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Speaker 1: Hey, everybody, it's Bill Courtney with an army of normal folks.

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Speaker 1: And we continue now with part two of our conversation

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Speaker 1: with Tim Brown. Right after these brief messages from our

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Speaker 1: general sponsors. You see mister kissy cigar guy go up

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Speaker 1: with Chris, and then you see some other folks.

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Speaker 2: Yeah. I saw Captain Terry hatt and my best friend

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Speaker 2: in the lobby of the North Tower, and I ran

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Speaker 2: to him, and he was six or four. So when

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Speaker 2: I wrapped my arms around him, I wrapped my arms

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Speaker 2: around his chest and then he comes down on top

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Speaker 2: of me like this huge eagle or something like just

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Speaker 2: I totally got lost in his hug and he just

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Speaker 2: squeezed me to his chest and he kissed me on

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Speaker 2: the right cheek and he said in my ear, I

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Speaker 2: love you, brother, I may never see you again. And

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Speaker 2: I blew him off. But I didn't know what he knew.

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Speaker 2: You know, he had come down the West Side Highway.

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Speaker 2: He saw there were eight or ten floors of fire,

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Speaker 2: jet fueled fire, eight or ten floors each floor is

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Speaker 2: an acre. That's eight acres of jet fueled fire, ninety

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Speaker 2: stories up. And there's no way he knew. There's no

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Speaker 2: way we can get enough water up there. It's impossible.

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Speaker 2: There's no way we can fight these fires. And a

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Speaker 2: lot of the chiefs knew that, and Terry had that advantage,

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Speaker 2: which I didn't because I was underneath it looking straight up.

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Speaker 2: So when he said that to me, I blew him

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Speaker 2: off a little bit because we had done a lot

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Speaker 2: of things together. We had done a lot of really crazy,

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Speaker 2: dangerous things to save people, and we always we were

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Speaker 2: very good at what we did. We were very good.

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Speaker 2: And so I thought I would see him again, but

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Speaker 2: he knew better, and I didn't see him again, And

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Speaker 2: so a plane hit the South Tower. Chief Donald Burns

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Speaker 2: Assistant Chief Donald Burns, forty one years in the New

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Speaker 2: York City Fire Department, probably the most respected fire chief

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Speaker 2: at the fire that day. If you looked up Irish

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Speaker 2: fire chief in the dictionary, it would be his mug

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Speaker 2: with red, rosy cheeks and steely blue eyes and lines

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Speaker 2: of experience permanently etched in his face. And he was

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Speaker 2: my friend, you know, I had mad respect for him,

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Speaker 2: and we ran to the South Tower together after it

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Speaker 2: was hit. We were assigned to open that command post up. Yeah,

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Speaker 2: because now you've got to split forces. Yeah, exactly right,

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Speaker 2: exactly right. So we're running together from the North Tower

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Speaker 2: to the South Tower, and I said, Chief, what do

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Speaker 2: you need me to do? He said, in his New

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Speaker 2: York accident to me, there's not much you and I

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Speaker 2: can do. He only talked out of this side of

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Speaker 2: his mouth, like this, not much you and I can do.

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Speaker 2: I've ordered a fifth alarm for our building, but the

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Speaker 2: first five alarms are going to that building. Do your

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Speaker 2: best and be careful. He also said, we're at war.

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Speaker 2: He did say that those words to me. Yeah, we're

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Speaker 2: at war. He said, you know we're at war? I said, yes, sir.

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Speaker 2: We all knew when the second plane hit that we

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Speaker 2: were under terrorist attack. We didn't know if it was

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Speaker 2: al Kaeda or if it was China, Russia or someone else.

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Speaker 2: We didn't know, but we knew these planes were coming

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Speaker 2: for us. And as one of our chaplains said that

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Speaker 2: the fireman went to war with only tools of rescue, right,

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Speaker 2: not knowing that we were going into war. And so

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Speaker 2: Chief Burns and I were running the South tower. A

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Speaker 2: woman comes running in, running toward us, screaming that there

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Speaker 2: were people trapped in an elevator. So I went with

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Speaker 2: her and Chief Burns went to the command post, and

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Speaker 2: that's why I encountered people in an elevator. It's horrific.

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Speaker 2: They were the hoistway doors were opened so you could

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Speaker 2: see into the shaft, but the elevator car was stuck

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Speaker 2: and so at the top, so you could just see

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Speaker 2: like six inches into the elevator car at the top.

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Speaker 2: Feet you saw feet exactly. And the people were panicking

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Speaker 2: and screaming, and I remember seeing the men's dress shirts

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Speaker 2: and jackets as they were trying to pull that car

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Speaker 2: down a few more inches so that they could slip out.

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Speaker 2: And two things had happened to these poor people, which

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Speaker 2: I the first one I didn't know until later, but

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Speaker 2: that elevator car had free fallen seventy floors because the

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Speaker 2: flight one seventy five snapped the cable when it came in.

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Speaker 2: So they had taken this horrific ride, I think seventy

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Speaker 2: four stories free falling seventy probably seventy eight to seventy

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Speaker 2: somewhere in there. How were they not exactly Well, that's

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Speaker 2: what they expected to be killed on impact, But the

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Speaker 2: emergency brakes kicked in and worked the way they were

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Speaker 2: supposed to and stopped it before it hit the concrete pit.

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Speaker 2: But those breaks. Now we're on and no human strength

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Speaker 2: is going to move that car. Right. This was steel

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Speaker 2: on steel saying you're not moving.

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Speaker 1: If the plane hit the cable and they're in the

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Speaker 1: elevator shaft, they're far something coming down exactly.

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Speaker 2: The jet fuel also had cascaded down that elevator shaft

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Speaker 2: and now was pooling in concrete pit below them, and

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Speaker 2: it was on fire, so they were getting burned above it.

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Speaker 2: So they had taken a seventy story free fall. They

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Speaker 2: were trapped in the elevator and now they were getting burned.

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Speaker 2: And I'm the first first responder on the scene. But

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Speaker 2: what they needed was a fireman, not a mayor's office

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Speaker 2: guy with a green hat, with a green with a

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Speaker 2: stupid green hat. Fair, fair, And they were no. Never.

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Speaker 2: I can't say that in my horror at seeing this scene,

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Speaker 2: in my frustration and wanting to help them, You've got

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Speaker 2: no tools. I have nothing else, right, I don't have gloves,

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Speaker 2: I don't have protective gear. I have nothing. And so

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Speaker 2: I turned to my right and I started yelling to

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Speaker 2: the people, start bringing me fire extinguishers, because if you

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Speaker 2: can put a fire out your problems go away, and

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Speaker 2: you have time to rescue them. And so I was

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Speaker 2: screaming at people and a fireman, a bumblebee came up

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Speaker 2: behind me, and I looked over and I looked up

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Speaker 2: at his face, and it was firefighter Michael Lynch, who

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Speaker 2: I knew from Ladder four back in the early nineties,

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Speaker 2: and I knew him well. And he put his hand

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Speaker 2: on my shoulder and he squeezed my shoulder and he said, Timmy,

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Speaker 2: I got it. He was reassuring me, the senior guy,

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Speaker 2: that he was going to take care of it, because

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Speaker 2: he was a fireman, and he had all his equipment,

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Speaker 2: and he had all his tools, and he brought a

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Speaker 2: whole fire truck worth a full of tools with him,

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Speaker 2: and he was already formulating in his mind how he

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Speaker 2: was going to get those people out of the elevator,

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Speaker 2: put the fire out, save those people's lives. He was

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Speaker 2: already when I later talked to his widow, Denise, who

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Speaker 2: I hadn't known before, and she had one baby in

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Speaker 2: her lap and the two year old boy crawling around

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Speaker 2: on the rug in their living room. I wanted her

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Speaker 2: to hear the story of her heroic husband from me

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Speaker 2: because I was the last one to see him. And

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Speaker 2: we know in the end, we can prove that he

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Speaker 2: saved three women out of that elevator because they identify

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Speaker 2: him by photograph, and so we know he saved at

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Speaker 2: least three before the building came down. So I told

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Speaker 2: his widow in that living room, when he said to me,

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Speaker 2: to me, I got it, he may as well have

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Speaker 2: had wings coming out of his back, because he was

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Speaker 2: the angel sent to save the lives of those poor people,

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Speaker 2: and he did save some of them. We don't know

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Speaker 2: for sure how many, but at least three out of

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Speaker 2: that elevator.

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Speaker 1: I've heard you describe the term I got it means

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Speaker 1: so much more than I got it.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, tell us, Oh, it's just it's he had the training,

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Speaker 2: the experience, the knowledge, the the tools and equipment, because

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Speaker 2: he brought a whole fire truck of tools with him

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Speaker 2: and he knew how he knew how to use them.

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Speaker 2: All Right, it's a lot of work, it's a lot

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Speaker 2: of training, it's a lot of experience, it's a lot

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Speaker 2: of dedication, it's a lot of courage and bravery. And

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Speaker 2: he said, with all confidence in the world, I got it,

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Speaker 2: And I knew when he said that to me that

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Speaker 2: there was no one better to take care of those

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Speaker 2: people than firefighter and Michael Lynch, So you leave it

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Speaker 2: with them. I got word over my OEM radio because

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Speaker 2: we had three of radios, and NYPDA radio and FDNY

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Speaker 2: radio and OEM radio, and so over my OEM radio, urgent, urgent,

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Speaker 2: urgent confirmed by the FBI. Third plane incoming, It's confirmed,

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Speaker 2: it's ours impact imminent, getting the stairwells get protected. So

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Speaker 2: that's why I left Mike the Angel at the elevator

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Speaker 2: scene to save those people, because I was representing the mayor,

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Speaker 2: and I went to the command post. I found a

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Speaker 2: landline that worked. I dialed the operator. She picked up

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Speaker 2: right away and I said, I'm with Mayor Giuliani in

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Speaker 2: the World Trade Center. I need to talk to the

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Speaker 2: White House immediately. She tried to get through, she couldn't.

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Speaker 2: I said, then the Pentagon, and she said, the Pentagon's

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Speaker 2: under attack.

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Speaker 1: And that's the first we knew of it. At that point,

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Speaker 1: you have to be like the whole world's coming.

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Speaker 2: In, yeah, and we're under it, and we're under it.

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Speaker 2: And I talked with the New York State Emergency Management

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Speaker 2: Office and they assured me that the fighter jets were

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Speaker 2: coming for us as fast as possible. We couldn't do

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Speaker 2: our job and help people and save people if planes

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Speaker 2: kept crashing into us, so we needed air cover. Maybe

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Speaker 2: for the first time in the history of the city

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Speaker 2: of New York. We couldn't handle it. You know, our

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Speaker 2: army of cops and firefighters couldn't handle it. I've heard

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Speaker 2: you say, that's fifty thousand, oh yeah, easily fifty, probably

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Speaker 2: a little more. That's fifty thousand uniformed. Fifty thousand uniformed.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, you guys had to have felt like an army

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Speaker 1: that could handle anything thrown at you.

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Speaker 2: Very rarely asked for help, almost never, And on September eleventh,

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Speaker 2: we needed our heroes in the US military to come

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Speaker 2: help us, and so they assured me that the fighter

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Speaker 2: jets were coming to protect us, and I just kind

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Speaker 2: of checked that box and went on with my business.

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Speaker 2: The lobby of the South Tower, now where I am,

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Speaker 2: is filling up with the people who were badly injured, burned, bloody, broken.

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Speaker 2: Chief Burns ordered me to go find the paramedics and

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Speaker 2: bring them into the lobby of the South Tower to

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Speaker 2: start getting these people out.

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Speaker 1: So you once described that as obvious something you said

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Speaker 1: to me, not to me, something you've said that I've read.

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Speaker 1: It dawned on me how right you were. These are

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Speaker 1: people that went to work that day and they're in

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Speaker 1: suits and flat shoes, they're not in any kind of gear,

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Speaker 1: and they have descended through smoke seventy floors finish it.

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Speaker 2: So the stairwells were narrow. There was only room for

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Speaker 2: single file down in a single file up.

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Speaker 1: Do you think that big building? But yeah, it's small. Yeah, well,

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Speaker 1: thousands of people escape.

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Speaker 2: Stairwells were very small, and it's something that's now corrected

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Speaker 2: in new construction. But so imagine going down the stairs

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Speaker 2: to escape this disaster, and you were single file, so

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Speaker 2: you could only go as fast as the people in

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Speaker 2: front of you. And some of those people might be disabled,

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Speaker 2: some might be injured, some might be elderly. So it

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Speaker 2: is a slow, slow descent, And it was dark and

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Speaker 2: wet from the water, and smoky and sooty, and and

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Speaker 2: those folks who did make it out describe being so

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Speaker 2: encouraged when they saw the fire and the policeman going up.

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Speaker 2: It helped them think that they were going to be okay.

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Speaker 1: But after descending through all that crap and you open

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Speaker 1: a door and you end up in a big lobby

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Speaker 1: where you see light and fresh air and firemen everywhere

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Speaker 1: you collapse. Yeah, and so you saw a lobby of

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Speaker 1: collapse people.

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Speaker 2: That's right, And it was affecting our evacuation of the building.

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Speaker 2: So that's why I left the South Tower. I went

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Speaker 2: out the door onto Liberty Street, which was the south

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Speaker 2: boundary of the World Traits and the complex. And the

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Speaker 2: first thing I saw, I remember it clearly in sear

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Speaker 2: it into my photographic memory, is there was a dead

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Speaker 2: fireman in the middle of the street who had been

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Speaker 2: crushed by a woman who had jumped or fallen and

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Speaker 2: she landed on him and killed him. And it happened

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Speaker 2: right before I went out the door. It happened right before.

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Speaker 2: Can I ask you a question? I hesitate to even

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Speaker 2: ask the question, but I want everybody that hears us

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Speaker 2: to know this, and the depths of them to never forget.

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Speaker 1: So there's imagery. I can't help but get past where

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Speaker 1: there was there a lot of that.

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Speaker 2: Did you so did that sound like what was? I mean?

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Speaker 1: Anybody's paid attention to seeing the images of the people

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Speaker 1: hanging out of the building with smoke rolling behind them,

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Speaker 1: and you think, oh, they can't breathe. I don't think

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Speaker 1: what people get is that smoke is seven hundred degrees.

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Speaker 1: They're literally getting their flesh burned off. And the people

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Speaker 1: who jumped, they died on their terms. But you see

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Speaker 1: a few pictures and a few videos and they're absolutely

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Speaker 1: gunt riching. But what we don't know is what's going

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Speaker 1: on on the ground, you know.

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Speaker 2: So in some of the videos you can hear the

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Speaker 2: bodies crashing. I would call it like a muffled explosion.

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Speaker 2: Each time some of them hit the glass overhangs, so

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Speaker 2: it was like a muffled explosion with glass. This happened

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Speaker 2: over and over and over and over for these poor

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Speaker 2: people who had no choice. I saw this fireman in

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Speaker 2: the middle of Liberty Street, and I saw his buddies.

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Speaker 2: We call it a company. They belonged together, and you know,

249
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Speaker 2: they were pulling at what was just one second ago

250
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Speaker 2: their brother, their brother, and trying to save him. And

251
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Speaker 2: they tried to do CPR and stuff, and he was gone.

252
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Speaker 2: But I had had I was very mission focused. I

253
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Speaker 2: had a job to do and I had to leave

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Speaker 2: them to do that. And I found the paramedics, myself

255
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Speaker 2: in three paramedics went running back with the stretcher and

256
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Speaker 2: all their equipment to go back into the lobby of

257
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Speaker 2: the South Tower. We were running along the south wall

258
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Speaker 2: of three World Trade Center. We were on the sidewalk,

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Speaker 2: and when we got to the adjoining two World Trade Center,

260
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Speaker 2: which was the South Tower, it was set back in

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Speaker 2: the sidewalk a little deeper, so we kind of came

262
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Speaker 2: around the corner. And when we came around the corner,

263
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Speaker 2: the first steel snapped. How far are you from the door?

264
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Speaker 2: Twenty feet from the door of going back in? You're

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Speaker 2: twenty feet that's yeah, I mean it's right there, yeah, yeah,

266
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Speaker 2: the door of the tower. We were we were there,

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Speaker 2: I mean we were going in, and you hear this

268
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Speaker 2: first piece of steel snap all the way up, all

269
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Speaker 2: the way up. But it must have been loud. It

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Speaker 2: was so loud that it echoed through the canyons of

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Speaker 2: Lower Manhattan. It was like a major explosion. And none

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Speaker 2: of us, as I remember it, none of us even

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Speaker 2: looked at each other because we all knew what it was.

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Speaker 1: We all knew it was coming down, at least part

275
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Speaker 1: of it. But you're twenty feet from the door.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, well, al one hundred and fifteen acres of steel.

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Speaker 2: This is time to try to save your life. And

278
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Speaker 2: we know from experience and from our training that you

279
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Speaker 2: can never outrun a building collapse. It will always catch

280
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Speaker 2: you and kill you. It happens too fast. We, unfortunately

281
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Speaker 2: in the New York City Fire Department, as in other

282
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Speaker 2: fire departments, deal with burning building collapse often, so we

283
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Speaker 2: have a lot of experience. So I know that you're

284
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Speaker 2: not going to be able to like run back across

285
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Speaker 2: the street and get away from it. It's going to

286
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Speaker 2: kill you. So you have to try and get something

287
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Speaker 2: over your head to protect you, some kind of structure

288
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Speaker 2: over your head at least to give yourself a chance.

289
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Speaker 2: And I knew that we had just run by the

290
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Speaker 2: door into the adjoining three World Trade Center, which was

291
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Speaker 2: the Marriott Hotel, and that door was particularly the door

292
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Speaker 2: into the restaurant of the lobby of the hotel called

293
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Speaker 2: the Tall Ships Restaurant. I knew we had just run

294
00:17:01,440 --> 00:17:03,400
Speaker 2: by it, so I was like, that's where I'm going,

295
00:17:04,320 --> 00:17:07,879
Speaker 2: and I yelled at the paramedics follow me, and we

296
00:17:08,040 --> 00:17:12,679
Speaker 2: ran and ducked into that door very quickly. And so

297
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Speaker 2: now I'm in the restaurant in the lobby of the

298
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Speaker 2: Marriott Hotel. It's as clear as this room here, and

299
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Speaker 2: snap of the fingers, it's pitch black. The south towers

300
00:17:23,800 --> 00:17:27,199
Speaker 2: collapsing onto the Marriott Hotel. The Marriott Hotel is now

301
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Speaker 2: starting to collapse around us. I hit the floor on

302
00:17:30,800 --> 00:17:34,800
Speaker 2: all fours and I'm crawling. Everything that wasn't nailed down

303
00:17:35,080 --> 00:17:40,679
Speaker 2: was blowing in my face and pummeling me. And you

304
00:17:40,720 --> 00:17:44,240
Speaker 2: couldn't see because the dust got so thick, it got

305
00:17:44,280 --> 00:17:47,760
Speaker 2: pitch black. You couldn't see, You couldn't breathe. It was

306
00:17:47,960 --> 00:17:50,439
Speaker 2: kicking in your mouth and your nose, and your eyes

307
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Speaker 2: and your ears. And I was trying to stick my

308
00:17:52,880 --> 00:17:55,600
Speaker 2: nose in my mouth in my t shirt as I

309
00:17:55,640 --> 00:18:00,879
Speaker 2: was crawling trying to get away from it, turned my

310
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Speaker 2: back so that it was my back getting pummeled, not

311
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Speaker 2: my face. I compare the sound to sitting on the

312
00:18:07,600 --> 00:18:11,560
Speaker 2: tarmac at JFK Airport, surrounded by seven forty sevens that

313
00:18:11,560 --> 00:18:14,760
Speaker 2: are full blasts, and every time you thought it was

314
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Speaker 2: the loudest thing you ever heard in your life, it

315
00:18:16,640 --> 00:18:18,920
Speaker 2: would increase by ten, and then ten and then ten.

316
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Speaker 2: As the collapse was getting closer, I knew I was

317
00:18:22,520 --> 00:18:26,720
Speaker 2: in big, big, big trouble and that this was probably

318
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Speaker 2: the end of it. But I knew that my best chance,

319
00:18:29,760 --> 00:18:33,040
Speaker 2: my only chance, was to find a vertical column. And

320
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Speaker 2: I was crawling as fast as I could, trying to

321
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Speaker 2: get away from it. And I found a very big

322
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Speaker 2: vertical column, which is a vertical column of steel. I

323
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Speaker 2: also know from our experience that that's when we where

324
00:18:45,080 --> 00:18:49,719
Speaker 2: we find people alive in building collapses, because it forms

325
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Speaker 2: a tent and there's there's a space of life, livable

326
00:18:56,480 --> 00:18:59,679
Speaker 2: space in there. It's like a tent. And sometimes it's

327
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Speaker 2: where we search a building collapse first for people because

328
00:19:01,840 --> 00:19:03,760
Speaker 2: we know we can maybe get them alive. And so

329
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Speaker 2: I'm trying to find this. I find a vertical column.

330
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Speaker 2: I wrapped my arms around it, and I'm not just

331
00:19:09,440 --> 00:19:11,720
Speaker 2: holding onto it. I'm trying to become a part of it.

332
00:19:12,080 --> 00:19:14,600
Speaker 2: I'm squeezing so hard I'm trying to get into the steel.

333
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Speaker 2: I'm trying to live. The helmet blows off my head.

334
00:19:19,160 --> 00:19:24,119
Speaker 2: The wind was so strong. My pager breaks off my belt.

335
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Speaker 2: And now all I need is a little brick to

336
00:19:27,359 --> 00:19:29,119
Speaker 2: hit me in the head because I have no helmet.

337
00:19:29,119 --> 00:19:32,239
Speaker 2: I have no stupid green helmet to protect me. I

338
00:19:32,240 --> 00:19:36,440
Speaker 2: guess it got mad at me. But and the wind

339
00:19:36,560 --> 00:19:41,520
Speaker 2: was so powerful as the building collapsed, it was pushing

340
00:19:41,600 --> 00:19:45,080
Speaker 2: all that air out, and I was in the pathway

341
00:19:45,080 --> 00:19:47,600
Speaker 2: of where all that air was going. So the wind

342
00:19:47,640 --> 00:19:50,320
Speaker 2: actually lifted me up off the ground like a flag.

343
00:19:51,440 --> 00:19:53,680
Speaker 2: And so now I'm horizontal and I'm trying to hold

344
00:19:53,680 --> 00:20:01,080
Speaker 2: onto this column. That was my moment. That was my

345
00:20:01,119 --> 00:20:08,240
Speaker 2: moment when I thought it was over. And so I prayed,

346
00:20:10,119 --> 00:20:14,520
Speaker 2: and I said, God, I'm not afraid to come to you.

347
00:20:15,680 --> 00:20:18,080
Speaker 2: In fact, I look forward to it one day. I

348
00:20:18,080 --> 00:20:20,959
Speaker 2: look forward to sitting at your side one day. But

349
00:20:21,040 --> 00:20:24,560
Speaker 2: please not now, because I want to hold my family

350
00:20:24,600 --> 00:20:27,000
Speaker 2: one more time and tell them I love them. And

351
00:20:27,040 --> 00:20:30,240
Speaker 2: then I will come to you and I will sit

352
00:20:30,280 --> 00:20:36,880
Speaker 2: by your side. And that's okay. And within fifteen seconds,

353
00:20:36,960 --> 00:20:45,600
Speaker 2: the collapse subsided, the wind stopped. Couldn't see, couldn't breathe,

354
00:20:45,720 --> 00:20:46,520
Speaker 2: but I was alive.

355
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Speaker 1: And before we go to what happens next where you

356
00:20:50,080 --> 00:20:54,040
Speaker 1: save many lives off a ledge which I still can't

357
00:20:54,040 --> 00:21:01,800
Speaker 1: even picture to give everybody conception of the wind. Afterwards,

358
00:21:02,560 --> 00:21:05,240
Speaker 1: when they inspected this area, there were shards of glass

359
00:21:05,280 --> 00:21:10,280
Speaker 1: embedded in the steel, and scientists looked at it, and

360
00:21:10,359 --> 00:21:13,679
Speaker 1: it proved that the wind at the collapse of the

361
00:21:13,760 --> 00:21:16,320
Speaker 1: towers was equal to that of a hurricane. It was

362
00:21:16,359 --> 00:21:22,399
Speaker 1: one hundred and eighty five mile an hour winds, a fire, debris, glass, steel,

363
00:21:22,480 --> 00:21:23,360
Speaker 1: and bodyboards.

364
00:21:24,520 --> 00:21:27,200
Speaker 2: That's the collapset. The only way I was able to

365
00:21:27,240 --> 00:21:30,920
Speaker 2: hold onto that column was with God's strength, because there's

366
00:21:31,000 --> 00:21:33,960
Speaker 2: no human strength that can hold on to something like

367
00:21:34,000 --> 00:21:40,640
Speaker 2: that in that kind of wind. And so he decided

368
00:21:40,680 --> 00:21:44,159
Speaker 2: to leave me here on the earth. I think to

369
00:21:44,240 --> 00:21:49,240
Speaker 2: do this, I think, to tell the stories. We'll be

370
00:21:49,359 --> 00:22:02,399
Speaker 2: right back some sods. It's still dark. You're on your

371
00:22:02,400 --> 00:22:06,320
Speaker 2: hands and knees. I'm bouncing around in there. I desperately

372
00:22:06,400 --> 00:22:09,359
Speaker 2: want to want to live. They could call it, what

373
00:22:09,400 --> 00:22:12,280
Speaker 2: do they call it? A fight flight mode? And that's

374
00:22:12,320 --> 00:22:15,000
Speaker 2: where I was, and I wanted to get out of there,

375
00:22:15,040 --> 00:22:18,160
Speaker 2: and I wanted to live desperately. I wanted to get

376
00:22:18,160 --> 00:22:21,720
Speaker 2: back to my brother and tell him that I was alive,

377
00:22:21,800 --> 00:22:25,920
Speaker 2: because I knew he would think I was gone. And

378
00:22:26,040 --> 00:22:28,080
Speaker 2: I wanted my mom and dad to know that I

379
00:22:28,160 --> 00:22:30,880
Speaker 2: was alive. And and so I was a little bit

380
00:22:31,920 --> 00:22:34,639
Speaker 2: desperate in that moment to get out of there and

381
00:22:34,680 --> 00:22:39,680
Speaker 2: I bounced around in that restaurant because it was all

382
00:22:39,760 --> 00:22:43,439
Speaker 2: changed now it was all collapsed, and I wound up

383
00:22:43,480 --> 00:22:46,880
Speaker 2: at a metal roll down gate. Later on I find

384
00:22:46,880 --> 00:22:50,879
Speaker 2: out that it separated the lobby of the hotel from

385
00:22:51,280 --> 00:22:53,920
Speaker 2: the restaurant of the hotel, and at night they would

386
00:22:53,920 --> 00:22:58,560
Speaker 2: put it down. In the collapse, the roll down gate

387
00:22:58,600 --> 00:23:01,439
Speaker 2: came down and I got to this gate and I

388
00:23:01,480 --> 00:23:03,800
Speaker 2: put my fingers under it and to lift it up.

389
00:23:04,640 --> 00:23:06,440
Speaker 2: And when I lifted it up an inch or two,

390
00:23:07,080 --> 00:23:09,960
Speaker 2: all these fingers came from the other side of people

391
00:23:10,000 --> 00:23:11,600
Speaker 2: who were trapped on the other side of it, which

392
00:23:11,600 --> 00:23:15,160
Speaker 2: I didn't know. And together we lifted up this gate

393
00:23:15,840 --> 00:23:18,200
Speaker 2: and I said to them, there's a I thought there

394
00:23:18,240 --> 00:23:19,840
Speaker 2: was a truck bomb. I was like, there's a there's

395
00:23:19,840 --> 00:23:21,560
Speaker 2: a bomb back there, and we have to keep going

396
00:23:21,600 --> 00:23:25,200
Speaker 2: that way, and they said, no, there is no that way.

397
00:23:26,200 --> 00:23:28,480
Speaker 2: So what it was is a group of firefighters and

398
00:23:28,520 --> 00:23:32,639
Speaker 2: civilians who they were saving in the lobby of the

399
00:23:32,680 --> 00:23:36,040
Speaker 2: Marriott Hotel and the collapse came through right where they

400
00:23:36,080 --> 00:23:39,520
Speaker 2: were and killed half the firemen and civilians they were rescuing.

401
00:23:40,119 --> 00:23:44,840
Speaker 2: But this group, the collapse missed them by inches. All

402
00:23:44,880 --> 00:23:48,440
Speaker 2: the others were killed and behind them was they were

403
00:23:48,440 --> 00:23:52,160
Speaker 2: on a ledge that was seven stories down on that side.

404
00:23:52,280 --> 00:23:55,200
Speaker 2: It went down into the structure, into the sub sub

405
00:23:55,240 --> 00:23:58,359
Speaker 2: sub sub sub basements. It was literally there two foot

406
00:23:58,440 --> 00:24:02,400
Speaker 2: ledge yeah what used to be the ground yeah, which

407
00:24:02,520 --> 00:24:04,920
Speaker 2: was the floor of the lobby of the hotel. And

408
00:24:05,880 --> 00:24:09,359
Speaker 2: so we couldn't go that way. They were stuck. So

409
00:24:09,800 --> 00:24:11,640
Speaker 2: we turned around, we went back the way I had

410
00:24:11,680 --> 00:24:15,600
Speaker 2: just come from, and one of the ladies in the

411
00:24:15,640 --> 00:24:20,119
Speaker 2: group saw a fireman waving a very bright flashlight. He

412
00:24:20,200 --> 00:24:22,320
Speaker 2: must have seen us in the rubble, and he was

413
00:24:22,560 --> 00:24:27,000
Speaker 2: waving his flashlight light at us and screaming, come this way,

414
00:24:27,040 --> 00:24:29,800
Speaker 2: Come this way. So we went up and down over

415
00:24:29,880 --> 00:24:34,639
Speaker 2: the piles of steel and stuff toward him because we

416
00:24:34,720 --> 00:24:38,480
Speaker 2: knew that was safety. And as far as I know,

417
00:24:38,560 --> 00:24:41,239
Speaker 2: that group of people I was with all lived and

418
00:24:41,680 --> 00:24:43,679
Speaker 2: to this day, I believe that's the largest group of

419
00:24:43,680 --> 00:24:47,159
Speaker 2: survivors in the sixteen and a half acres was the

420
00:24:47,160 --> 00:24:52,960
Speaker 2: group I was with there. So Patty, Patty Brown legend

421
00:24:54,920 --> 00:25:00,960
Speaker 2: maybe the most well known firefighter in New York. I

422
00:25:01,760 --> 00:25:06,360
Speaker 2: think that's a very accurate statement. He was a hero

423
00:25:06,440 --> 00:25:08,280
Speaker 2: of the New York City Fire Department. He was a

424
00:25:08,359 --> 00:25:11,679
Speaker 2: captain He was the highest decorated New York City fireman.

425
00:25:12,000 --> 00:25:15,959
Speaker 2: Murdered on Sptember eleventh. Patty had a legendary life. He

426
00:25:16,000 --> 00:25:20,359
Speaker 2: was single, He lived in Manhattan. He was United States

427
00:25:20,400 --> 00:25:24,679
Speaker 2: Marine Corps sergeant in Vietnam. When he came back, he

428
00:25:24,720 --> 00:25:26,800
Speaker 2: got treated like crap, like the rest of them did.

429
00:25:26,880 --> 00:25:30,399
Speaker 2: He had a hard time with that. He realized that

430
00:25:30,480 --> 00:25:33,480
Speaker 2: he was an alcoholic, and he got on top of

431
00:25:33,520 --> 00:25:35,720
Speaker 2: it and he went to AA. He was a Golden

432
00:25:35,760 --> 00:25:39,720
Speaker 2: Gloves boxer. He was a second or third degree black

433
00:25:39,720 --> 00:25:42,639
Speaker 2: belt in karate. He was a marathon er, he was

434
00:25:42,680 --> 00:25:47,600
Speaker 2: a triathlete. He was a yogi. Yeah, I mean, come on.

435
00:25:47,280 --> 00:25:50,119
Speaker 2: He was on the cover of Men's Health magazine. He

436
00:25:50,160 --> 00:25:52,760
Speaker 2: was also for the Ladies here. He was very good looking,

437
00:25:54,720 --> 00:25:57,640
Speaker 2: and he was a very successful bachelor in New York.

438
00:25:59,840 --> 00:26:04,760
Speaker 2: I witnessed some of it. Patty was the guy you

439
00:26:04,880 --> 00:26:09,680
Speaker 2: always wanted around and he was he was Captain America.

440
00:26:09,800 --> 00:26:12,959
Speaker 2: Like he didn't say it, he just was. And if

441
00:26:13,880 --> 00:26:16,760
Speaker 2: somebody was doing something wrong, if he saw somebody getting

442
00:26:16,840 --> 00:26:21,800
Speaker 2: robbed or someone beating up a girl or something, God

443
00:26:21,880 --> 00:26:24,760
Speaker 2: help that person. Because Patty was all about doing the

444
00:26:24,840 --> 00:26:28,520
Speaker 2: right thing always, And what do you do on eleven.

445
00:26:28,640 --> 00:26:31,560
Speaker 2: So he went up in the North Tower with his firefighters,

446
00:26:31,600 --> 00:26:34,800
Speaker 2: one of which Jerry Dewan, was a good friend of mine.

447
00:26:34,960 --> 00:26:37,920
Speaker 2: And Jerry was from He was a Boston Irish guy,

448
00:26:38,760 --> 00:26:41,320
Speaker 2: and so he had a little he had a little problem,

449
00:26:43,280 --> 00:26:45,119
Speaker 2: and he got and he got jammed up a little

450
00:26:45,119 --> 00:26:49,680
Speaker 2: bit in his previous firehouse. So I purposely got him

451
00:26:49,680 --> 00:26:54,320
Speaker 2: detailed into Patty's command because I knew Patty would help

452
00:26:54,359 --> 00:26:57,119
Speaker 2: straighten him out and talk sense to him right. And

453
00:26:57,480 --> 00:27:00,000
Speaker 2: it was one of Jerry's first tours with Patty Brown

454
00:27:00,640 --> 00:27:03,040
Speaker 2: as his boss, and they went up together, and they

455
00:27:03,080 --> 00:27:07,000
Speaker 2: died together on September eleventh. I believe, I can't prove it,

456
00:27:07,040 --> 00:27:09,840
Speaker 2: but Captain Terry Hatt and Captain Patty Brown and myself

457
00:27:09,840 --> 00:27:13,200
Speaker 2: were three musketeers. We were best friends. We spent all

458
00:27:13,280 --> 00:27:16,440
Speaker 2: kinds of time together on and off duty, and they

459
00:27:16,480 --> 00:27:20,199
Speaker 2: would compete over who had the more beautiful girlfriend and stuff.

460
00:27:20,240 --> 00:27:24,840
Speaker 2: And I believe Terry and his men got trapped up

461
00:27:24,840 --> 00:27:27,840
Speaker 2: on the eighty third floor of the North Tower early

462
00:27:27,880 --> 00:27:32,480
Speaker 2: on in a localized collapse, and Terry was screaming for help.

463
00:27:32,560 --> 00:27:34,160
Speaker 2: May we call it may day, may day, may day,

464
00:27:34,160 --> 00:27:36,640
Speaker 2: mayde And it's the worst thing a fireman could say,

465
00:27:36,680 --> 00:27:39,880
Speaker 2: or here, it means you're either trapped or your friend

466
00:27:39,960 --> 00:27:42,679
Speaker 2: is trapped. And so I believe that Patty heard that

467
00:27:43,040 --> 00:27:45,119
Speaker 2: and was running up the stairs in the North Tower

468
00:27:45,520 --> 00:27:48,639
Speaker 2: because Terry was one of his best friends, and it

469
00:27:48,720 --> 00:27:50,800
Speaker 2: didn't have to be his best friend. Patty would have

470
00:27:50,840 --> 00:27:53,879
Speaker 2: done that for anyone, but it was especially important to

471
00:27:53,960 --> 00:27:57,280
Speaker 2: him because it was one of his best friends. And yeah,

472
00:27:57,840 --> 00:28:02,480
Speaker 2: all those guys died in the North Tower. Just so

473
00:28:02,600 --> 00:28:05,240
Speaker 2: out of the three hundred and forty three New York

474
00:28:05,240 --> 00:28:10,119
Speaker 2: City heroes New York City Fire Department heroes, one hundred

475
00:28:10,200 --> 00:28:12,720
Speaker 2: of them were from our Special Operations Command, which is

476
00:28:12,760 --> 00:28:17,359
Speaker 2: where I worked. So our most experienced, well trained firefighters

477
00:28:17,400 --> 00:28:20,440
Speaker 2: in the world, probably from Chief Downey who was our

478
00:28:20,560 --> 00:28:23,840
Speaker 2: Special Operations chief, all the way down to our youngest guy,

479
00:28:24,560 --> 00:28:27,760
Speaker 2: were murdered on September eleventh. It took out one third

480
00:28:27,760 --> 00:28:32,600
Speaker 2: of our command, and so we lost a lot. It

481
00:28:32,680 --> 00:28:37,480
Speaker 2: wasn't just just three hundred and forty three firefighters. It

482
00:28:37,560 --> 00:28:42,640
Speaker 2: was all that experience that we lost, and all that

483
00:28:42,680 --> 00:28:46,080
Speaker 2: experience they would have passed on to the younger firefighters

484
00:28:46,320 --> 00:28:51,160
Speaker 2: had they lived. Right, So you get out, there's still

485
00:28:51,240 --> 00:28:57,720
Speaker 2: one tower standard. Yeah, I actually had the misjudgment. In

486
00:28:57,760 --> 00:29:00,960
Speaker 2: my state of fight or flight, I thought it would

487
00:29:01,000 --> 00:29:03,040
Speaker 2: be a good idea to swim across the Hudson River

488
00:29:03,080 --> 00:29:06,320
Speaker 2: to New Jersey. That's never a good idea, never a

489
00:29:06,360 --> 00:29:09,240
Speaker 2: good idea, But in that state of mind, I thought

490
00:29:09,240 --> 00:29:11,840
Speaker 2: that was a better option than staying in Lower Manhattan.

491
00:29:12,800 --> 00:29:15,840
Speaker 2: And I tried to break through one of the office

492
00:29:15,840 --> 00:29:20,880
Speaker 2: buildings to go toward the Hudson River. Luckily the glass

493
00:29:20,920 --> 00:29:24,760
Speaker 2: I couldn't break the glass. And as I was doing that,

494
00:29:25,560 --> 00:29:28,160
Speaker 2: I heard over. I heard my boss, Calvin over the radio,

495
00:29:28,400 --> 00:29:31,200
Speaker 2: my OEM boss over the radio, and he was screaming

496
00:29:31,240 --> 00:29:33,520
Speaker 2: for help. He was trapped in the rubble. And that

497
00:29:33,600 --> 00:29:35,400
Speaker 2: brought me back to reality. So I ran up the

498
00:29:35,400 --> 00:29:38,760
Speaker 2: West Side Highway. He was able to articulate where he was,

499
00:29:39,480 --> 00:29:41,400
Speaker 2: and so I was running up the West Side Highway

500
00:29:41,600 --> 00:29:42,200
Speaker 2: toward him.

501
00:29:42,400 --> 00:29:47,720
Speaker 1: I got you hear in fear and pain on the radio. Oh, terror, terror,

502
00:29:47,800 --> 00:29:51,280
Speaker 1: And you know the voices. Yeah, they're my friends. They're screaming,

503
00:29:51,280 --> 00:29:55,600
Speaker 1: they're dying, they're screaming for help. They're my friends. All

504
00:29:55,680 --> 00:29:56,800
Speaker 1: that's like a lot.

505
00:29:58,040 --> 00:30:06,080
Speaker 2: And and Calvin was my friend, and he's a black guy, dark, dark,

506
00:30:06,120 --> 00:30:11,760
Speaker 2: skinned black guy, and I got to him, and another thing,

507
00:30:11,800 --> 00:30:13,800
Speaker 2: I realized that in that moment, we were all the

508
00:30:13,840 --> 00:30:17,640
Speaker 2: same color, because we were all gray from the dust.

509
00:30:17,960 --> 00:30:20,280
Speaker 2: All the white boys were gray, all the black boys

510
00:30:20,320 --> 00:30:23,880
Speaker 2: were gray. Everybody was gray, and we were all the same.

511
00:30:25,120 --> 00:30:28,680
Speaker 2: And when I got to him, the par of the

512
00:30:28,720 --> 00:30:32,560
Speaker 2: fireman had gotten him out of rubble already and the

513
00:30:32,600 --> 00:30:37,240
Speaker 2: paramedics had him, and our bigger boss, Chief John Odermatt

514
00:30:37,240 --> 00:30:40,160
Speaker 2: from NYPD, grabbed me and said, Timmy, he's okay, he's

515
00:30:40,200 --> 00:30:42,360
Speaker 2: going to go to the hospital. He's in good hands.

516
00:30:42,840 --> 00:30:44,760
Speaker 2: We have to go find the mayor. Mayor wants us

517
00:30:44,760 --> 00:30:48,280
Speaker 2: with him, and so Chief Voto, Matt and I started

518
00:30:48,360 --> 00:30:53,400
Speaker 2: running north up West Broadway behind seven World Trade Center,

519
00:30:54,000 --> 00:30:59,000
Speaker 2: and the people behind me started screaming and I turned around.

520
00:30:59,400 --> 00:31:03,320
Speaker 2: Everybody was running away. We were chasing the mayor, and

521
00:31:03,520 --> 00:31:06,280
Speaker 2: when they started screaming, I turned around and I remember

522
00:31:06,320 --> 00:31:08,560
Speaker 2: seeing the antenna on the top of the North Tower

523
00:31:09,600 --> 00:31:12,040
Speaker 2: where I knew all my friends were. I remember seeing

524
00:31:12,040 --> 00:31:14,080
Speaker 2: it kick over just a little bit and then go

525
00:31:14,160 --> 00:31:17,560
Speaker 2: straight down and disappear, and I knew, I knew that

526
00:31:17,640 --> 00:31:21,680
Speaker 2: was my friends in there. We got overrun by the

527
00:31:21,800 --> 00:31:24,680
Speaker 2: dust and debris, and we got pummeled again and all

528
00:31:24,720 --> 00:31:28,160
Speaker 2: of that stuff, and I kept running north until I

529
00:31:28,200 --> 00:31:34,080
Speaker 2: found the mayor, and then we had to reorganize because

530
00:31:34,200 --> 00:31:37,240
Speaker 2: we had lost a lot a lot of civilians, a

531
00:31:37,280 --> 00:31:39,280
Speaker 2: lot of police officers, a lot of firefighters, and a

532
00:31:39,320 --> 00:31:42,320
Speaker 2: lot of our command staff was wiped out.

533
00:31:42,600 --> 00:31:46,000
Speaker 1: Two thousand, nine hundred and seventy seven lives were murdered

534
00:31:46,000 --> 00:31:48,400
Speaker 1: on nine to eleven, three hundred and forty three members

535
00:31:48,440 --> 00:31:52,840
Speaker 1: of the fire department, seventy two law enforcement officers. You

536
00:31:52,920 --> 00:31:56,440
Speaker 1: personally lost one hundred friends that day, probably a little more,

537
00:31:56,480 --> 00:32:00,920
Speaker 1: but yeah, maybe something people need to understand. And it's

538
00:32:01,000 --> 00:32:04,920
Speaker 1: four hundred thousand people were exposed to Ground zero's toxic environment.

539
00:32:05,640 --> 00:32:11,160
Speaker 1: Five thousand I've died from illnesses because of it, including

540
00:32:11,200 --> 00:32:15,200
Speaker 1: three hundred and sixty more. New York City Fire Department

541
00:32:16,080 --> 00:32:19,240
Speaker 1: nine to eleven hadn't stopped killing. There are firemen and

542
00:32:19,320 --> 00:32:23,480
Speaker 1: policemen that I have interviewed in New York who have

543
00:32:23,680 --> 00:32:26,560
Speaker 1: forms of cancer that doesn't even have names.

544
00:32:27,000 --> 00:32:28,560
Speaker 2: You're talking to one right now. I don't know if

545
00:32:28,600 --> 00:32:31,560
Speaker 2: you know that I did not. Yeah, well do you

546
00:32:31,600 --> 00:32:33,000
Speaker 2: have found out About a year and a half ago,

547
00:32:33,080 --> 00:32:35,960
Speaker 2: I have a prostate cancer from nine to eleven, normal

548
00:32:36,000 --> 00:32:39,040
Speaker 2: man cancer, whatever, but it's nine to eleven related and

549
00:32:40,320 --> 00:32:43,480
Speaker 2: we found it, thank god, we found it early through

550
00:32:43,560 --> 00:32:48,480
Speaker 2: our very good health program. And it's something I will

551
00:32:49,320 --> 00:32:51,920
Speaker 2: I will not die from. It's a slow spreading cancer.

552
00:32:52,080 --> 00:32:56,000
Speaker 2: In my case. Do you have friends that have died from? None? One? One? Only?

553
00:32:56,160 --> 00:33:00,000
Speaker 2: Oh many many friends. I visited last week, my friend

554
00:33:00,080 --> 00:33:04,360
Speaker 2: and Aaron from Rescue one. He is fifty years old

555
00:33:04,360 --> 00:33:08,040
Speaker 2: and he has pancreatic cancer from nine to eleven fifty.

556
00:33:08,840 --> 00:33:12,920
Speaker 1: I interviewed someone whose husband has a cancer. They don't

557
00:33:12,920 --> 00:33:16,880
Speaker 1: even have a name for, yeah, because it's just cancer.

558
00:33:17,120 --> 00:33:21,440
Speaker 1: But it's not even a named cancer because of so

559
00:33:21,640 --> 00:33:26,480
Speaker 1: much crap that they inhaled, not only that day, but

560
00:33:26,600 --> 00:33:29,440
Speaker 1: staying on site for two and three days later trying

561
00:33:29,480 --> 00:33:30,200
Speaker 1: to find life.

562
00:33:30,280 --> 00:33:34,320
Speaker 2: Yeah, weeks and months later, that dust kept kicking up

563
00:33:34,560 --> 00:33:37,200
Speaker 2: and we kept trying to use water to knock the

564
00:33:37,280 --> 00:33:39,000
Speaker 2: dust down because we were trying not to breathe it.

565
00:33:40,280 --> 00:33:44,440
Speaker 2: But you couldn't help it. And you know, one of

566
00:33:44,480 --> 00:33:49,040
Speaker 2: the most unusual cancers is male breast cancer, which we have.

567
00:33:49,200 --> 00:33:52,400
Speaker 2: It's like two or three or four times the average

568
00:33:52,840 --> 00:33:57,560
Speaker 2: that our guys are suffering from breast cancer and testical

569
00:33:57,640 --> 00:34:01,600
Speaker 2: and then, like you said, all the other crazy things

570
00:34:02,120 --> 00:34:05,880
Speaker 2: autoimmune diseases. My friend Mike Morrissey, I was with him

571
00:34:06,000 --> 00:34:09,279
Speaker 2: last week. He has Parkinson's from it. So it's just

572
00:34:09,440 --> 00:34:12,200
Speaker 2: it's the point is the attack has not ended. That's right,

573
00:34:12,440 --> 00:34:29,120
Speaker 2: that's right. We'll be right back. This one chokes me up.

574
00:34:30,280 --> 00:34:36,000
Speaker 1: There are sixty nine children a former fire department people who.

575
00:34:36,120 --> 00:34:41,120
Speaker 2: Died that are now New York City Fire Department. Yeah, yeah,

576
00:34:42,400 --> 00:34:47,440
Speaker 2: I was with. We have a proud tradition with the

577
00:34:47,480 --> 00:34:50,320
Speaker 2: bumper stickers on some of the cars said on Heaven

578
00:34:50,400 --> 00:34:54,200
Speaker 2: and Earth, still the greatest job in the world. And

579
00:34:54,360 --> 00:34:58,239
Speaker 2: we believe that. I was with the four two of

580
00:34:58,280 --> 00:35:01,520
Speaker 2: the four a Sorrow children the other day at the

581
00:35:01,600 --> 00:35:06,000
Speaker 2: nine eleven Museum. The four children, three male and one female,

582
00:35:06,080 --> 00:35:10,719
Speaker 2: are all New York City firefighters, following in their heroic

583
00:35:11,040 --> 00:35:15,120
Speaker 2: dad's footsteps. Carlo Saro, who I think, as far as

584
00:35:15,120 --> 00:35:16,760
Speaker 2: I know, I was the last one to see him alive,

585
00:35:17,360 --> 00:35:20,560
Speaker 2: and all four of his children became New York City firefighters.

586
00:35:20,840 --> 00:35:26,480
Speaker 2: Tell us about is it Chris Chris Blackwell Junior? No,

587
00:35:26,600 --> 00:35:31,240
Speaker 2: Michael Lynch, Michael Lynch or right? So what an amazing story.

588
00:35:31,320 --> 00:35:36,080
Speaker 2: So Michael Lynch sor was the angel at the elevator scene, right,

589
00:35:36,680 --> 00:35:40,319
Speaker 2: he saved we say at least the three ladies. He

590
00:35:40,480 --> 00:35:42,880
Speaker 2: was six four or sixty five. He was very handsome,

591
00:35:43,560 --> 00:35:46,560
Speaker 2: He was a professional. They were trying to bring him

592
00:35:46,560 --> 00:35:49,839
Speaker 2: into Special Operations Command when he was killed, because they

593
00:35:49,840 --> 00:35:52,560
Speaker 2: had that much respect for him. When I went out

594
00:35:52,600 --> 00:35:55,760
Speaker 2: to his home in Long Island to tell his wife

595
00:35:55,840 --> 00:35:58,759
Speaker 2: that her husband was a hero and an angel in

596
00:35:58,800 --> 00:36:02,120
Speaker 2: his last moments, remember she had the little baby in

597
00:36:02,120 --> 00:36:04,960
Speaker 2: her lap, and she had the two year old boy

598
00:36:05,600 --> 00:36:11,000
Speaker 2: crawling on the carpet. So I told Denise the story,

599
00:36:11,040 --> 00:36:12,879
Speaker 2: and then I said I gave her my card because

600
00:36:12,880 --> 00:36:15,480
Speaker 2: I didn't know her personally before, and I gave her

601
00:36:15,520 --> 00:36:17,520
Speaker 2: my card, and I said, one day, when those boys

602
00:36:17,520 --> 00:36:19,800
Speaker 2: are older and they want to know about their dad,

603
00:36:20,520 --> 00:36:22,040
Speaker 2: tell them to reach out to me and I'll tell

604
00:36:22,080 --> 00:36:25,080
Speaker 2: them about their what a hero of their dad is. Was.

605
00:36:26,200 --> 00:36:29,320
Speaker 2: About twenty years later, I got an email from Michael

606
00:36:29,360 --> 00:36:33,600
Speaker 2: Francis Lynch Junior, and he said, my mom told me

607
00:36:35,320 --> 00:36:37,720
Speaker 2: that if I wanted to know about my dad's last moments,

608
00:36:37,719 --> 00:36:42,560
Speaker 2: that I should talk with you. And I said, that's correct.

609
00:36:43,320 --> 00:36:47,720
Speaker 2: He told me I've done everything that I was supposed

610
00:36:47,719 --> 00:36:49,279
Speaker 2: to do as the man of the house since he

611
00:36:49,360 --> 00:36:54,560
Speaker 2: was two years old. He went to college, he graduated,

612
00:36:54,560 --> 00:36:57,279
Speaker 2: he got his bachelor's degree, did everything right. He took

613
00:36:57,280 --> 00:36:59,600
Speaker 2: care of his little brother, He took care of his mom.

614
00:36:59,680 --> 00:37:02,920
Speaker 2: His mom had a girl later on, and so he

615
00:37:02,920 --> 00:37:05,960
Speaker 2: took care of his little sister, Elizabeth. He said, my

616
00:37:06,080 --> 00:37:08,200
Speaker 2: mom now told me that I have to go live

617
00:37:08,280 --> 00:37:12,799
Speaker 2: my life for me, and she said you're You're the

618
00:37:12,800 --> 00:37:17,920
Speaker 2: first step. So I met Mike my favorite watering hole, o'haris,

619
00:37:19,719 --> 00:37:24,480
Speaker 2: in my regular seat, just saying and Mike and I

620
00:37:24,560 --> 00:37:29,960
Speaker 2: drank all the beer in O'Hara's together, every drop, every drop,

621
00:37:30,400 --> 00:37:33,600
Speaker 2: and we we did, and we laughed, and we cried

622
00:37:33,640 --> 00:37:37,440
Speaker 2: and we hugged. And one of the most important things

623
00:37:37,480 --> 00:37:42,040
Speaker 2: he said to me was please never leave me, because

624
00:37:42,120 --> 00:37:46,920
Speaker 2: every one of those kids has abandonment problems, and many

625
00:37:46,960 --> 00:37:49,080
Speaker 2: of them have said that exact same thing to me,

626
00:37:49,520 --> 00:37:51,919
Speaker 2: many of them who I meant her. And I said,

627
00:37:51,960 --> 00:37:54,000
Speaker 2: I promise, Mike, I will never leave you. I will

628
00:37:54,000 --> 00:37:56,560
Speaker 2: always be here for you. I'm not your dad, I'll

629
00:37:56,600 --> 00:37:59,360
Speaker 2: never prove I'll never pretend to be your dad, but

630
00:37:59,560 --> 00:38:01,800
Speaker 2: I'll be your uncle or I'll be your friend whatever

631
00:38:01,800 --> 00:38:04,960
Speaker 2: you want. And so I said to him, you know,

632
00:38:05,040 --> 00:38:06,520
Speaker 2: what do you want to do. He's like, I want

633
00:38:06,520 --> 00:38:09,920
Speaker 2: to be a Green Beret. I was like, don't sign anything,

634
00:38:11,239 --> 00:38:16,239
Speaker 2: because they lie, and I said, come with me, and

635
00:38:16,280 --> 00:38:18,040
Speaker 2: I brought him up and down the East coast to

636
00:38:18,080 --> 00:38:26,720
Speaker 2: meet my army, Navy friends, seals, Delta guys, intelligence community folks,

637
00:38:26,760 --> 00:38:29,560
Speaker 2: all of them, and of course every one of them

638
00:38:30,040 --> 00:38:32,919
Speaker 2: embraced him and took them under their wings. So now

639
00:38:32,920 --> 00:38:36,520
Speaker 2: he had all these uncles and aunts in some pretty

640
00:38:36,560 --> 00:38:41,440
Speaker 2: amazing positions who wanted to help him. And he came

641
00:38:41,480 --> 00:38:43,760
Speaker 2: back later on he met my one of my best friends,

642
00:38:43,840 --> 00:38:47,600
Speaker 2: Navy seal Jason Redman, and so a couple months later,

643
00:38:47,680 --> 00:38:48,960
Speaker 2: I said, it's Mike, what do you want to do?

644
00:38:49,000 --> 00:38:50,319
Speaker 2: He said, I want to be a Navy seal. I

645
00:38:50,360 --> 00:38:51,960
Speaker 2: was like, I kind of figured that it would come

646
00:38:52,000 --> 00:38:55,279
Speaker 2: to that, and so we started getting in with the

647
00:38:55,320 --> 00:39:00,719
Speaker 2: right people who intentionally drowned him five times and you know,

648
00:39:00,840 --> 00:39:04,560
Speaker 2: dropped him in the woods in some god forsaken place

649
00:39:04,640 --> 00:39:08,359
Speaker 2: and said good luck. And you know, they they gave

650
00:39:08,440 --> 00:39:12,920
Speaker 2: him a real rough time, as they should. And he

651
00:39:12,960 --> 00:39:15,759
Speaker 2: came back to me after that and kind of sheepish,

652
00:39:15,840 --> 00:39:17,359
Speaker 2: and he was he's the same as his dad. He's

653
00:39:17,360 --> 00:39:21,000
Speaker 2: six fourths, very handsome. He came back to me. He

654
00:39:21,120 --> 00:39:23,319
Speaker 2: was a little afraid to tell me. I was like, Mike,

655
00:39:23,400 --> 00:39:25,319
Speaker 2: just tell me what's going on. He said, well, I

656
00:39:25,400 --> 00:39:27,399
Speaker 2: decided to go back and be a Green Beret again.

657
00:39:27,480 --> 00:39:30,120
Speaker 2: I said, that's okay, Mike, that's that's a very noble

658
00:39:30,160 --> 00:39:34,960
Speaker 2: thing to do. And I get it. And so by

659
00:39:35,040 --> 00:39:38,240
Speaker 2: December of this year he should get his Green Beret.

660
00:39:38,360 --> 00:39:41,640
Speaker 2: He's passed on through everything, He's done very well. He

661
00:39:41,760 --> 00:39:45,239
Speaker 2: excels at this stuff, and and by the end of

662
00:39:45,280 --> 00:39:47,560
Speaker 2: this year he will be I believe, will be a

663
00:39:47,560 --> 00:39:52,080
Speaker 2: Green Beret. This is why to be able to tell

664
00:39:52,080 --> 00:39:55,440
Speaker 2: a beautiful story like this. If I had committed suicide

665
00:39:55,480 --> 00:39:59,319
Speaker 2: back then, which we had a lot of and my

666
00:39:59,400 --> 00:40:02,279
Speaker 2: family was a I would do that. If I had

667
00:40:02,320 --> 00:40:05,480
Speaker 2: done this, I wouldn't be able to witness this thing.

668
00:40:05,880 --> 00:40:09,319
Speaker 2: This Michael. I'm so I love this man, and I'm

669
00:40:09,320 --> 00:40:12,280
Speaker 2: so proud of him, of what he's done with his life.

670
00:40:12,760 --> 00:40:14,719
Speaker 2: I never would have been able to enjoy this with

671
00:40:14,840 --> 00:40:18,960
Speaker 2: him if I had taken my own life. Now, the

672
00:40:19,040 --> 00:40:23,279
Speaker 2: story I mentor a lot of these young people I

673
00:40:23,400 --> 00:40:26,640
Speaker 2: work a lot with the Tunnel to Towers Foundation, the

674
00:40:26,640 --> 00:40:29,520
Speaker 2: greatest charity in the history of America in my opinion,

675
00:40:30,440 --> 00:40:33,120
Speaker 2: And so I know the Siller family. The Siller family

676
00:40:33,200 --> 00:40:36,759
Speaker 2: runs that Stephen Siller had the five children. I don't

677
00:40:36,760 --> 00:40:39,200
Speaker 2: know if I talked about that earlier. One of the

678
00:40:39,239 --> 00:40:43,600
Speaker 2: young girls is now all grown up. I didn't know

679
00:40:43,640 --> 00:40:45,960
Speaker 2: her before, but someone told me she wanted to go

680
00:40:46,000 --> 00:40:47,880
Speaker 2: into the FBI. So I was like, give me her

681
00:40:47,920 --> 00:40:49,960
Speaker 2: phone number right now, and so we got her into

682
00:40:50,000 --> 00:40:52,799
Speaker 2: the FBI. She is now in the FBI. She's very

683
00:40:52,800 --> 00:40:57,480
Speaker 2: happy working down in the DC area. I invited them

684
00:40:57,520 --> 00:41:01,239
Speaker 2: to our Proper Justice League cigar night at Shelley's back

685
00:41:01,320 --> 00:41:04,720
Speaker 2: room in Washington, d C. Because I wanted my FBI

686
00:41:04,920 --> 00:41:08,200
Speaker 2: and CIA friends. I wanted all them to know these kids,

687
00:41:08,520 --> 00:41:12,000
Speaker 2: because it's why they do their job right, It's these

688
00:41:12,080 --> 00:41:16,760
Speaker 2: kids are are why. And so I brought them together,

689
00:41:16,880 --> 00:41:19,360
Speaker 2: a bunch of the young people. And it's the first

690
00:41:19,360 --> 00:41:25,239
Speaker 2: time Michael and Genevieve met Michael Lynch Genevieve Siller. And

691
00:41:25,320 --> 00:41:28,480
Speaker 2: on Sundays she sent me the picture of the engagement

692
00:41:28,520 --> 00:41:29,680
Speaker 2: ring on her finger.

693
00:41:29,920 --> 00:41:36,560
Speaker 1: No the children of falling firefighters, none, one are now

694
00:41:36,680 --> 00:41:40,399
Speaker 1: engaged and engaged in the FBI and Green Bries.

695
00:41:40,320 --> 00:41:42,120
Speaker 2: He's going to be a Green Brave. She's in the FBI.

696
00:41:42,520 --> 00:41:48,439
Speaker 2: They just sent me the you're allowed to tear up man.

697
00:41:48,480 --> 00:41:53,399
Speaker 2: That's beautiful. I'm really proud of them and happy for them.

698
00:41:53,960 --> 00:41:57,520
Speaker 2: And they will carry on the story and the tradition

699
00:41:57,719 --> 00:42:00,000
Speaker 2: and yeah, you know.

700
00:42:00,160 --> 00:42:06,400
Speaker 1: The stories of the greatest evil something good. It's beautiful, Yeah, beautiful.

701
00:42:07,160 --> 00:42:15,719
Speaker 1: Questions come after one more thing, okay, this one. This

702
00:42:15,880 --> 00:42:23,400
Speaker 1: part of the story is it was a lot when.

703
00:42:23,280 --> 00:42:28,120
Speaker 2: I heard it. Was it Friday before oh yeah, Tuesday? Yeah,

704
00:42:28,239 --> 00:42:31,120
Speaker 2: Friday before the Tuesday, so it would have been September eighth,

705
00:42:31,160 --> 00:42:35,080
Speaker 2: two thousand and one. It was. It was a warm,

706
00:42:35,160 --> 00:42:39,920
Speaker 2: warm day out. I had just been turned down by

707
00:42:39,960 --> 00:42:42,680
Speaker 2: a lady who I loved very much, actually the only

708
00:42:42,719 --> 00:42:45,520
Speaker 2: woman I have asked to marry. Means she said no,

709
00:42:45,960 --> 00:42:48,040
Speaker 2: what is wrong with her? And in the end she

710
00:42:48,160 --> 00:42:52,920
Speaker 2: was right. But and to this day we're good friends.

711
00:42:52,960 --> 00:42:55,320
Speaker 2: So but but I was not in a good place.

712
00:42:55,400 --> 00:42:58,080
Speaker 2: I had the blues, and I was depressed and very

713
00:42:58,120 --> 00:43:02,799
Speaker 2: sad and lonely. And I left work at seven year

714
00:43:02,800 --> 00:43:05,440
Speaker 2: old trade Center that evening that Friday evening and I

715
00:43:05,480 --> 00:43:08,759
Speaker 2: wanted to go over toward the Hudson River where I

716
00:43:08,840 --> 00:43:12,080
Speaker 2: was on the water, have a beer and just, I guess,

717
00:43:12,080 --> 00:43:15,439
Speaker 2: feel sorry for myself or whatever. And I got over

718
00:43:15,480 --> 00:43:18,480
Speaker 2: there and they put the beer on the table for me,

719
00:43:19,640 --> 00:43:24,080
Speaker 2: and I didn't even touch the beer before I started

720
00:43:24,840 --> 00:43:31,080
Speaker 2: feeling very bad, feeling very ill, and I felt this

721
00:43:31,400 --> 00:43:36,960
Speaker 2: freezing cold come over me and I started shaking and

722
00:43:37,040 --> 00:43:41,520
Speaker 2: my body actually be compensated. If you don't know what

723
00:43:41,560 --> 00:43:45,040
Speaker 2: it means, basically, all your pores open up and you

724
00:43:45,160 --> 00:43:49,640
Speaker 2: just soak your clothes. It's a nervous kind of reaction.

725
00:43:50,640 --> 00:43:54,120
Speaker 2: And I didn't know what was happening. I was in

726
00:43:54,280 --> 00:43:57,680
Speaker 2: complete fear. I didn't even touch my beer. I put

727
00:43:57,880 --> 00:43:59,880
Speaker 2: a twenty on top of the beer, on top of

728
00:44:00,000 --> 00:44:03,200
Speaker 2: twenty dollar bill, and I walked out, and I walked

729
00:44:03,239 --> 00:44:10,680
Speaker 2: five miles home, and I could feel the evil around me,

730
00:44:12,000 --> 00:44:15,000
Speaker 2: and I didn't know what it was. I didn't recognize it.

731
00:44:15,719 --> 00:44:18,560
Speaker 2: Of course, I didn't know what was coming at that time,

732
00:44:19,320 --> 00:44:27,239
Speaker 2: but I was scared out of my mind. So we

733
00:44:27,400 --> 00:44:33,160
Speaker 2: hear that, right, I believe you. I hear it, I

734
00:44:33,280 --> 00:44:33,680
Speaker 2: feel it.

735
00:44:34,320 --> 00:44:36,799
Speaker 1: I've heard you tell that story, I've read it, and

736
00:44:36,880 --> 00:44:40,360
Speaker 1: I've heard you tell it before and it never changes.

737
00:44:42,120 --> 00:44:47,200
Speaker 1: What makes it crazy is some years later your interaction

738
00:44:47,320 --> 00:44:48,280
Speaker 1: with the Navy poot.

739
00:44:48,440 --> 00:44:51,959
Speaker 2: Yeah. So in my I called my lost years after

740
00:44:52,000 --> 00:44:53,960
Speaker 2: I retired like so for two thousand and four or

741
00:44:54,000 --> 00:44:55,840
Speaker 2: five six, In those years, I was trying to figure

742
00:44:55,840 --> 00:44:58,480
Speaker 2: out what to do with my life and my friend

743
00:44:58,520 --> 00:45:00,759
Speaker 2: even to keep it, yeah, even keep it. Yeah, those

744
00:45:00,800 --> 00:45:03,440
Speaker 2: were those are my hard years. For sure. I was

745
00:45:03,520 --> 00:45:07,799
Speaker 2: very lonely again. I was I had you know, all

746
00:45:07,840 --> 00:45:09,520
Speaker 2: my guy friends were gone. I had no one to

747
00:45:09,520 --> 00:45:15,120
Speaker 2: hang out with, and so I thought, I like to travel.

748
00:45:15,200 --> 00:45:17,960
Speaker 2: Maybe I'll be a flight attendant. And then Jet Blue

749
00:45:18,480 --> 00:45:21,719
Speaker 2: hires retired New York City firefighters to be flight attendants.

750
00:45:22,040 --> 00:45:24,200
Speaker 2: Their number one flight attendant was a retired New York

751
00:45:24,239 --> 00:45:26,520
Speaker 2: City fireman. I was like, I'll give it a shot.

752
00:45:26,600 --> 00:45:29,480
Speaker 2: So I went and did the training and I did

753
00:45:29,480 --> 00:45:31,040
Speaker 2: a few flights. In the end, it wasn't for me.

754
00:45:31,200 --> 00:45:34,000
Speaker 2: But on one of my flights from LA to New

755
00:45:34,080 --> 00:45:35,960
Speaker 2: York on Jet Blue, I was a flight attendant in

756
00:45:35,960 --> 00:45:38,399
Speaker 2: the back of the plane. And now you know I'm

757
00:45:38,400 --> 00:45:40,279
Speaker 2: making I'm not making this up because I would never

758
00:45:40,560 --> 00:45:45,400
Speaker 2: tell this. I was a flight attendant, So you know,

759
00:45:45,440 --> 00:45:48,879
Speaker 2: I'm not making this up. So I'm in the back

760
00:45:48,920 --> 00:45:51,600
Speaker 2: of the plane and there's an extra pilot on the plane.

761
00:45:52,080 --> 00:45:56,239
Speaker 2: It's a east West coast flight, and so one of

762
00:45:56,280 --> 00:45:58,879
Speaker 2: the pilots came back to take a break stretcher's legs

763
00:45:58,920 --> 00:46:01,000
Speaker 2: or whatever. He came back and sat with me in

764
00:46:01,040 --> 00:46:03,920
Speaker 2: the back of the plane and he was like, what

765
00:46:04,000 --> 00:46:06,560
Speaker 2: did you do before? I was like a fireman. And

766
00:46:06,600 --> 00:46:07,920
Speaker 2: of course, as soon as you say that, he's like

767
00:46:08,000 --> 00:46:09,480
Speaker 2: nine to eleven. I was like, yeah, So I tell

768
00:46:09,520 --> 00:46:11,920
Speaker 2: him the story, and then I tell him the story

769
00:46:11,920 --> 00:46:14,239
Speaker 2: of the Friday night before the Tuesday.

770
00:46:15,440 --> 00:46:19,359
Speaker 1: And which at this point was just a weird night

771
00:46:19,400 --> 00:46:21,880
Speaker 1: to you. Yeah, it's just before this conversation.

772
00:46:22,000 --> 00:46:23,800
Speaker 2: Right. It didn't make it doesn't make any sense, and

773
00:46:23,880 --> 00:46:26,400
Speaker 2: I had forgotten about it for a long time, and

774
00:46:26,440 --> 00:46:30,799
Speaker 2: then for some reason I came back and so I'm

775
00:46:30,800 --> 00:46:33,920
Speaker 2: telling the story and he just sits there and nods

776
00:46:33,920 --> 00:46:34,279
Speaker 2: his head.

777
00:46:34,680 --> 00:46:38,080
Speaker 1: And this guy's a Navy, former Navy power yeah.

778
00:46:38,560 --> 00:46:42,120
Speaker 2: And now even flies for Jet Blue, right, And he

779
00:46:42,160 --> 00:46:44,680
Speaker 2: had his bag with him and he waited till I

780
00:46:44,719 --> 00:46:48,239
Speaker 2: was done telling the story, and he goes, I want

781
00:46:48,239 --> 00:46:50,960
Speaker 2: to show you something, and he reaches in his bag

782
00:46:51,120 --> 00:46:55,120
Speaker 2: and he pulls out a book that's covered in a

783
00:46:55,200 --> 00:46:59,120
Speaker 2: leather case with a zipper. It's all worn, and he

784
00:46:59,160 --> 00:47:02,880
Speaker 2: goes like this with zipper and he undoes it and

785
00:47:02,920 --> 00:47:05,720
Speaker 2: he opens the book up and it's all highlighted in yellow,

786
00:47:05,920 --> 00:47:09,960
Speaker 2: pink blue highlighter throughout the whole book. And he's just

787
00:47:10,040 --> 00:47:12,799
Speaker 2: he's going like this through the book and he comes

788
00:47:12,840 --> 00:47:15,160
Speaker 2: to a page and he puts it to me and

789
00:47:15,200 --> 00:47:22,560
Speaker 2: he says, read this. What's the book the Bible. He's

790
00:47:22,560 --> 00:47:26,880
Speaker 2: a student of the Bible. And he goes right to

791
00:47:26,920 --> 00:47:30,760
Speaker 2: the page. He has it like memorized, and he says,

792
00:47:30,800 --> 00:47:33,840
Speaker 2: read this, and it describes what happened to me in

793
00:47:33,880 --> 00:47:39,640
Speaker 2: the Bible. And it's called spiritual discernment. And when you're

794
00:47:39,800 --> 00:47:47,560
Speaker 2: at your lowest emotionally, sometimes you are able to feel

795
00:47:49,560 --> 00:47:54,520
Speaker 2: other world's other spirits. And I believe, and he believed,

796
00:47:55,600 --> 00:47:58,120
Speaker 2: and I think he's right that I was feeling the

797
00:47:58,200 --> 00:48:03,120
Speaker 2: evil gathering at grounds before the following Tuesday. And it's

798
00:48:03,160 --> 00:48:07,920
Speaker 2: called spiritual discernment. And look, I'm not a conspiracy guy

799
00:48:07,920 --> 00:48:11,120
Speaker 2: at all. I'm the opposite, but this actually is true.

800
00:48:11,239 --> 00:48:13,920
Speaker 2: This is what happened to me. And I all I

801
00:48:13,960 --> 00:48:17,319
Speaker 2: did was tell this guy the story. But he knew

802
00:48:17,400 --> 00:48:19,319
Speaker 2: he understood what I was talking about because he read

803
00:48:19,320 --> 00:48:20,080
Speaker 2: about it in the Bible.

804
00:48:20,320 --> 00:48:22,560
Speaker 1: The reason I wanted to tell you the story is this.

805
00:48:25,680 --> 00:48:28,840
Speaker 1: I don't know why you're alive, but you were twenty

806
00:48:28,840 --> 00:48:31,240
Speaker 1: feet from the stupid building when it fell. You should

807
00:48:31,280 --> 00:48:38,160
Speaker 1: be dead. You survived a fire hurricane with glass flying

808
00:48:38,239 --> 00:48:42,360
Speaker 1: to there and I don't know why, but there's a reason.

809
00:48:43,239 --> 00:48:48,360
Speaker 1: Your talk about what you just said says an enormous

810
00:48:48,360 --> 00:48:49,360
Speaker 1: amount about your faith.

811
00:48:49,440 --> 00:48:56,520
Speaker 2: I think, and.

812
00:48:56,000 --> 00:48:59,960
Speaker 1: Before we open up for questions, with that faith in mind,

813
00:49:00,920 --> 00:49:05,000
Speaker 1: and that duty and service and the heroic actions of

814
00:49:05,040 --> 00:49:09,040
Speaker 1: yourself and the friends you lost, as you consider and

815
00:49:09,160 --> 00:49:12,759
Speaker 1: look back on those who attacked our country and you,

816
00:49:14,200 --> 00:49:24,880
Speaker 1: how are we to reconcile humanity, evil, grace forgiveness.

817
00:49:30,680 --> 00:49:33,120
Speaker 2: I am not proud of this, but I'm not a

818
00:49:33,120 --> 00:49:36,040
Speaker 2: big forgiver right now, and maybe I'm wrong for that,

819
00:49:36,200 --> 00:49:42,120
Speaker 2: but I believe in proper justice for those who did this,

820
00:49:42,280 --> 00:49:47,560
Speaker 2: who happily admit they did this and happily say they

821
00:49:47,600 --> 00:49:49,880
Speaker 2: would do it again if given the chance. They have

822
00:49:49,960 --> 00:49:57,120
Speaker 2: said that in court. I have witnessed these families suffer

823
00:49:57,200 --> 00:50:00,600
Speaker 2: for the last twenty five years, including the children who

824
00:50:00,600 --> 00:50:03,560
Speaker 2: grew up without their dad, without their mentor without their

825
00:50:04,400 --> 00:50:07,560
Speaker 2: spiritual guider, without someone who has a rolodex to get

826
00:50:07,560 --> 00:50:09,680
Speaker 2: them a job at the FBI or be a Green

827
00:50:09,680 --> 00:50:13,359
Speaker 2: Beret or whatever. Right, these kids, you know, didn't have

828
00:50:13,400 --> 00:50:16,840
Speaker 2: that chance. So I'm not I'm not big on forgiving

829
00:50:18,800 --> 00:50:22,880
Speaker 2: the guys who planned this and anyone that supported them.

830
00:50:23,200 --> 00:50:27,440
Speaker 2: And maybe I'll learn better as I get older, or

831
00:50:27,520 --> 00:50:29,759
Speaker 2: maybe in another life, and I'll be more forgiving, But

832
00:50:30,280 --> 00:50:33,600
Speaker 2: I don't feel I feel proper justice is correct, and

833
00:50:33,680 --> 00:50:38,040
Speaker 2: we have not done that, and it's it's it's look,

834
00:50:38,040 --> 00:50:42,640
Speaker 2: I'm part of the team doing it, and it's just shameful, shameful.

835
00:50:43,160 --> 00:50:47,720
Speaker 1: Which is why we cannot forget, because it will happen

836
00:50:47,719 --> 00:50:48,879
Speaker 1: again if we lower our.

837
00:50:48,840 --> 00:50:51,080
Speaker 2: They want to do it again. They want to do

838
00:50:51,120 --> 00:50:54,680
Speaker 2: it bigger. You know, these Islamists and and look, I've

839
00:50:54,719 --> 00:50:59,040
Speaker 2: been accused of being all all those islamophobe and racist.

840
00:50:59,080 --> 00:51:02,040
Speaker 2: I've been a of all of that. You're careful to

841
00:51:02,160 --> 00:51:06,000
Speaker 2: say terrorists after yeah, yeah, well so that's who everybody knows.

842
00:51:07,080 --> 00:51:12,440
Speaker 2: Islamists are the Muslims who want to impose what they

843
00:51:12,480 --> 00:51:15,680
Speaker 2: believe on you, and if you don't comply with them,

844
00:51:16,000 --> 00:51:17,920
Speaker 2: then you pay attacks, and if you don't pay attacks,

845
00:51:18,520 --> 00:51:21,359
Speaker 2: then they kill you. Yeah, we're not talking about We're

846
00:51:21,360 --> 00:51:24,520
Speaker 2: not talking well, it's a certain group, but they're Look,

847
00:51:24,719 --> 00:51:26,799
Speaker 2: who are the people. Who is the group of people

848
00:51:26,880 --> 00:51:31,000
Speaker 2: that suffer the most at the hands of Islamists, Innocent Muslims,

849
00:51:31,160 --> 00:51:33,640
Speaker 2: they're the ones that suffer the most. And I have

850
00:51:33,719 --> 00:51:39,839
Speaker 2: lots of Muslim friends who look, I've we had this

851
00:51:40,520 --> 00:51:45,920
Speaker 2: Afghan female tactical platoon. Nobody knows about them, sixty Afghan

852
00:51:45,960 --> 00:51:49,440
Speaker 2: women who who fought with our Tier one forces in

853
00:51:49,480 --> 00:51:52,720
Speaker 2: Afghanistan for the purpose of taking the women and children

854
00:51:52,880 --> 00:51:56,320
Speaker 2: on a raid so that the men wouldn't touch them. Right,

855
00:51:56,520 --> 00:51:59,160
Speaker 2: So these women would win fighting with our guys, but

856
00:51:59,160 --> 00:52:01,600
Speaker 2: then they would take the win and children and protect them.

857
00:52:02,080 --> 00:52:05,160
Speaker 2: So sixty of them. Of course, when we pulled out,

858
00:52:05,200 --> 00:52:09,440
Speaker 2: they became the number one target of the Taliban, and

859
00:52:09,480 --> 00:52:12,080
Speaker 2: so they forty of them made it to America and

860
00:52:12,160 --> 00:52:16,000
Speaker 2: we were able to get them into get them help,

861
00:52:16,560 --> 00:52:20,960
Speaker 2: and we took them to the nine eleven Museum, the

862
00:52:21,040 --> 00:52:24,680
Speaker 2: Statue of Liberty, because that's what they hoped for for

863
00:52:25,000 --> 00:52:27,839
Speaker 2: the women and for their girls. And then we took

864
00:52:27,920 --> 00:52:29,440
Speaker 2: them to oharas they don't drink. But we had a

865
00:52:29,440 --> 00:52:33,400
Speaker 2: good time anyhow. But there's a lot of there's a

866
00:52:33,440 --> 00:52:37,840
Speaker 2: lot of good people of all faiths. But you know,

867
00:52:37,920 --> 00:52:42,440
Speaker 2: these Islamists that are causing trouble around the world, they

868
00:52:42,480 --> 00:52:47,560
Speaker 2: need to be poked in the nose. We'll be right

869
00:52:47,600 --> 00:53:02,520
Speaker 2: back some That's a story.

870
00:53:02,600 --> 00:53:05,280
Speaker 1: And in the context of an army of normal folks,

871
00:53:05,760 --> 00:53:08,960
Speaker 1: it's really hard to say that Tim and his brothers

872
00:53:09,000 --> 00:53:14,560
Speaker 1: are normal. But I think of the office workers helping

873
00:53:14,560 --> 00:53:18,920
Speaker 1: one another down the escalator. I also think of the

874
00:53:18,960 --> 00:53:24,359
Speaker 1: cognitive decision of these firefighters saying I may not make it,

875
00:53:24,400 --> 00:53:27,279
Speaker 1: but I'm going anyway. And then I think of the

876
00:53:27,320 --> 00:53:31,480
Speaker 1: work that the ones that have survived have done to

877
00:53:31,560 --> 00:53:35,719
Speaker 1: support the children of firefighters and to keep the awareness going.

878
00:53:35,800 --> 00:53:38,880
Speaker 1: And so this whole story is wrought with stories of

879
00:53:38,960 --> 00:53:42,120
Speaker 1: heroic normal folks seeing areas and ed and filling it

880
00:53:42,760 --> 00:53:47,120
Speaker 1: from firefighters to civilians to now. And it's why we

881
00:53:47,200 --> 00:53:50,719
Speaker 1: celebrate your story, Tim, and it's why I want it

882
00:53:50,760 --> 00:53:54,040
Speaker 1: to be told for that, but also to challenge us

883
00:53:54,080 --> 00:53:57,600
Speaker 1: to remember there are twenty three and four year old

884
00:53:57,640 --> 00:53:59,799
Speaker 1: people walking the face of the planet right now that

885
00:54:00,040 --> 00:54:02,759
Speaker 1: aren't even alive when this happened, and it is incumbent

886
00:54:03,000 --> 00:54:07,480
Speaker 1: upon us as a nation to remember and respect and honor.

887
00:54:10,600 --> 00:54:14,760
Speaker 1: Does anybody out there have any questions for firefighter don Scott?

888
00:54:15,680 --> 00:54:15,960
Speaker 2: You do?

889
00:54:16,040 --> 00:54:23,760
Speaker 1: Alex has got a microphone. Yeah, coming your way. Please

890
00:54:23,800 --> 00:54:24,399
Speaker 1: say your name.

891
00:54:25,320 --> 00:54:28,600
Speaker 3: Thank you, Harold Daniels here in Memphis. I don't know

892
00:54:28,640 --> 00:54:31,080
Speaker 3: what it's like to be a I know New York

893
00:54:31,080 --> 00:54:32,920
Speaker 3: City FI fighters are the best in the world.

894
00:54:33,160 --> 00:54:35,359
Speaker 2: I do know that, Thank you. Uh.

895
00:54:37,280 --> 00:54:39,480
Speaker 3: I'm a first responder myself, and I do a lot

896
00:54:39,480 --> 00:54:41,960
Speaker 3: of stuff with the Health Department and training, and I

897
00:54:42,000 --> 00:54:44,479
Speaker 3: work Katrina and pulling bodies out of houses and stuff

898
00:54:44,560 --> 00:54:48,560
Speaker 3: during Katrina, and babies and kids and where people got

899
00:54:48,640 --> 00:54:50,640
Speaker 3: up to the attic with the water rossel hide, they

900
00:54:50,680 --> 00:54:53,440
Speaker 3: gathered addict and they didn't find their way out.

901
00:54:53,200 --> 00:54:54,680
Speaker 2: And you hold the mac up a little bit, and.

902
00:54:54,600 --> 00:54:58,520
Speaker 3: So I experienced that. But my question to you, and

903
00:54:58,520 --> 00:55:03,040
Speaker 3: I'm going back to the forest gump. We're Lieutenant Dan

904
00:55:03,239 --> 00:55:06,000
Speaker 3: as far as why did he save me? I wanted

905
00:55:06,040 --> 00:55:08,520
Speaker 3: to be with my man. Has that ever entered your

906
00:55:08,560 --> 00:55:11,360
Speaker 3: mind about all the friends that you lost? It you

907
00:55:11,400 --> 00:55:13,160
Speaker 3: want to know in yourself and you might fight it

908
00:55:13,200 --> 00:55:16,040
Speaker 3: in your dreams or fight it well, I'll say God,

909
00:55:16,080 --> 00:55:18,799
Speaker 3: why am I still here? I did not go with

910
00:55:18,800 --> 00:55:23,399
Speaker 3: my friends. It's a really good question, thank you. If

911
00:55:23,480 --> 00:55:25,560
Speaker 3: funny Lieutenant Dan is actually a good friend of mine,

912
00:55:26,200 --> 00:55:29,440
Speaker 3: the actor, so it's a it's a good question.

913
00:55:30,360 --> 00:55:36,920
Speaker 2: I Gary, Yeah, Gary Yeah. So I know what my

914
00:55:37,080 --> 00:55:39,719
Speaker 2: mission in my purpose is. So I'm lucky compared to

915
00:55:39,760 --> 00:55:42,360
Speaker 2: a lot of people. This is my mission in my purpose,

916
00:55:42,719 --> 00:55:46,200
Speaker 2: working with the Three Letter agencies, going around the world

917
00:55:46,239 --> 00:55:49,840
Speaker 2: and being able to say thank you to our heroes

918
00:55:50,040 --> 00:55:54,200
Speaker 2: who serve overseas and our partners from different countries and things.

919
00:55:54,800 --> 00:55:59,080
Speaker 2: So I have a very full, meaningful mission. If I

920
00:55:59,160 --> 00:56:02,360
Speaker 2: had heard my best friend Terry Hatton screaming for help

921
00:56:02,760 --> 00:56:04,960
Speaker 2: on the radio, I would have been up those stairs,

922
00:56:05,239 --> 00:56:08,680
Speaker 2: you know, just like Patty was. I didn't hear him,

923
00:56:08,920 --> 00:56:11,560
Speaker 2: and I didn't know he was in trouble. I am

924
00:56:11,600 --> 00:56:15,560
Speaker 2: happy to be alive. I am happy to be able

925
00:56:15,560 --> 00:56:19,480
Speaker 2: to impact, especially the lives of like Michael and Genevieve,

926
00:56:19,520 --> 00:56:23,560
Speaker 2: you know, and bring them together. Right. Do I wonder

927
00:56:23,640 --> 00:56:26,680
Speaker 2: why I was spared? I guess I used to, but

928
00:56:26,719 --> 00:56:31,080
Speaker 2: I don't think. I don't question that anymore. Do I

929
00:56:31,120 --> 00:56:33,520
Speaker 2: miss my friends like crazy every day? One hundred percent?

930
00:56:34,200 --> 00:56:36,960
Speaker 2: Do I think about what life would have been like

931
00:56:37,200 --> 00:56:40,839
Speaker 2: with them still in my life. Yes, my best friend,

932
00:56:40,880 --> 00:56:44,680
Speaker 2: Terry Hatton's wife Beth, found out she was pregnant two

933
00:56:44,760 --> 00:56:48,080
Speaker 2: days after nine to eleven and they were around forty

934
00:56:48,160 --> 00:56:51,960
Speaker 2: years old, so they hadn't had children before. And she

935
00:56:52,080 --> 00:56:54,440
Speaker 2: made it through some rough times in her pregnancy and

936
00:56:54,480 --> 00:56:57,680
Speaker 2: had a healthy baby, girl named Terry with an I

937
00:56:57,760 --> 00:57:02,040
Speaker 2: named after her dad. So she's my little pal now.

938
00:57:02,640 --> 00:57:05,319
Speaker 2: And at that around that age twenty three, twenty four,

939
00:57:05,320 --> 00:57:09,120
Speaker 2: twenty five, they start wanting to know more about their

940
00:57:09,200 --> 00:57:12,160
Speaker 2: dad and stuff. She didn't know her dad, So I'm

941
00:57:12,160 --> 00:57:16,160
Speaker 2: getting closer with her again, and I hope to help

942
00:57:16,920 --> 00:57:20,640
Speaker 2: help her understand her father and what a hero he

943
00:57:20,880 --> 00:57:23,800
Speaker 2: was and then help her with anything she needs. And man,

944
00:57:23,960 --> 00:57:27,840
Speaker 2: there's nothing more fulfilling than that, So thank you. Anybody else?

945
00:57:29,240 --> 00:57:31,120
Speaker 4: I actually have more than one question, so I'll start

946
00:57:31,160 --> 00:57:34,680
Speaker 4: with the easy one. You said as a teenager that

947
00:57:35,360 --> 00:57:37,440
Speaker 4: you were going through the madness of your own family

948
00:57:37,520 --> 00:57:41,800
Speaker 4: and you found the profession which you eventually entering in firefighting.

949
00:57:42,320 --> 00:57:45,200
Speaker 4: I work with kids, and I'm curious how you found

950
00:57:45,280 --> 00:57:48,920
Speaker 4: that and what led you to finding that. Did someone

951
00:57:48,960 --> 00:57:51,640
Speaker 4: help you? Did you accidentally discover it? Or how did

952
00:57:51,680 --> 00:57:53,960
Speaker 4: you find that because we need that for more people.

953
00:57:54,560 --> 00:58:01,640
Speaker 2: Yeah, good question, thank you. Yeah. I was was how

954
00:58:01,680 --> 00:58:04,320
Speaker 2: blunt can I be here as blunt as you want? Yeah?

955
00:58:04,480 --> 00:58:07,600
Speaker 2: I was smoking a lot of weed and failing out

956
00:58:07,600 --> 00:58:13,000
Speaker 2: of school, and I hated the world. I had no purpose,

957
00:58:13,040 --> 00:58:17,600
Speaker 2: no mission. I wasn't enjoying anything. A house caught on

958
00:58:17,680 --> 00:58:19,880
Speaker 2: fire across the street from where I lived, and my

959
00:58:19,960 --> 00:58:22,640
Speaker 2: father and the boys we all went running down and

960
00:58:23,680 --> 00:58:27,400
Speaker 2: to see our neighbor's house burn up. And there was

961
00:58:27,440 --> 00:58:29,920
Speaker 2: a young guy there. I was fifteen, he was sixteen,

962
00:58:30,880 --> 00:58:34,560
Speaker 2: and he was my friend, Jay Walsh, and he lived

963
00:58:34,560 --> 00:58:35,760
Speaker 2: all the way on the other side of town. I

964
00:58:35,800 --> 00:58:37,040
Speaker 2: was like, Jay, what are you doing all the way

965
00:58:37,080 --> 00:58:40,760
Speaker 2: over here? And he was sixteen, so I was licensed.

966
00:58:40,800 --> 00:58:43,600
Speaker 2: So he goes, well, I came, you know, in my

967
00:58:43,600 --> 00:58:46,440
Speaker 2: car whatever to he and he goes, I'm a junior

968
00:58:46,440 --> 00:58:49,520
Speaker 2: fireman like that. And I was like, you're a what

969
00:58:49,680 --> 00:58:52,520
Speaker 2: He's like, I'm a junior fireman. And I was like,

970
00:58:52,600 --> 00:58:55,400
Speaker 2: what's a junior fireman? And he said, come down on

971
00:58:55,440 --> 00:59:00,520
Speaker 2: Wednesday night and see if you like it. And you know, well,

972
00:59:00,640 --> 00:59:03,560
Speaker 2: we train and drill with ladders and hoes and all

973
00:59:03,640 --> 00:59:06,320
Speaker 2: kinds of stuff, learn ems stuff and all that, and

974
00:59:06,920 --> 00:59:08,760
Speaker 2: so I went down the following Wednesday. I thought it

975
00:59:08,760 --> 00:59:10,680
Speaker 2: was the coolest thing in the world. And I went

976
00:59:10,720 --> 00:59:14,120
Speaker 2: down the following Wednesday and attended and it was great.

977
00:59:14,160 --> 00:59:16,760
Speaker 2: I loved it. I had a great time. A few

978
00:59:16,800 --> 00:59:19,120
Speaker 2: days later he called me up and he said, Tim,

979
00:59:19,480 --> 00:59:22,640
Speaker 2: you can either be a junior fireman or be stoned.

980
00:59:22,720 --> 00:59:25,240
Speaker 2: You can't do both. In other words, knock it off.

981
00:59:26,000 --> 00:59:29,240
Speaker 2: And so because of Jay, and I tell him he's

982
00:59:29,280 --> 00:59:31,400
Speaker 2: my friend to this day, all he had to do

983
00:59:31,480 --> 00:59:33,840
Speaker 2: was tell me that that was available and then smack

984
00:59:33,920 --> 00:59:36,440
Speaker 2: me around a little bit and say stop being a jerk.

985
00:59:37,280 --> 00:59:40,880
Speaker 2: And that was it. I was got on straight and narrow,

986
00:59:41,040 --> 00:59:44,160
Speaker 2: and I became junior fireman and EMT and it was

987
00:59:44,200 --> 00:59:45,960
Speaker 2: the best thing that could ever have happened to me.

988
00:59:46,440 --> 00:59:49,480
Speaker 2: So I highly recommend it, especially for kids who are

989
00:59:49,520 --> 00:59:50,520
Speaker 2: maybe on the wrong track.

990
00:59:51,720 --> 00:59:53,640
Speaker 4: Okay, and I want to thank you for being willing

991
00:59:53,720 --> 00:59:57,920
Speaker 4: to just constantly relive that trauma and share those stories,

992
00:59:58,160 --> 01:00:01,080
Speaker 4: because I think that's so powerful. Well, one of my

993
01:00:01,160 --> 01:00:04,360
Speaker 4: other questions is, I'm a school counselor and you went

994
01:00:04,440 --> 01:00:09,240
Speaker 4: through trauma I cannot imagine. And you've spoken of the

995
01:00:09,320 --> 01:00:13,200
Speaker 4: several years when you were in despair and discouragement. Are

996
01:00:13,240 --> 01:00:17,320
Speaker 4: there any specific things that helped you to get through

997
01:00:17,600 --> 01:00:20,720
Speaker 4: that trauma? What can we do for people that have

998
01:00:20,800 --> 01:00:23,640
Speaker 4: had instrumentable trauma so they can be more like you

999
01:00:23,680 --> 01:00:26,520
Speaker 4: and find the hope and the purpose in what they've

1000
01:00:26,520 --> 01:00:27,040
Speaker 4: been through.

1001
01:00:28,080 --> 01:00:32,560
Speaker 2: So that my mantra is truth in history, which means

1002
01:00:32,600 --> 01:00:39,040
Speaker 2: tell the whole truth. Patience and grief and resilience of

1003
01:00:39,080 --> 01:00:46,439
Speaker 2: the human spirit. I find that patience. You can pray

1004
01:00:46,480 --> 01:00:49,480
Speaker 2: to God all you want. You know, I was praying

1005
01:00:49,880 --> 01:00:54,200
Speaker 2: to meet good quality men, similar to the friends I lost.

1006
01:00:54,640 --> 01:00:56,800
Speaker 2: He didn't answer. God didn't answer me in that way.

1007
01:00:56,800 --> 01:00:58,440
Speaker 2: He answered me in a different way, and I won't

1008
01:00:59,040 --> 01:01:01,240
Speaker 2: get into it right now. I think it's too long

1009
01:01:01,240 --> 01:01:04,080
Speaker 2: of a story. But he answered me in other ways.

1010
01:01:04,080 --> 01:01:09,120
Speaker 2: So you have to pray, but don't expect that specific

1011
01:01:09,160 --> 01:01:12,040
Speaker 2: prayer to be answered. But God knows what's wrong with

1012
01:01:12,080 --> 01:01:18,600
Speaker 2: you and will help you. Patience in grief means a

1013
01:01:18,640 --> 01:01:22,520
Speaker 2: lot of patients. It doesn't mean a month, it doesn't

1014
01:01:22,560 --> 01:01:25,120
Speaker 2: mean six months. It means five years or ten years

1015
01:01:25,640 --> 01:01:30,360
Speaker 2: of patience, and that's hard. But eventually you find the life,

1016
01:01:30,480 --> 01:01:33,280
Speaker 2: laughter in love in what I call the tim two

1017
01:01:33,320 --> 01:01:37,840
Speaker 2: point zero again in your life. The other thing that

1018
01:01:37,920 --> 01:01:42,040
Speaker 2: I or two more things. I went through ten therapists

1019
01:01:42,760 --> 01:01:47,840
Speaker 2: and I stayed at it. When I speak to our

1020
01:01:47,880 --> 01:01:52,680
Speaker 2: first responders in military and our veterans, and I tell

1021
01:01:52,720 --> 01:01:56,840
Speaker 2: him that I went through ten therapists before I found

1022
01:01:57,000 --> 01:02:01,680
Speaker 2: my dear Ashley, who I just with, and she didn't

1023
01:02:01,680 --> 01:02:03,960
Speaker 2: pretend to know what I went through. What she did

1024
01:02:04,000 --> 01:02:06,640
Speaker 2: is she gave me tools to put in my toolbox

1025
01:02:07,240 --> 01:02:13,120
Speaker 2: so I could help myself, such as compartmentalizing grief. No,

1026
01:02:13,280 --> 01:02:16,400
Speaker 2: I had never heard of that before. And I was

1027
01:02:16,440 --> 01:02:21,400
Speaker 2: able every morning to mourn for an hour and then

1028
01:02:21,440 --> 01:02:25,120
Speaker 2: shut it off and try and have a productive day. Right,

1029
01:02:25,400 --> 01:02:34,360
Speaker 2: Admirrable make your Bed. Sorry I'm losing his name right now. Yeah,

1030
01:02:34,400 --> 01:02:40,640
Speaker 2: thank you, Admiral mccraven. He is. Yeah, he's writing the

1031
01:02:40,640 --> 01:02:44,320
Speaker 2: forward to my book. But he has a very simple

1032
01:02:44,320 --> 01:02:47,600
Speaker 2: book New York Times bestseller called Make your Bed. It's

1033
01:02:47,640 --> 01:02:51,080
Speaker 2: just that simple get up in the morning. It doesn't

1034
01:02:51,080 --> 01:02:52,960
Speaker 2: have to be your bed. But do one or two

1035
01:02:53,080 --> 01:02:55,680
Speaker 2: or three things that make you feel good about yourself

1036
01:02:55,720 --> 01:02:58,919
Speaker 2: every morning, and force yourself to do it, and you'll

1037
01:02:58,960 --> 01:03:03,600
Speaker 2: be amazed at how it changes your disposition for the

1038
01:03:03,640 --> 01:03:10,120
Speaker 2: rest of the day. Yeah. Oh, and another book you

1039
01:03:10,160 --> 01:03:13,480
Speaker 2: guys can look at if you want is by a

1040
01:03:13,560 --> 01:03:22,880
Speaker 2: Navy seal called Touching the Dragon, and basically, the dragon

1041
01:03:23,120 --> 01:03:28,960
Speaker 2: is that pain. Right, So my dragon would be the

1042
01:03:29,360 --> 01:03:35,400
Speaker 2: loss of my friends. Right. My friend Donna's dragon was

1043
01:03:36,000 --> 01:03:37,960
Speaker 2: she was on the seventy eighth floor of the South Tower.

1044
01:03:38,280 --> 01:03:40,280
Speaker 2: She actually gets hit by the plane when the plane

1045
01:03:40,280 --> 01:03:43,040
Speaker 2: comes into the building and it slams her against the

1046
01:03:43,080 --> 01:03:45,360
Speaker 2: wall and it explodes and she gets all burned up

1047
01:03:45,920 --> 01:03:47,960
Speaker 2: and she has to claw her way out from the

1048
01:03:48,000 --> 01:03:54,480
Speaker 2: bodies of her dead, burned friends. And so that's her thing.

1049
01:03:54,960 --> 01:03:58,200
Speaker 2: Was She's burned pretty badly and she felt like she

1050
01:03:58,240 --> 01:04:01,400
Speaker 2: couldn't go out in public. And we got our through that.

1051
01:04:01,520 --> 01:04:04,000
Speaker 2: So that was her dragon. Once I helped her to

1052
01:04:04,040 --> 01:04:07,280
Speaker 2: face her dragon and not just to touch it. But

1053
01:04:07,960 --> 01:04:10,120
Speaker 2: I say, you know, if I wrote a book like that,

1054
01:04:10,160 --> 01:04:12,720
Speaker 2: would be like punch the dragon in the nose, you know,

1055
01:04:12,800 --> 01:04:16,600
Speaker 2: don't just touch it. And that's where I try to do.

1056
01:04:16,720 --> 01:04:18,919
Speaker 2: I try to punch the dragon in the nose every

1057
01:04:19,040 --> 01:04:21,040
Speaker 2: chance I get, because that dragon is not going to

1058
01:04:21,040 --> 01:04:24,160
Speaker 2: take that power away from me and make me unhappy.

1059
01:04:24,560 --> 01:04:26,800
Speaker 2: And so those are things for the kids that I

1060
01:04:26,840 --> 01:04:29,280
Speaker 2: think can be really helpful all those things, and I'm

1061
01:04:29,280 --> 01:04:30,280
Speaker 2: happy to talk with you more.

1062
01:04:30,880 --> 01:04:34,080
Speaker 4: And last one is because of what you're sharing and

1063
01:04:34,160 --> 01:04:37,200
Speaker 4: I can remember, after all of us can exactly where

1064
01:04:37,240 --> 01:04:40,680
Speaker 4: we were when it happened. And as you mentioned, we're

1065
01:04:40,720 --> 01:04:45,040
Speaker 4: moving more and more away from people being able to

1066
01:04:45,120 --> 01:04:50,000
Speaker 4: remember the experience. What do you find impactful for us

1067
01:04:50,040 --> 01:04:53,240
Speaker 4: to share with others so we can make sure that

1068
01:04:53,280 --> 01:04:57,320
Speaker 4: people never forget and it's not just some story. I

1069
01:04:57,360 --> 01:04:59,920
Speaker 4: find that the kids I work with they have no

1070
01:05:00,120 --> 01:05:04,240
Speaker 4: idea and they don't get it. Do you have anything

1071
01:05:04,240 --> 01:05:06,560
Speaker 4: that you've seen to be impactful, I mean other than

1072
01:05:06,880 --> 01:05:08,440
Speaker 4: I mean I think if they heard you, they might

1073
01:05:08,480 --> 01:05:08,800
Speaker 4: get it.

1074
01:05:09,320 --> 01:05:12,880
Speaker 2: A couple of things. The Tunnel to Towers Foundation T

1075
01:05:12,880 --> 01:05:19,960
Speaker 2: two t dot org has a whole Educate educational section

1076
01:05:20,120 --> 01:05:23,840
Speaker 2: or curriculum for kids, and the nine to eleven in

1077
01:05:23,880 --> 01:05:28,320
Speaker 2: the nine to eleven Museum has also has curriculum for kids.

1078
01:05:28,520 --> 01:05:30,040
Speaker 2: If you go to New York, go to the nine

1079
01:05:30,040 --> 01:05:33,080
Speaker 2: to eleven Museum if you've not done yeah, one hundred percent, yeah,

1080
01:05:33,080 --> 01:05:38,479
Speaker 2: and bring the kids to that. So there was one

1081
01:05:38,560 --> 01:05:44,400
Speaker 2: two Yeah. I'm based on the oh oh yeah, the

1082
01:05:44,440 --> 01:05:48,880
Speaker 2: conspiracy theory stuff so there's a big being a bit

1083
01:05:48,920 --> 01:05:51,680
Speaker 2: a big push for whatever reasons. I have my thoughts,

1084
01:05:51,680 --> 01:05:57,200
Speaker 2: but there there's been some people, including Mel Gibson and

1085
01:05:57,280 --> 01:06:00,720
Speaker 2: Senator Ron Johnson who have this decided to get on

1086
01:06:00,760 --> 01:06:06,240
Speaker 2: the conspiracy theory train. It's bs, it's not true. I

1087
01:06:06,400 --> 01:06:09,840
Speaker 2: was there seven World Trade was my office. I was

1088
01:06:09,880 --> 01:06:14,880
Speaker 2: there through the whole thing. NISSED National Institute of Standards

1089
01:06:15,160 --> 01:06:24,200
Speaker 2: and Training did a scientific, evidence based investigation that that

1090
01:06:24,480 --> 01:06:28,800
Speaker 2: proves that the conspiracy theories are not true. And the

1091
01:06:28,880 --> 01:06:32,560
Speaker 2: reason I get angry about people that espouse that is

1092
01:06:32,600 --> 01:06:35,800
Speaker 2: because it takes away from the truth that Islamist al

1093
01:06:35,840 --> 01:06:39,360
Speaker 2: Qaeda terrorists murdered twenty nine hundred and seventy seven innocent

1094
01:06:39,400 --> 01:06:42,240
Speaker 2: human beings. It also furnishes the heroism of your friend.

1095
01:06:42,480 --> 01:06:46,160
Speaker 2: It does. It does so, which is unacceptable. That whole

1096
01:06:46,160 --> 01:06:51,720
Speaker 2: conspiracy theory thing is so wrong. It's so offensive to us,

1097
01:06:52,520 --> 01:06:56,080
Speaker 2: to the families, and to the heroes that were murdered

1098
01:06:56,080 --> 01:06:56,480
Speaker 2: that day.

1099
01:06:57,400 --> 01:07:02,480
Speaker 5: Last question, so, several years ago, I visited a friend

1100
01:07:02,520 --> 01:07:05,720
Speaker 5: in Connecticut and took the train from Connecticut to New York,

1101
01:07:06,400 --> 01:07:08,680
Speaker 5: and I was kind of shocked, being my first.

1102
01:07:08,480 --> 01:07:09,200
Speaker 2: Time in New York.

1103
01:07:09,240 --> 01:07:13,560
Speaker 5: How large a place is, and so I just wonder,

1104
01:07:13,680 --> 01:07:16,600
Speaker 5: like when you guys work in the fire department and

1105
01:07:16,640 --> 01:07:21,080
Speaker 5: you're pulling from all these areas, like how many departments

1106
01:07:21,120 --> 01:07:21,520
Speaker 5: are there?

1107
01:07:21,560 --> 01:07:22,800
Speaker 2: And do you rotate?

1108
01:07:22,920 --> 01:07:25,640
Speaker 5: How do you get to know so many firemen or

1109
01:07:25,880 --> 01:07:28,960
Speaker 5: you just stay within your fire Oh, I.

1110
01:07:28,880 --> 01:07:32,040
Speaker 2: See what you're saying, Okay, So yeah, yeah, So the

1111
01:07:32,040 --> 01:07:35,240
Speaker 2: New York City Fire Department is probably now or under

1112
01:07:35,280 --> 01:07:39,400
Speaker 2: ten thousands, somewhere around eighty five hundred to seven hundred firefighters.

1113
01:07:39,560 --> 01:07:42,919
Speaker 2: And so, of course I was mostly a Bronx Harlem guy,

1114
01:07:44,680 --> 01:07:50,240
Speaker 2: but starting in ninety one or ninety two, I was

1115
01:07:50,280 --> 01:07:53,480
Speaker 2: in special operations. And once you're in special operations, you

1116
01:07:53,600 --> 01:07:56,720
Speaker 2: work in all the special operations firehouses throughout the city.

1117
01:07:57,000 --> 01:07:59,600
Speaker 2: So that's where I got to know this whole group

1118
01:07:59,640 --> 01:08:04,800
Speaker 2: of firefighters. I knew around around one hundred. There's a

1119
01:08:04,800 --> 01:08:08,120
Speaker 2: couple other guys that knew around one hundred who are alive.

1120
01:08:08,280 --> 01:08:10,760
Speaker 2: But there are two guys I know of that knew

1121
01:08:10,800 --> 01:08:13,840
Speaker 2: two hundred just because of the way their careers went.

1122
01:08:15,800 --> 01:08:20,439
Speaker 2: And so there, if it's possible, they're hurt twice as

1123
01:08:20,479 --> 01:08:25,400
Speaker 2: bad as me. It's breathtaking, and look, it took a

1124
01:08:25,439 --> 01:08:28,160
Speaker 2: long time, but we got it back up and the

1125
01:08:28,160 --> 01:08:31,320
Speaker 2: fire departments back to where a friend of mine said

1126
01:08:31,320 --> 01:08:34,760
Speaker 2: that he said the fire department will recover, but not

1127
01:08:34,800 --> 01:08:37,479
Speaker 2: for twenty years, and that was a true statement.

1128
01:08:38,720 --> 01:08:43,360
Speaker 1: What's the world? Yeah, yeah, sure, that's okay. This will

1129
01:08:43,400 --> 01:08:46,439
Speaker 1: be the last one, and I'm staying around.

1130
01:08:46,520 --> 01:08:50,120
Speaker 6: So this is a very difficult question to ask. So

1131
01:08:50,200 --> 01:08:53,040
Speaker 6: I'm not enjoying doing this, and I hope nobody takes offense.

1132
01:08:53,120 --> 01:08:58,720
Speaker 6: But I don't know a lot about the procedures of

1133
01:08:59,120 --> 01:09:03,800
Speaker 6: how you handle going into situations like that. You know,

1134
01:09:03,840 --> 01:09:08,439
Speaker 6: as a fireman. Has things changed since nine to eleven?

1135
01:09:10,520 --> 01:09:12,160
Speaker 6: Do you think they should change?

1136
01:09:14,520 --> 01:09:18,439
Speaker 2: So, just so we know, has the fire Department changed

1137
01:09:19,400 --> 01:09:24,000
Speaker 2: operational procedures and such in policy since September eleventh? And yeah,

1138
01:09:24,040 --> 01:09:27,439
Speaker 2: I mean the answer is, of course yes. We sent

1139
01:09:27,640 --> 01:09:31,160
Speaker 2: everything we had to that scene, and that's one of

1140
01:09:31,160 --> 01:09:34,439
Speaker 2: the reasons we lost so much of our leadership and

1141
01:09:34,520 --> 01:09:38,800
Speaker 2: so much of our special operations command. So now since then,

1142
01:09:38,880 --> 01:09:43,080
Speaker 2: we hold back. We won't send our entire special operations

1143
01:09:43,160 --> 01:09:48,559
Speaker 2: force to one emergency, we won't send our leadership to

1144
01:09:48,600 --> 01:09:53,960
Speaker 2: one emergency anymore. We got a lot of federal money

1145
01:09:54,920 --> 01:09:59,720
Speaker 2: to help us recover. Back then, we probably had four fireboats.

1146
01:09:59,760 --> 01:10:02,760
Speaker 2: Now we probably have close to thirty fireboats in New

1147
01:10:02,840 --> 01:10:07,760
Speaker 2: York City. We've built two new state of the art

1148
01:10:08,600 --> 01:10:12,720
Speaker 2: communications nine to one one communications centers in kind of

1149
01:10:12,760 --> 01:10:15,880
Speaker 2: secret places, one in Brooklyn, one in the Bronx, and

1150
01:10:15,920 --> 01:10:18,560
Speaker 2: they're redundt. Well you're not gonna you're not going to

1151
01:10:18,600 --> 01:10:21,880
Speaker 2: find them, but they're they're but they're completely redundant with

1152
01:10:21,920 --> 01:10:29,120
Speaker 2: each other. We have built new firehouses that our people

1153
01:10:29,160 --> 01:10:33,680
Speaker 2: don't know, but there's there's big, huge office spaces underground

1154
01:10:34,640 --> 01:10:37,599
Speaker 2: and they're wired to be so that our fire department

1155
01:10:37,600 --> 01:10:40,280
Speaker 2: headquarters can move to any of these firehouses in case

1156
01:10:40,320 --> 01:10:44,120
Speaker 2: something happens at our headquarters. So we're you know, we're more.

1157
01:10:44,720 --> 01:10:49,519
Speaker 2: We've responded more to what could happen if we're attacked.

1158
01:10:50,320 --> 01:10:54,400
Speaker 2: They call it COOP and COG continuity of operations and

1159
01:10:54,439 --> 01:10:59,559
Speaker 2: continuity of government, and the local fire and police departments

1160
01:10:59,600 --> 01:11:02,479
Speaker 2: really haven't. The federal departments do that a lot, but

1161
01:11:02,880 --> 01:11:05,320
Speaker 2: the locals hadn't done that before. But now we have

1162
01:11:05,400 --> 01:11:08,360
Speaker 2: done that. We do a lot more training now than

1163
01:11:08,360 --> 01:11:11,840
Speaker 2: we used to do. We've done that. We have done

1164
01:11:11,840 --> 01:11:16,960
Speaker 2: an awful lot to improve our chances of helping people

1165
01:11:17,040 --> 01:11:19,080
Speaker 2: in our chances of survivability ourselves.

1166
01:11:19,280 --> 01:11:22,320
Speaker 1: Thank you everybody here. Tim's going to hang around, maybe

1167
01:11:22,360 --> 01:11:25,080
Speaker 1: have another beer. Maybe Alex will actually pull some money

1168
01:11:25,120 --> 01:11:26,559
Speaker 1: out of his pocket and buy you a beer.

1169
01:11:26,720 --> 01:11:28,080
Speaker 2: I don't know. Bottom one give.

1170
01:11:31,640 --> 01:11:37,719
Speaker 1: Before we before we finish up, Just quick, quick plug.

1171
01:11:38,560 --> 01:11:42,000
Speaker 1: We will have another live interview on June twelfth, and

1172
01:11:42,040 --> 01:11:46,719
Speaker 1: it's another non eleven survivor named Father Mark.

1173
01:11:46,720 --> 01:11:51,320
Speaker 2: Hannah Uh. Father Mark will be here.

1174
01:11:52,120 --> 01:11:58,479
Speaker 1: He saved fifty lives on nine to eleven. After not eleven,

1175
01:11:59,680 --> 01:12:05,559
Speaker 1: Father Well Mark became a became a Coptic priest and

1176
01:12:05,680 --> 01:12:08,559
Speaker 1: hence the father title. It's part of our Lunch and

1177
01:12:08,600 --> 01:12:11,559
Speaker 1: Listen series that we've been doing at Crosstown Concourse. So

1178
01:12:12,320 --> 01:12:14,800
Speaker 1: you show up around eleven thirty, sit there and eat

1179
01:12:14,840 --> 01:12:18,479
Speaker 1: your lunch and meet somebody really special. You can learn

1180
01:12:18,520 --> 01:12:24,799
Speaker 1: more and RSVP at Fathermark dot event bright dot com.

1181
01:12:25,320 --> 01:12:28,000
Speaker 1: As we continue to do our part to try to

1182
01:12:28,080 --> 01:12:35,440
Speaker 1: keep your story, your friend's heroic story, and our collective

1183
01:12:35,479 --> 01:12:38,080
Speaker 1: memory is a nation alive so that we don't live

1184
01:12:38,120 --> 01:12:43,680
Speaker 1: through this misery again. Tim, thank you, brother, Thank you

1185
01:12:43,760 --> 01:12:48,680
Speaker 1: so much for coming to Memphis. And I know that

1186
01:12:49,320 --> 01:12:54,479
Speaker 1: everybody here and everybody listening one learned a lot, and

1187
01:12:54,600 --> 01:13:00,559
Speaker 1: two joins me in saying thank you for what you've done,

1188
01:13:00,800 --> 01:13:04,200
Speaker 1: but thank you for representing the heroes that can no

1189
01:13:04,280 --> 01:13:08,639
Speaker 1: longer speak for themselves. And I, for one, sir, believe

1190
01:13:08,760 --> 01:13:10,639
Speaker 1: that's why God kept you alive that day.

1191
01:13:10,720 --> 01:13:12,800
Speaker 2: Yes, sir, thank you very much, God bless.

1192
01:13:14,320 --> 01:13:17,920
Speaker 1: And thank you for joining us this week. If Tim

1193
01:13:17,960 --> 01:13:21,000
Speaker 1: Brown has inspired you in general, or better yet, to

1194
01:13:21,040 --> 01:13:25,799
Speaker 1: take action by becoming a firefighter or something else entirely,

1195
01:13:26,240 --> 01:13:28,800
Speaker 1: please let me know. I'd love to hear about it.

1196
01:13:29,320 --> 01:13:33,519
Speaker 1: If you write me anytime at Bill at normalfolks dot us,

1197
01:13:33,880 --> 01:13:38,280
Speaker 1: I will respond. And if you enjoy this episode, please

1198
01:13:38,280 --> 01:13:41,960
Speaker 1: share with friends on socials, subscribe to the podcast, rate

1199
01:13:42,040 --> 01:13:45,360
Speaker 1: and review it. Join the army at normalfolks dot us,

1200
01:13:45,640 --> 01:13:49,519
Speaker 1: consider becoming a premium member. There any and all of

1201
01:13:49,560 --> 01:13:52,680
Speaker 1: these things that will help us grow an army of

1202
01:13:52,800 --> 01:13:57,519
Speaker 1: normal folks. I'm fill quirk. Until next time, do what

1203
01:13:57,640 --> 01:14:00,880
Speaker 1: you can