By Ret. Lt. George R. Kreuscher
FDNY
The phone rings in our bedroom. It’s 6:10 in the morning. It is just about the time my wife, Mary Lou, and I usually get up on the ranch in northern California. It’s our son Leif. Even though it’s 9:10 in New York, it is an unusual time for a call this early in California. “Dad, did you see on the news what happened at the World Trade Center?” he asks softly. Then he says, “A plane hit the building.” I’m half asleep yet, and I say, “Could be an accident.” He says, “No. It was two planes.” I run out to the TV room, which is surrounded by windows, looking out at what promises to be a lovely northern California day. The sun’s just peeking over the hill east of our valley. I flip the TV on and see the plane coming in and hitting the South Tower. I cannot believe my eyes. I am fully awake now, Mary Lou is at my side now, and I get right back to Leif. He’s been a firefighter in the Fire Department New York for the last five years.
“Leif, you’ll probably be recalled.” He says, “Yeah, Dad, I better go so I can call and find out what’s happening.” We will not talk to him again for the next couple of days. He was at home when he called us. I call back 10 minutes later and he’s already gone. It’s a full recall of all off-duty fire personnel. This lovely September morning on both coasts of the United States will turn out to be the worst day of all of our lives. For Leif, it is the beginning of a couple of weeks of horrific carnage and unspeakable deeds. He will never be the same again, but he will have the company of thousands.
I put the phone down and it rings again immediately. It is our oldest son, George. He is a former Marine and former firefighter with the Fire Department New York, and was badly burned in a Molotov cocktail attack in a riotous situation up in Washington Heights, Manhattan. After being burned, with five years in the fire department, he worked five more years in Ladder Company 44 in the Bronx. He had to leave the job he loved due to the physical damage to his hands from the burns. He’s accepted this with grace. “How are you doing, Dad?” He is also aware that we will know many of the fire fighters lost this day. We already suspect who’s behind this terrible, blindsiding attack. He growls into the phone as only a true fighting man can, “It’s time to get medieval.” I will never forget that low grow from our otherwise very civilized son.
Mary Lou and I stand together in this multi-windowed TV room, watching both towers of the city, which look like two candles belching volumes of ugly, black smoke from the top floors. The beauty of northern California outside is no comfort. Our eyes are glued to the TV screen.
With the aid of telephoto lenses, the TV cameras are picking up closer views of the upper floors of the towers. We see heat-wavering images of the desperate souls waving handkerchiefs or anything that will get the attention of rescuers who will never come. Some people are climbing outboard to escape the heat and smoke from the intense fire inside and below.
I am standing in front of a television on a ranch in northern California with my wife of 39 years, but our total focus is on those towers in New York. We cannot yet comprehend how someone or some group could bring something like this on innocent fellow human beings.
As I watch the TV screen, I know the drill. In September 1995, I retired from the Fire Department New York after 31 years of service. Sixteen of these years were spent in Rescue1, which was the Manhattan Rescue. I’d been to thousands of fires and emergencies of every kind imaginable. Many were in high-rise buildings. There were many procedures for when to, and when not to, use elevators. Under the conditions that existed between 8:45 and 10:28 a.m. on September 11, 2001, most firefighters would have had to use the stairs, and many would prefer the stairs to elevators with something of this magnitude, no matter how awful or arduous that seems.
So, after all these years of experience in Manhattan, like many other firefighters, I know the drill in my sleep. The elevators are unusable, untenable, or limited. It’s the stairs and it will take a long time to get to those in need. Many will be trapped above. The rescuers will risk everything to reach them. For some, it will never happen. I stand there mesmerized by what I see with my eyes. Inside those buildings, I can see the drill in m y mind’s eye. The firefighters are a steady stream of enginemen carrying hose and truckmen and rescue men with tools of every kind, Scott Air Paks, and extra bottles. They are going up one side of the stairs, the survivors, fortunate civilians, are coming down the other side. My mind’s picture is one of order. The civilians are civilized, decent people, the fire department firefighters are focused on the job above. People are in trouble and no matter that there’s never been anything quite this calamitous in the world, like soldiers going toward the sound of gunfire, the firefighters are heading up to people in trouble.
Mary Lou and I stand facing the television screen, three thousand miles from New York. Like millions of other Americans on this day, our whole attention is on those towers. My mind is dulled and racing at the same time. Like many, I already know this is going to be a terrible day. My thoughts, of course, are with the violated innocents, but I am in those stairwells with those brave firefighters. They are trudging up those stairs, each carrying a hundred pounds of gear. They are hardly looking at those coming down. One step after the other, they are moving up to God knows what. Bathed in sweat, they are almost on automatic. After responding to twenty-eight thousand alarms in my own time, I cannot imagine what these men are ultimately getting into.
The news people on the TV are aghast, describing what they are seeing. I hear the sounds of the air horns and sirens from all those fire trucks and emergency responders converging on the World Trade Center. There are now reports of people jumping from the upper floors and deep down I know many must be trapped above.
A strange thing happens to me standing there. Time is compressed, unlike what happened years ago at a nasty fire on Bank and West streets. We of Rescue 1 were moving up the rear fire escape, removing tin from the rear windows, venting a full-blown, multiple-alarm fire. We were mounting the steps to the fourth-floor landing, when all six floors collapsed into the cellar in a fraction of a second. Debris was blowing out the windows like a blast from a shotgun. We were running for our lives, trying to get away from the windows to escape the debris of the floors snapping by from above, which had the potential to kill instantly. I can still see John McAllister’s helmet next to me, turning from sided to side in slow motion. I was outboard, sliding the frame normally holds the drop ladder up; the ladder is down. The building was shaking violently and this was the closest I’d ever been to a building in collapse; if the rear wall had fallen outward, I would surely already have been dead. As I slide, the building shook and I thought, “Is this it? Is this where I die?” on a beautiful, sunny late Sunday afternoon. I made it to the drop ladder, sliding the rails submariner-style, which I had never done before. I made it to the rear yard, looked up and saw the last of the rescue guys, including McAllister, climbing from the fire escape landing to the building next door. The collapse of all six floors took half a second and left us black as coal miners. My flight to get away from the third-floor windows and sliding into the rear yard took, at the most, two seconds. Yet, I can remember almost every detail over a period of time that seemed like minutes.
On September 11, 2001, the time between 9:05 and 10:00 a.m. is a blur and compressed. At 10:00, the news people scream that the building (the South Tower) has collapsed. From this point until 10:28, when the North Tower collapses, I cannot account for the time, except that I’m standing transfixed. There seems almost no time between the South Tower’s collapse and when the North Tower collapses twenty-eight minutes later. The collapse of the second tower brings me to my knees in tears, grief, and prayer. My wife is in tears and tries to comfort me: “Oh, those beautiful men.”