By Travis Crum
The Charleston Gazette
NEW YORK — Most people remember where they were on Sept. 11, 2001 and the eight seconds that it took for the South Tower of the World Trade Center to collapse. For Cmdr. Richard Picciotto, those eight seconds seemed like a lifetime.
Picciotto is the highest-ranking firefighter to survive the World Trade Center collapse and the last fireman to escape the devastation. On Wednesday, he was the keynote speaker at the kickoff of the West Virginia Safety Expo, speaking to more than 100 firefighters, police, medic personnel and their families at the Bendi Kedem Temple in Charleston.
“I just heard this noise and the entire building seemed like it was coming apart at the seams,” Picciotto recalled as the South Tower began collapsing. “When you die, they say you see your life flash before your eyes. All I could see was my family, because, for some of us, our family is everything. I just kept praying, ‘God, please make it quick.’ ”
Picciotto and his crew were dispatched to the South Tower shortly after the planes hit on that fateful day in 2001. They were on their way up to the point of impact in the South Tower when they heard the North Tower collapse.
It was at that point Picciotto sent a radio signal ordering a complete evacuation of the South Tower. Thanks to his efforts, thousands of people, including emergency responders, were able to escape alive.
“I just thought to myself, ‘how many of my friends just died, how many people just died,” he said. “I had to make the toughest decision I’ve ever made in my life and that was to order the evacuation of the South Tower.”
On the way down, Picciotto and his crew reached the sixth and seventh floors just as the tower collapsed, leaving them trapped in an air pocket of debris.
Picciotto described the collapse as “immense sound and then complete and utter silence and darkness.”
But he didn’t let that stop his rescue instinct from kicking in. Picciotto began to make Mayday calls until a search party rescued them approximately four hours later.
He climbed upward and helped those around him escape to safety. He was the last to leave.
The events of Sept. 11 inspired William Javins, an Alum Creek volunteer firefighter, to dedicate himself to helping others.
“It was his bravery and others like him that inspired me to begin volunteering 10 years ago,” Javins said. “The dangers cross my mind everyday but I just look to my brothers, God and my family to get through it.”
Picciotto has served as a New York police officer, fire marshal, arson investigator and lieutenant before becoming fire chief in 1992. He has served in the FDNY for 28 years and has commanded Battalion 11, covering Manhattan’s Upper West Side, for nine years. He is the recipient of departmental awards and commendations for his bravery and service.
Copyright 2011 Charleston Newspapers