I thought about dying,” she says.
“I just thought: ‘God, just let it be fast.’ I don’t want to linger in here like a miner for 18 days and be crushed at the same time.”
After getting to safety, Lynn was in New York City Hall when the second tower collapsed, about two blocks away.
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9/11: ‘People decided between burning and jumping’
The force of the building collapse blew the hall’s doors open and as smoke and dust came into the building, Lynn hid in a staircase.
Some 343 firefighters died that day and Lynn wrote about 100 eulogies for the victims.
On one day alone, 23 funerals were held.
“These emotions from 9/11 are always under the surface,” says Lynn, who later became president of the 9/11 Tribute Centre and held the role until 2007.
“You learn to live with it. I call it ‘keeping a bolt in your heart’.
“It’s overwhelming sometimes. The oddest thing for me is I lived through it.
“I can’t believe I got out of there. That’s the biggest surprise.”
• The British trader who felt Twin Tower plane crash
Briton Charlie Gray thought an earthquake had hit New York when he was working in the North Tower on 11 September 2001.
The London-born trader, who was employed by broker firm ICAP, was stood in the office on the 26th floor when the building “shook and moved”.
Charlie Gray escaped the September 11 attacks in New York
Suddenly, he saw debris falling from the upper floors.
“You could see this stuff was really burning,” Charlie tells Sky News.
“We thought it must be something like a bomb.
“Nobody had to tell us. Everybody just headed for the stairs.”
Charlie and his colleagues began walking down the tower but they were slowed down as more and more people entered the stairwell, before they passed three firefighters on the 17th floor.
“As they passed us we heard on their radio another plane has hit the South Tower,” Charlie says.
“It had taken about 17 minutes to get down nine floors.”
• ‘It was like a warzone’
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What is the legacy of 9/11?
Charlie describes the scene outside the World Trade Center as “like a warzone”.
He says he saw body parts on the street and cars that had been destroyed by falling debris.
A “black charred body” landed about 30ft away as he walked to the ferry terminal and he watched 20 people jump from the towers, he says.
“What was their option?” Charlie asks.
“You stand and either die of smoke inhalation, you burn to death, or you take that quick leap and get it over with.”
After boarding a ferry, Charlie “heard a rumble” and watched as the South Tower came down.
“In less than a minute, the dock where we were just standing was a mass of dust and dirt,” he adds.
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Charlie says 20 of his friends were killed that day – including one he saw in the lobby of the North Tower shortly before the first plane struck.
He says a psychiatrist later diagnosed him with a form of PTSD called “guilt disorder”.
“I was having trouble getting my head around why so many people died and I didn’t,” Charlie says.
After moving back to the UK in 2016, he now gives motivational speeches but admits he still sometimes struggles with the emotional toll of 9/11.
“I get a little teary now and again,” he says.
“I think about things and get a little bit upset because it was an awful day.
“It will never go – that monkey will always be on my back.
“But I found talking about it and sharing my experiences with people helped me get through it.”
US
Britain has been playing a role behind the scenes of Trump’s deal between Israel and Hamas | Beth Rigby
Sir Keir Starmer will join world leaders at a historic summit in Egypt today – to witness the signing of the Gaza peace plan to end two years of conflict, bloodshed and suffering that has cost tens of thousands of lives and turned Gaza into a wasteland.
Travelling over to Egypt, flanked by his national security adviser Jonathan Powell, the prime minister told me it was a “massive moment” and one that is genuinely historic.
US President Donald Trump moved decisively last week to end this bloody war, pushing Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Hamas into a ceasefire as part of his 20-point peace plan.
Pic: AP
In the flurry of the following 48 hours, Sir Keir and another 20 or so leaders were invited to Egypt to bear witness to the signing of this deal, with many of them deserving some credit for the effort they made to bring this deal around – not least the leaders of Qatar, Egypt and Turkey, who pressed Hamas to sign up to this deal.
Today, the remaining 20 living hostages are finally set to be released, along with the bodies of another 28 who were either killed or died in captivity, and aid is due to flow back into a starving Gaza.
Some 1,200 Israelis were killed on 7 October 2023, with another 250 taken hostage. In the subsequent war, most of Gaza’s two million population has been displaced. More than 67,000 Gazans have been killed, according to Palestinian health officials.
Then, the signing ceremony is due to take place this afternoon in Sharm el Sheikh. It will be a momentous moment after a long and bloody war.
But it is only just the beginning of a long process to rebuild Gaza and try to secure a lasting peace in the region.
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Humanitarian aid rolls into Gaza
The immediate focus for the UK and other nations will be to get aid into Gaza, with the UK committing £20m for water, sanitation and hygiene services for Gazans.
But the focus for the UK and other European allies is what happens after the hostages are released and Israel withdraws its troops.
What happens next is a much bigger and more complicated task: rebuilding Gaza; turning it into a terrorist-free zone; governing Gaza – the current plan is for a temporary apolitical committee; creating an international stabilisation force and all the tensions that could bring about – which troops each side would allow in; a commitment for Israel not to occupy or annex Gaza, even as Netanyahu makes plain his opposition to that plan.
The scale of the challenge is matched by the scale of devastation caused by this brutal war.
The prime minister will set out his ambition for the UK to play a leading role in the next phase of the peace plan.
Starmer arrives in Sharm el-Sheikh. Pic: PA
Back home, the UK is hosting a three-day conference on Gaza’s recovery and reconstruction.
Last week, France hosted European diplomats and key figures from Middle Eastern countries, Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia and Qatar – and later this week, the German chancellor is hoping to organise a conference on the reconstruction of Gaza with the Egyptians.
But in reality, European leaders know the key to phase two remains the key to phase one, and that’s Donald Trump.
As one UK figure put it to me over the weekend: “There is lots of praise, rightly, for the US president, who got this over the line, but the big challenge for us post-war is implementing the plan. Clearly, Arab partners are concerned the US will lose focus.”
Bridget Phillipson and Mike Huckabee. Pics: Sky/AP
The prime minister knows this and has made a point, at every point, to praise Mr Trump.
His cabinet minister Bridget Phillipson learned that diplomatic lesson the hard way yesterday when she was publicly lambasted by the US ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee for suggesting to my colleague Trevor Phillips that the UK “had played a key role behind the scenes” and failed to mention Mr Trump by name.
“I assure you she is delusional,” tweeted Governor Huckabee. “She can thank @realDonaldTrump anytime just to set the record straight”.
Today, leaders will rightly be praising Mr Trump for securing the breakthrough to stop the fighting and get the remaining hostages home.
People hug next in Hostages Square. Pic: Reuters
But this is only the beginning of a very long journey ahead to push through the rest of the 19-point plan and stop the region from falling back into conflict.
Britain has, I am told, been playing a role behind the scenes. The PM’s national security adviser Mr Powell was in Egypt last week and has been in daily touch with his US counterpart Steve Witkoff, according to government sources. Next week the King of Jordan will come to the UK.
Part of the UK’s task will be to get more involved, with the government and European partners keen to get further European representation on Trump’s temporary governance committee for Gaza, which Tony Blair (who was not recommended or endorsed by the UK) is on and Mr Trump will chair.
The committee will include other heads of states and members, including qualified Palestinians and international experts.
As for the former prime minister’s involvement, there hasn’t been an overt ringing endorsement from the UK government.
It’s helpful to have Mr Blair at the table because he can communicate back to the current government, but equally, as one diplomatic source put it to me: “While a lot of people in the Middle East acknowledge his experience, expertise and contact book, they don’t like him and we need – sooner rather than later – other names included that Gulf partners can get behind.”
Today it will be the US, Egypt, Qatar and Turkey that sign off on the peace plan they directly negotiated, as other Middle Eastern and European leaders, who have flown into Sharm el Sheikh to bear witness, look on.
But in the coming days and weeks, there will need to be a big international effort, led by Mr Trump, not just to secure the peace, but to keep it.
Actress Diane Keaton, who starred in films including The Godfather and Annie Hall, has died aged 79.
Keaton’s daughter, Dexter Keaton White, confirmed her death in California to Sky’s US partner network NBC News.
With a long career, across a series of movies that are regarded as some of the best ever made, Keaton was widely admired.
She was awarded an Oscar, a BAFTA and two Golden Globe Awards, and was also nominated for two Emmys, and a Tony, as well as picking up a series of other Academy Award and BAFTA nominations.
Diane Keaton, with her best actress Oscar for Annie Hall in 1978. Pic: AP
Her best actress Oscar was for the Woody Allen film Annie Hall, which is said to be loosely based on her life.
She appeared in several other Allen projects, including Manhattan, as well as all three Godfather movies, in which she played Kay, the wife and then ex-wife of Marlon Brando’s son Michael Corleone, played by Al Pacino, opposite him as he descends into a life of crime and replaces his father in the family’s mafia empire.
With Woody Allen in 1978. Pic: Adam Scull/PHOTOlink.net/AP
Keaton was the kind of actor who helped make films iconic and timeless, from her heartbreaking turn as Kay Adams-Corleone to the “La-dee-da, la-dee-da” phrasing as Annie Hall, bedecked in the now famous necktie, bowler hat, vest and khakis.
Keaton also frequently worked with Nancy Meyers, starting with 1987’s Baby Boom.
Their other films together included 1991’s Father Of The Bride and its 1995 sequel, as well as 2003’s Something’s Gotta Give.
Keaton (centre) with Goldie Hawn (L) and Bette Midler at the premiere of The First Wives Club in 1996. Pic: AP
In 1996, she starred opposite Goldie Hawn and Bette Midler in The First Wives Club, about three women whose husbands had left them for younger women.
More recently, she collaborated with Jane Fonda, Mary Steenburgen and Candice Bergen on the Book Club films.
‘Brilliant, beautiful’
The unexpected news of Keaton’s death was met with shock around the world.
Diane Keaton shows her hands after placing them on fresh cement during a ceremony TCL Chinese Theatre in 2022. Pic: Reuters
Her First Wives Club co-star Midler wrote on Instagram: “The brilliant, beautiful, extraordinary Diane Keaton has died. I cannot tell you how unbearably sad this makes me.
“She was hilarious, a complete original, and completely without guile, or any of the competitiveness one would have expected from such a star. What you saw was who she was … oh, la, lala!”
Fellow co-star Goldie Hawn said Keaton had left “a trail of fairy dust, filled with particles of light and memories beyond imagination”.
“How do we say goodbye? What words can come to mind when your heart is broken? You never liked praise, so humble, but now you can’t tell me to ‘shut up’ honey. There was, and will be, no one like you,” Hawn added in a post on Instagram.
“You stole the hearts of the world and shared your genius with millions, making films that made us laugh and cry in ways only you could.”
Actor Ben Stiller paid tribute on X, writing: “Diane Keaton. One of the greatest film actors ever. An icon of style, humor and comedy. Brilliant. What a person.”
Kate Hudson, Goldie Hawn’s daughter, posted simply: “We love you so much Diane.”
Last year at New York Fashion Week. Pic: AP
In her Instagram tribute, Emmy, Grammy, Oscar, and Tony award-winning actress and producer Viola Davis said: “No!! No!!! No!! God, not yet, NO!!! Man… you defined womanhood.
“The pathos, humor, levity, your ever-present youthfulness and vulnerability – you tattooed your SOUL into every role, making it impossible to imagine anyone else inhabiting them.
“You were undeniably, unapologetically YOU!!! Loved you. Man… rest well. God bless your family, and I know angels are flying you home.”
Diane Keaton and her children, Duke (left) and Dexter Keaton, at the premiere of ‘Book Club’ in 2018. Pic: AP
Keaton never married.
She adopted her daughter Dexter at the age of 50 in 1996 and a son, Duke, four years later.
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