Students remember 9/11

Although they were just in fourth grade when terrorists flew planes into the World Trade Center twin towers and the Pentagon, Woodward High School seniors know that the events of Sept. 11, 2001 are “definitely something that will never be forgotten.”

“It something that will be in the history books for the rest of time,” Travis McGowan said.

But these students don’t need history books to remember that day eight years ago.

“We witnessed it,” Shelby Roach said.

Both Roach and McGowan were watching televised news coverage when the second plane, United Airlines Flight 175, struck the south tower at 9:03 a.m. (EDT).

“I was staying in Oklahoma City, my aunt was watching me,” McGowan said. “I was sleeping on the couch and when I woke up my brother told me we are under attack. That scared me because I thought it was there in the city. And as soon as I woke up, then the second plane hit.

“I didn’t know what to think, I was a little kid,” he said, noting that it seemed somewhat surreal. “Everyday of your life you go by and nothing like that happens; it seemed like it was a joke.”

“I remember parents picking up all their kids at Highland Park,” Roach said, noting “my parents picked my little sister and I up from school and took us to her (mom’s) work.” she said.

“We were watching it on TV and we saw it,” she said of the second plane crash. “I thought they were in the city (Oklahoma City), too. I didn’t know it was in New York, because I didn’t comprehend that; I was in fourth grade.

“It was scary.”

Angela Briscoe and Lupe Rojas were attending school in other towns, but can remember how consuming the television coverage was and how everything else was forgotten.

“I was in school in Kansas and we didn’t do anything the whole day,” Rojas said. “We just watched videos of it on the news and replays and stuff.”

“I was in Fargo in class and they took us all to the lunchroom. They had a TV in there and we watched it,” Briscoe said. “Then they let us out early and sent us home.”

“I was like the only one who didn’t see anything,” Caleb Alexander said, noting that at Horace Mann Elementary “it was like a normal day of school.”

But it all changed when his mother came to pick him up from school.

“She seemed different,” he said. “Then we went straight to a gas station. There were so many cars lined up. I was like ‘what’s up?’ My mom said something about we had a terrorist attack.

“At the time, I didn’t really understand what she meant by that,” Alexander said, noting “it was all kind of a blur until it got straightened out later on and everything had been told in detail.”

However, he said he does remember how the city of Woodward “was so far away, but it was panicking.”

“It’s weird how it affect(ed) people on the opposite side of the country,” Rojas said. “It (didn’t) matter how close you were, it stop(ped) people at work, whatever they were doing. It affects everybody.”

“My family was scared because we have a lot of military (members),” Alexander said. “We didn’t know what to think of it, maybe World War III or something was going to break out

“It seemed like everybody was glued to the television, trying to get some word of hope from the announcer … because nobody knew what was going to happen,” McGowan said.

Even though eight years have passed, the seniors said the event remains frightening.

“It gets definitely scarier every year,” McGowan said, after the students noted that they learn a little more about the events of that day each year.

“It gets to us,” Briscoe said of watching the images from that day. “I think what was bad about it is when you were watching video of it when you were young, you didn’t understand and then you look at it today and see people jumping from windows and you realize how bad it was.”

“I can’t imagine what those families feel like,” Alexander said. “There were so many people involved in it and not (just) the people involved in the towers but the firefighters and others.”

He and the other students said they feel it is important, especially on the anniversary of that day, to take time to remember all those who were involved, including those affected when American Airlines Flight 77 crashed into the Pentagon and the passengers aboard United Airlines Flight 93.

“I wonder why sometimes, the Pentagon got hit too and it seems like the twin towers always overshadow that,” McGowan said. “It’s always about the World Trade Center and I don’t know if that’s because there’s more video footage of it, more reports on it or that more people were killed, but you never hear much about what happened at the Pentagon.”

“There was Flight 93 too, people got killed there too and at the Pentagon,” Alexander said.

He noted that he feels like Sept. 11 “should be a new holiday” as a time for all Americans to remember the events of that tragic and earth-shattering day.