FDNY 9/11/01

I’d recently put my FDNY retirement papers in and finished months of study and internship in Culinary Arts. In the years previous, I consider myself lucky, not only in the FDNY career I’d come to love, but through some degree of luck and circumstance was discovered to publish a “Firehouse” cookbook. Not one but two successful cookbooks! It came with lots of publicity and eventually leading to many appearances on local and national television shows. Several food corporations asked me to appear on shows and mention their products. I wasn’t quite an “A-List” culinary celebrity but there did come many great opportunities. 

     In summer of 2001, Ronzoni pasta, a longtime favorite pasta company in New York, asked me to judge the upcoming New York Firefighter Cook Off. The winning recipes would be served before the NYC Marathon. Of course, there were plenty of pre race publicity to do. I did several local TV appearances but in early August, they asked if I’d do a live TV segment for WB-11 at a firehouse, my last assignment, Ladder 152 in Queens. Of course I agreed and they set it up. They called back, said we’re all set, September 8, 2001 at Ladder 152.

     Around September 3 or so, WB-11 producers called me up. I was told that the TV signal from Queens isn’t that great and with traffic in New York and all, they thought it’d be better to do it at a firehouse in Manhattan. Of course I agreed, I worked part of my career in Manhattan and my brother worked in Manhattan also. They called the next day or so and said it’s all set, Ladder 3, on 13th and Broadway. They also said they also had to change the date. Would I be available the morning of September 11? Yes, of course.

     The TV station was kind enough to send a car service to drive me in….September 11, 2001. I was picked up at 5 a.m., early enough to beat some of the traffic. I arrived around 6 a.m. and met the host of WB-11, Larry Hoff, a well known morning host. I was in uniform and went in to meet the members of Ladder 3, several I knew through my brother. They were all anxious to be on TV, as was I. Once comfortable with it, we were all having fun with it. 

     So, it was “live” but the WB-11 morning show was in the studio and every 20 or so minutes, they would cut “live” to the host, me and the firefighters at Ladder 3. The host made his favorite pasta dish, I made mine and we’d brought it out to the street to have a passersby taste test. Ronzoni was donating $10,000 to the FDNY Widow and Childrens Fund, so many mentions of Ronzoni and how good pasta was for energy.

      Ladder 3 had a few early real alarms but nothing of consequence and a quick return. Great opportunity the host thought to catch a few of us sliding down the fire pole. 

      We did one live segment at around 6:45.a.m. then another at around 7:45 a.m. Because it was live, in several pictures, firefighters were behind me calling home to get the kids up to see Dad on TV. The last “live” TV from Ladder 3 was around 8:15 a.m or so. I went into the kitchen to do the dishes. James Coyle, a newly assigned “probie”(short for Probationary Firefighter) said our guests don’t do dishes and took over, not without a fight. I told him I wasn’t just a guest but I relented. I stood by to dry and he told me how lucky he felt to get assigned to this firehouse. I grabbed a cup of coffee and went to he front of the firehouse, talking with some of the incoming crew. Our shift change is 9 a.m, One incoming was the legendary Lt. Patrick Brown, Vietnam veteran and highly decorated firefighter. An honor to finally meet him, we exchanged a brief hello and conversation and talked with several other firefighters on the “apron” (front sidewalk in front of the firehouse).

     Weatherwise, it was an astoundingly beautiful day. The Ronzoni representative informed me that the car service was in the Bronx and couldn’t get here for an hour. The firefighters said great, hang with us, the traffic is terrible anyway at this time. Not less than a minute later, the Ronzoni rep got a cell call. She said good news, another car is around the block and will be here in a minute, do you want to take it or wait?             The firefighters were pulling me in to the kitchen to stay but…call it fate, divine intervention, I said thanks fellas but I’ll take the traffic and head home. TIme…near as I can remember..8:40 a.m. or so, maybe closer but the first plane hit the North Tower at 8:45 a.m. I was just making the turn up Broadway, hearing sirens all over the place. I asked the driver to put the radio on. It just happened, so reports were vague, a small plane hit the World Trade Center? More sirens, passing fire trucks and police cars as I entered the Queens Midtown Tunnel. As I left the tunnel, I looked back to see a tremendous amount of smoke from the North Tower and what seemed like an explosion in the South Tower! The radio back on saying it was a commercial plane and a second and this is not by accident. I asked the driver to take me back in but the tunnels, all tunnels and bridges into the city were closed. 

     A LONG drive home, hearing for sure it was an attack. I arrived home to see the South Tower collapsing. I knew I was watching thousands die and hundreds of firefighters and police in less than 11 seconds. There are no words that suffice. We all felt it. Then the second tower collapsed. 

      I hadn’t been on TV for a spell while I was in culinary school. So this was my first TV thing in a while. Oddly enough, my brother Michael, who was retired from the FDNY with a back injury, was visiting NY with his wife and daughter. Both he and several friends asked me over the weekend before, “hey, when you gonna be on TV again”. I told them  to tune in Tuesday morning. 

     So, upon returning home, there were several concerned calls on my answering machine…and they kept coming all day long as you might imagine. I went over my sisters house where my brother was staying and said “I can’t watch this, I’m going back in to help” He agreed and asked if I had gear for us both, which I did. We took the Long Island Rail Road into Penn Station. A girl on the train came over to us. She asked us to please look for her husband and gave us a picture. He worked for Cantor Fitzgerald.       Up to the street and some NY State Troopers in a Humvee pulled over and said jump in. We got as close as we could, got let out and walked. When I turned the corner and saw that “pile” of smoking rubble, crushed fire trucks and overturned police cars I cried deeply. It only got worse the closer we got. 

     Here and there we ran into firefighters we worked with, working and retired. We asked about certain ones and more often than not, head down and a no, I don’t think they made it. At that point “missing” but not confirmed…but we knew. Ladder 3, where I’d been the morning before, my brother and I found the truck, the first third of it crushed almost to the ground. It now sits in the World Trade Center museum lobby. I asked the inevitable, the firefighters of Ladder 3….all twelve were killed in the collapse. In the months to come, I found out that only 2 of the bodies were ever recovered. The woman on the train? Cantor Fitzgerald was on 110th floor, no one survived

      I made tapes of the morning appearance and delivered it to the families of Ladder 3 and attended their funerals and the many others I knew. We continued to work the rescue and recovery efforts in the weeks to come, seeing SO many we worked with walking around the “pile” kind of in a daze at the immensity of this tragedy. On a visit back to Ladder 3 I was told that they had a tape of Lt. Patrick Brown, which I listened to. “We’re on the 40th floor with 50-60 severely burned people. The next transmission, “I think the buildings coming down around us….then static”.

     Ronzoni raised their donation to $30,000. I raised money at many events for Ladder 3 and the FDNY Burn Center. While working at Ground Zero, I cleaned up and rested at Ladder 5(worked there) and Ladder 7 where my brother was assigned. The outpouring of New Yorkers support was indescribable and helped us heal. Hugs, cheers and trays of Lasagna; it didn’t change the event but thank you New York, you helped. I was also so deeply touched at pictures of firefighters AROUND THE WORLD, standing at attention in front of firehouses from Poland to Antartica, saluting us and sharing our grief. 

     So, you can read my story as written in the Tampa Bay Times here and Michaels story in a California news article. There are two videos here on this page, one is the exact video from the morning of September 11, 2001 before they responded. The other, the host, Larry Hoff had me back for a dedication, they assumed after they left that I’d gone with Ladder 3 and perished. Had I stayed a few more minutes, I surely would have. Please watch with respect and pray, as I do every night, for all those lost that awful day.  God rest there brave souls.