‘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.
Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player
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’
Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player
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.
Subscribe to StoryCast ’21 now on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, Spreaker
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.”
The headlines these past few weeks have focused on the National Guard deployed by the American president to the streets of Washington DC.
With combat rifles and armoured vehicles, they are an effective visual for Donald Trump.
They neatly project his power. But they are a distraction too.
Donald Trump has deployed National Guard troops to Washington DC. Pic: Reuters
While the troops may, for his supporters, represent hard presidential power in a Democrat-run city perceived to be out of control, they are not actually fighting crime (nor are they the right tool to do that) and they are not focused on the nation’s immigration challenges.
This week, they were spotted collecting litter in downtown DC.
Yet Trump’s law, order, and crime agenda has many strands which represent an unprecedented extension of presidential authority. Two weeks ago, at the White House, he told America what to expect.
Protests in Washington DC following the deployment of National Guard troops. Pics: Reuters
“We’re going to take our capital back; we’re going to take it back,” he said.
“Massive enforcement operations targeting known gangs, drug dealers and criminal networks to get them the hell off the street, maybe get them out of the country because a lot of them came into our country illegally.
“They shouldn’t have been allowed in. They come from Venezuela. They come from all over the world. We’re going to get them the hell out. They won’t be here long.”
Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player
Trump: National Guard deployment will ‘take capital back’
The real story is going on beyond the National Guard photo-op.
On Tuesday morning, I set out to see what this sweeping new presidential power really looks like on the streets of America’s capital city. I didn’t expect that it would take five minutes and a drive of just a few blocks to find what appears to be a new normal.
The neighbourhood of Mount Pleasant is a couple of miles north of the White House.
It’s a proudly multicultural and multi-income part of the city. In that sense, it’s somewhat unusual. Washington is mostly a city of bubbles – where different communities are distinct, and the wealth gap is vast.
Turning off 17th Street, the flashing lights were ahead. It was just after 7am. This residential neighbourhood had been awoken this particular morning by the sound of a commotion which was unfolding in front of me.
A construction truck had been pulled over by unmarked police vehicles. Three Latino men had been taken out, handcuffed and were in the process of being taken to the police cars.
Sky News witnessed several men being detained
‘You’re the Gestapo’
It was an immigration raid. The men had been detained because they were not able to prove, on demand, as they went to work, whether they were in the country legally.
Locals, drawn out of their houses, shouted at the federal agents from ICE – the Immigration and Customs Enforcement Agency.
“Shame, shame, shame. You’re the Gestapo… why are you doing this,” they shouted.
“These are hardworking people,” one neighbour said of the men detained.
“These people work in our neighbourhood. They work in our restaurants. They’re our neighbours. They are taking hardworking people away, not criminals.”
“I’m feeling devastated for those men who were just ripped out of their lives unceremoniously,” another neighbour told me. “I’m feeling scared for my neighbours who are afraid to leave their house because they’re afraid of exactly that happening.”
“This is not making our city safe,” her partner added, his young children crying in his arms. “Pulling out workers who are an essential member of our community and being like, ‘oh, that makes DC a better place’. It doesn’t.”
Local residents are angry about how their neighbours are being treated
The surge of federal law enforcement agents into America’s capital has been unprecedented, and their powers are too.
Using presidential authority and harnessing the unique status of Washington as a district rather than a state, Trump has taken control of local law enforcement agencies in the city.
The city’s Metropolitan Police now answer to him, not to the local government, and are working alongside federal agencies.
In a recent statement, a spokesperson for ICE said: “We will support the re-establishment of law and order and public safety in DC, which includes taking drug dealers, gang members and criminal aliens off city streets.”
Here, in Mount Pleasant, this now includes taking people, speculatively, from their vehicles on their way to work.
Much of the enforcement is heavily armed
Twenty minutes later, whistles punctuated another moment of tension up the road.
Whistles are a new community tactic to alert people that ICE agents are in the area. Other innovative tactics include using the Waze Satnav system to report “icy streets” – in August.
On 16th Street, a small group of locals – commuters and local business owners among them – had gathered around a car with blacked-out windows. They had identified ICE agents inside.
An officer from the city’s Metropolitan Police arrived and asked what the commotion was about. The crowd told him about the ICE agents. He looked into the car, nodded, and retreated. He, too, was then jeered.
Read more:
The flashpoint in Trump’s deportations blitz
Sky’s Mark Stone had no luck in his attempts to ask questions about what he witnessed
‘This is not what we’re about’
In these neighbourhoods of overwhelmingly Democratic, left-leaning Washington DC, the mood feels edgy; not a tipping point, but creeping towards one, for sure.
“I don’t feel safer, I feel more policed,” one woman said.
A day later, a few streets away, another raid. Officers were staged at the entrance to an apartment block. Heavily armed, they appeared to be from various agencies and the city police too.
“I’m sick, this is not this country, this is not what we’re about. We’re a quiet community. It’s unbelievable we’ve come to this, unbelievable,” a woman of retirement age told me as she watched the commotion.
‘They are brutalising people’
When questioned, the officers wouldn’t confirm what their operation was about, but no one was detained and in the end they were literally shouted out of the street by locals. The anger was visceral.
“I’ve lived here for 47 years, and I’ve never seen anything like this,” another woman said.
“They are occupying the city and our neighbourhoods. They are brutalising people, they are taking people for no reason. We don’t want them here. This is a Donald Trump dominance performance.”
It is more than a performance, though.
If this is the plan for Democrat-run cities across the country, well then the weeks ahead look divisive indeed.
Two children, aged eight and 10, have been killed in a shooting during mass at a school in Minneapolis.
An attacker opened fire with a rifle through the windows of a church at Annunciation Catholic School and struck a group of children as they sat in pews on Wednesday morning.
The FBI has confirmed the killer has been identified as Robin Westman, a male born as Robert Westman, and is investigating the shooting as an “act of domestic terrorism” and a “hate crime targeting Catholics”.
As it happened: FBI says attack investigated as ‘terrorism’
Robin Westman
The city’s police chief Brian O’Hara said the attacker – armed with a rifle, shotgun, and pistol – approached the side of the church and fired dozens of rounds as mass was celebrated during the first week of term.
He added that 17 other people were injured, including 14 children, two of whom were in a critical condition.
Police believe the suspect, thought to be in his early 20s and acting alone, died from a self-inflicted gunshot wound.
Parents and children wait for news after a school shooting in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Pic: AP
Mr O’Hara called the attack in Minnesota a “deliberate act of violence against innocent children and other people worshipping”.
“The sheer cruelty and cowardice of firing into a church full of children is absolutely incomprehensible.”
He also said a wooden plank had been used to barricade some side doors.
Authorities found a smoke bomb but no explosives at the scene, Mr O’Hara said.
Three adults in 80s among those injured
Hennepin Healthcare, the main trauma hospital in Minneapolis, received 11 patients, including nine children – aged six to 14 – and two adults, emergency medicine chair Dr Thomas Wyatt said.
He said four of the patients were taken to operating rooms.
Children’s Minnesota, a paediatric trauma hospital, said in a statement that five children were admitted.
At a later news conference, Mr O’Hara said three adults in their 80s are among those injured in the attack.
He added that Westman had scheduled a manifesto to be released on YouTube, which “appeared to show him at the scene and included some disturbing writings”.
The video has since been taken down with the assistance of the FBI.
Listen to The World with Richard Engel and Yalda Hakim every Wednesday
‘So much’ gunfire, witness says
Bill Bienemann, a witness to the shooting, told Sky News it went on “for several minutes – a long time for live gunfire”.
“I know what gunfire sounds like, and I was shocked,” he added. “I said there’s no way that could be gunfire, there was so much of it.
“It seemed like a rifle, it certainly didn’t sound like a handgun, so he must have reloaded several times.”
Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player
Witness says he heard 30 to 50 shots
The pre-kindergarten through eighth-grade school had an all-school mass scheduled at 8.15am local time on Wednesday morning (2.15pm UK time), according to its website.
Monday was the first day of the school semester.
Pic: AP
Pic: AP
Mayor calls shooting ‘unspeakable act’
At the first news conference, Minneapolis mayor Jacob Frey said the shooting was an “unspeakable act”.
“Children are dead,” he said. “There are families that have a deceased child. You cannot put into words the gravity, the tragedy, or the absolute pain of this situation.”
Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player
Mayor confirms children killed in school shooting
Speaking later, and joined by Governor Tim Walz, Mr Frey said that the “Minneapolis family” has stepped up in “thousands of different ways” after the shooting.
“The way that they acted during the severe threat and danger was nothing short of heroic,” he says.
“This is a tragic and horrible event that should never occur.”
He added: “Anybody who is using this as an opportunity to villainise our trans community or any other community out there has lost their sense of common humanity.”
Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player
Minneapolis mayor calls for action on gun crime
Mr Walz said: “We often come to these and say these are unspeakable tragedies or there are no words for this, there shouldn’t be words for these types of incidents because they shouldn’t happen.”
The school’s headteacher Matt DeBoer added: “To any of our students and families and staff watching right now, I love you. You’re so brave, and I’m so sorry this happened.”
Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player
Headteacher speaks after US school shooting
Senator: Girl ‘had to watch several of her friends get shot’
Speaking to MSNBC, Democratic senator Amy Klobuchar said she had called one of her longtime employees who had three children in the school during the shooting.
The senator described the call with the mother as “one of the most upsetting things I’ve ever heard”.
“These kids are doing an all-school mass and had to watch several of her friends get shot – one in the back, one in the neck,” Ms Klobuchar added.
“And they all got down under the pews and she – her daughter, of course, was not shot – but her daughter ended up being the one to tell one of the dads of one of the other kids that his daughter had been shot.”
Responding to the reports, US President Donald Trump said on Truth Social: “I have been fully briefed on the tragic shooting in Minneapolis, Minnesota.
“The FBI quickly responded and they are on the scene. The White House will continue to monitor this terrible situation.”
The world’s most valuable company, and first to be valued at $4trn (£2.9trn), beat market expectations in keenly anticipated financial results.
Microchip maker Nvidia recorded revenues of $46.7bn (£34.6bn) in just three months up to July, latest financial data from the company showed, slightly better than Wall Street observers had expected.
The company’s performance is seen as a bellwether for artificial intelligence (AI) demand, with investors paying close attention to see whether the hype is overblown or if significant investment will pay off.
Originally a creator of gaming graphics hardware, Nvidia’s chips help power AI capability – and the UK’s most powerful supercomputer.
Nvidia’s graphics processors underpin products such as ChatGPT from OpenAI and Gemini from Google.
Other tech giants – Microsoft, Meta and Amazon – make up Nvidia’s biggest customers and are paying large sums to embed AI into their products.
Why does it matter?
Nvidia has been central to the boom in AI development and the surge in tech stock valuations, which has seen stock markets reach record highs.
It represents about 8% of the value of the US S&P 500 stock market index of companies relied on to be stable and profitable.
Strong results will continue to fuel record highs in the market. Conversely, results that fail to live up to the hype could trigger a market tumble.
Read more business news:
Government costs to push up energy price cap
Wagamama owner among suitors for Costa
Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player
Is Trump’s AI plan a ‘tech bro’ manifesto?
Nvidia itself saw its share price rise more than 40% over the past year. Its value impacts anyone with cash in the US stock market, such as pension funds.
The S&P 500 rose 14% over the past year, and the tech-company-heavy NASDAQ gained 21%, largely thanks to Nvidia.
As such, its earnings can move markets as much as major economic or monetary policy announcements, like an interest rate decision.
Sir Keir Starmer with NVIDIA chief Huang at London Tech Week. Pic: AP
What next?
Revenue rises are forecast to continue to rise as Nvidia said it expected a rise to roughly $54bn (£40bn) in the next three months, more than the $53.14bn (£39.3bn) anticipated by analysts.
This excludes any potential shipments to China as export of Nvidia’s H20 chip, designed with the Biden administration’s export crackdown on advanced AI powering chips in mind, had been banned under US national security grounds.
But in recent weeks, Nvidia and another chipmaker, AMD, reached an unprecedented agreement to pay the Trump administration a 15% portion of China sales in return for export licences to send chips to China.
There were no H20 sales at all to China in the second quarter of the year, the period for which results were released on Wednesday evening.
Previously, 13% of Nvidia’s revenue came from China, with nearly 50% coming from the US.
Market reaction
Despite the expectation-beating results, Nvidia shares were down in after-hours trading, as the massive revenue rises previously booked by the company were not repeated in the latest quarter.
Compared to a year ago, revenues rose 56% and 6% compared to the three months up to April.
The absence of Chinese sales in forecasts appeared to disappoint.
-
Sports3 years ago‘Storybook stuff’: Inside the night Bryce Harper sent the Phillies to the World Series
-
Sports1 year agoStory injured on diving stop, exits Red Sox game
-
Sports2 years agoGame 1 of WS least-watched in recorded history
-
Sports2 years agoMLB Rank 2023: Ranking baseball’s top 100 players
-
Sports4 years ago
Team Europe easily wins 4th straight Laver Cup
-
Sports2 years agoButton battles heat exhaustion in NASCAR debut
-
Environment2 years agoJapan and South Korea have a lot at stake in a free and open South China Sea
-
Environment11 months agoHere are the best electric bikes you can buy at every price level in October 2024