Garth Feeney was at the Risk Waters conference at Windows on the World. He phoned his mother after Flight 11 hit, and explained "The floor was filled with very dense smoke. Feeney and 70 other people had been ushered into a corner of the building where there was less smoke. He said he wasn't sure he would make it out of the building."[1]
Damian Meehan called his brother from the 92nd floor, "It's really bad here-- the elevators are gone." His brother urged him to go to the office entrance and see if there was smoke there. When Damian put the phone down, his brother could hear the commotion but not panic. Damian returned after a few minutes and said that the "front entrance was filled with smoke". His brother urged him to "get to the stairs, see where the smoke is coming from, go the other way." Damian said "We've go to go" or "We're going." But all the stairwells were blocked at that floor. He and the other 69 people on the floor were stuck and could not evacuate. (but one was open on 91st floor)[2][3]
In all, there were 18 people on the 91st floor. Mike McQuaid and hist electrician crew of five were working on the 91st floor. This was two floors below the impact. Two of the stairwells were completely destroyed, but the one on the northwest side of the building was passable. 11 people working for the American Bureau of Shipping (the only tenant, with the other space on the floor vacant) were able to escape, along with some artist(s) who occupied vacant space.[4]
Gerry Wertz (who was on his way to the 93rd floor) was stuck on the elevator at the 91st floor, "he jumped from the car onto the ground, the ceiling and wallboards had collapsed, behind them the elevator seemed to disintegrate"[5]
George W. Sleigh, a naval architect with the American Bureau of Shipping, escaped from the 91st floor. "It took about an hour to get to the bottom of the building. Once I got out of the stairwell, I realized what a devastating thing this was, I could look out on the plaza, and there were piles of rubble everywhere and fires burning."[6]
Anne Prosser, at 8:45, she rode the elevator to the 90th floor of Tower 1, to her office. As the doors opened, she heard what seemed like an explosion. She didn't know it, but the first plane had just hit several floors above her. "I got thrown to the ground before I got to our suite," she said. "I crawled inside. Not everybody was at work." She said she tried to leave but there was so much debris in the air she couldn't breathe. Port Authority rescuers finally steered her to a stairway.
Dianne DeFontes was on the 89th floor when the plane crashed into her building. The crash blew open the double doors to the law firm where DeFontes' worked, split them in two and knocked her off her chair.[7] Those who started walking from above the 78th floor "sky lobby" did not have a straight shot to the bottom on one stairway. Some found themselves at a dead end and had to re-enter dark, smoke-filled floors to find another stairwell to continue the trek down. Dianne DeFontes just followed the stranger in front of her. "You're going to get out, you're going to get out, you're going to get out," she repeated to herself.[7] As she came down the stairwell, "pipes started to explode and water came running down the stairs"[8]
Adam Mayblum, a broker who'd tramped down from the 87th floor, soaked his T-shirt with bottled water, ripped it in pieces and distributed it to friends who used the cloths as masks. At about the 20th floor, the sprinkler system had turned on. Water ran down the stairs, sloshing into people's shoes, slowing them down.[7]
Louis Lesce was on the 86th floor, when American Airlines Flight 11 crashed into the building.[8]
Nicholas Scinicariello worked for the Port Authority on the 86th floor of Tower One. "I saw the plane come in. My office faces north. I just finished my coffee and I heard my friend say, 'Oh no, oh no.' This plane was coming right at us, then it went up and hit the upper floors. I opened the door to my office. The fire alarms were all going off, the fire doors were jammed because the building had been wracked. I finally made it to one of the stairwells. The lights started to flicker on and off. The stairwells were flooded. Firemen were passing us on the way up."[9]
Tim Snyder, who worked on the 85th floor, "We heard this huge 'whoosh' sound. The building started to shake. Our first assumption was it must have been a bomb. We saw this huge pile of debris falling out the window," said Snyder. "For a moment we weren't sure the building would stay standing."[10]
A survivor from a floor in the 80s: "The entire corridor became an inferno outside our front door. Smoke began to enter our office. There was also debris falling... The fire on the corridor was at least 10 ft high, and it ran the ... good length of the corridor. Then I saw a fireball come down the elevator shaft and blew the elevator doors. The fireball came right at me, it was a really bright color."[11]
Jeff Benjamin was on the 83rd floor when he "observed an approaching aircraft (American Airlines Flt.11) from a distance of aprox. 3-4 miles. At the time we initially spotted the plane, it appeared to be level with us. We could distinctly identify the American airlines insignia and my client commented that perhaps the plane had taken off from Kennedy and was experiencing mechanical problems. As the plane approached us it seemed to climb. I stood up from the conference table and walked over to the window assuming as everyone did that there was no imminent danger. As the plane came closer we could see that it was traveling at a high rate of speed and the sound of the engines intensified. Immediately before impact we could see images in the cockpit and the plane banked sharply. A split second later we heard an echoing shot, fell to the floor and observed a fireball followed by debris which struck the side of the building. At the same time you could feel the building sway every so slightly for a brief moment. We immediately retreated towards the main part of the office where we noticed a huge fireball shooting out of the elevator shaft which quickly disappeared..."[12]
Kamran Rafieyan was also on the 83rd floor, "We heard kind of a last-second weird rumble noise, and then there was an incredible crash and explosion. The whole building rocked, and a number of ceiling tiles crashed to the floor. I remember being rather stunned and wondering if I should dive under my desk. A number of people screamed and somebody yelled, “I think a plane just hit the building!” I looked out the window and saw flaming debris falling past the window, in an almost surreal and slow motion manner."[13] "We suddenly see gasoline streaming down all of our windows, now people started panicking we got to leave, no matter what."[14] "The 78th floor was a disaster, with collapsed ceilings, broken elevators, smoke, and people quickly piling in from the upper floors. There was a bit more panic here, as some of the stairways were not accessible. Eventually we found the next stairway and started heading down that."[13]
Michael Wright was on the 81st floor, in the restroom, when the plane crashed. He described damage including that the marble facade on opposite wall in men's restroom was shattered, with crack in drywall behind, and the floor had buckled. In the hallway, chunks of roof were falling, the facing wall was ripped open, and the elevator doors had blown out. Every joining surface was awry, every hinge was twisted or bent. A crater opened in the floor in front of him, exposing wires, pipes, girders and beams at least ten floors below. Acrid smoke poured out of the elevator shafts, and he could smell burning fuel.[15]
John Cerqueira and Mike Ben Fanter were working on the 81st floor of 1 World Trade Center when they felt the collision. "People were freaking out," said Mr. Fanter, a sales manager. "I tried to get them in the center of the office. About 40 people. I led them to the hall down the steps." He continued: "We stopped on the 68th floor. I could hear people screaming. There was a woman in a wheelchair. John and I carried her down from the 68th floor to the 5th floor, where we got out. We started to see people jumping from the top of the World Trade Center."[16]
Norbert Peat was on the 79th floor, waiting for an elevator. When the elevator doors opened, a blast of heat and smoke sent him staggering backward. He had just made a delivery a few floors below, had never been in the building before. Where was the fire exit? He thought of his 7-month-old son. "OK, God, it's you and me now," he prayed. "You got to help me through this." He tried one door, then another — both locked. A third swung open, and he was in a stairwell walking down.[7]
Fred Segro, a manager at Martin Progressive, described the impact, "the paneled ceiling collapsed, the floor trembled, and the sprinklers turned on" Nearby, a pregnant secretary named Julie was splattered with a large plate-glass window that pushed her back, hitting her head on the desk behind her. Segro had worked with her only three weeks. He didn't even know her last name, but he offered to help her. He wrapped his tie and a paper towel around her cut wrist, put another paper towel on her cut head. As they started down the stairs, Segro was amazed how calm people were. People stepped aside for the injured. Two men were carrying a woman down. Many were bleeding from their heads and arms. "I remember this one guy, a black man, his skin was burned off . . . he was totally pink on his arms, legs, the sides of his face."[17]
Erik Ronningen was on the 71st floor when "suddenly, and without warning the entire tower jolted south then snapped north, wrenched back and yanked north yet again, staggering like a drunk that had tripped and was struggling to regain his balance. People walking or standing were thrown to the floor while the rest of us hung on for dear life. I thought the tower was going to snap at its base and topple over like an extension ladder. The roar from somewhere above assaulting our ears sounded like an express freight train crossing an old railroad trestle. A huge flaming red and bright orange fireball came whooshing, blistering down and exploded not 25 feet outside my windows. Then the blizzard began. A blizzard of paper and debris forced out of the upper tower from the explosion, so intense I could no longer see New York Harbor, or east out over Queens and the Atlantic Ocean beyond. The floor began to fill with smoke, and the carpets with water flooding out of the freight elevator shaft. And from all around, the cry of people yelling to evacuate the building."[18]
Ezra Aviles' office had a window facing to the north. He "saw the plane tearing through the skies, heading straight for the tower. It had crashed into the building over his head -- how far, he was not sure." As a Port Authority employee, he worked to alert police and other authorities, making phone calls. He called one colleague, John Paczkowski, and left a message, "It seems to be an American Airlines jetliner came in from the northern direction, toward - from the Empire State Building, towards us." Aviles also called the Port Authority COO, "Smoke is beginning to come, so I think I'm gonna start bailing outta here, man... Don't come near the building if you're outside. Pieces are coming down, man. Bye."[19][20]
On the ground level, Michael DeVito was just entering the north tower lobby. He was late for his job on the 77th floor. As he walked into the lobby, he felt a huge explosion. A massive blast of air struck him. He guessed it was a suitcase bomb, but apparently it was air from the plane crash shooting down the elevator shafts. Black smoke filled the lobby. DeVito stumbled outside. He looked up to see flames shooting from the building. People were jumping out of windows.[17]
Dave Kravette had come down to the lobby from his Cantor Fitzgerald office to escort guests into the building. After exiting the elevator, he "heard a tremendous crash and what sounded like elevator cars free-falling. Then he saw a fireball blow out of a shaft. Around him, people dived to the ground. He froze and watched the fireball fold back on itself."[21]
A witness, talking to CNN, in a clip taken before the collapse of the South Tower, but broadcast ~11:10 a.m. - "I was in the basement, it came down, all of the sudden the elevator blew up, smoke, I dragged the guy out, his skin was hanging off, I just dragged him out and helped him out to the ambulance."