Terror Attack!

September 11, 2001 – WTC went down

Early morning September 11: Everyone in New York City woke up with no concern, like always. The traffic was running like usually, the sun was shining, and it seemed like a good day. But that did not last long. What happened yesterday is the most extreme thing that has happened since Pearl Harbor. The World Trade Center came crumbling down after what seems to be a terrorist attack.

Within three hours, both the World Trade Center buildings had collapsed after being hit by hijacked airplanes. At 08.20 (local time) the flight control got the first sign that something was wrong. The transponder signal disappeared. The first flight, an American Airlines Flight 11 (Boeing 767) hit the north side of the northern main tower at 08.46. With a speed limit about 790 km/h, the flight hit the World Trade Center between the 94th and the 98th floor. The planes thereby hit right in to the center of the building, where the fuel led to an intense fire.

Not long after the first flight hit the tower, the next one did too (09.03). The plane, also a Boeing 767, hit the south side of the southern tower, with a speed of about 980 km/h. The plane hit the building between the 78th and the 84th floor, which also led to an intense fire. But it did not stop there. Another Boeing 757 flew into the west side of The Pentagon. Luckily it mostly hit empty offices, but 64 persons on the flight, and 125 employees in Pentagon were killed.

Then the southern tower collapsed at 09.59, almost 55 minutes after it was hit. The area around the buildings was covered in grey/white clouds of powdered plaster and concrete. During this horrible incident a fourth plane crashed into a field in Pennsylvania, at 10.03. The northern tower collapsed half an hour after the first one. That means one hour and 42 minutes after the first plane hit the tower. Later that day, around 17.20 the 7th building collapsed. The building got damaged when the main towers fell.

19 members of Al-Qaida, led by the engineer Mohammed Atta, conducted the attacks. They planned this for many years, and many of the terrorists had studied at American flight schools. Everyone of them died, in addition to 2973 people. Of the victims 246 people died on the planes, 2602 in the towers and at the ground, 125 in Pentagon, 343 firefighters in New York, and 23 policemen.

The man in front of the picture above was really scared. He ran the second he saw the plane coming towards the towers.

- I had no idea what was going on. I just saw the plane, and began to run. The moment the plane hit the tower, everybody was screaming and running. It was a huge mess, and maybe this will lead to something bigger later, he said.

Sources:

http://stinemalin.wix.com/english-1stua#!Everythings-All-Messed-Up/cu6k/54f324e90cf257e2bffb879f

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/September_11_attacks

Wikipedia, September 11 attacks

http://www.history.com/topics/9-11-attacks

History Channel, 9-11-attacks

Downloaded 12.11.15

Pictures:

http://ndla.no/nb/node/108777

Ndla

#terror #911