On the morning of September 11, 2002, I was crossing Midtown Manhattan as the clock neared the moment, one year earlier, when the first plane struck the North Tower of the World Trade Center. Along the way, I watched construction workers slowly put down their tools and join pedestrians lining the sidewalks. By 8:46 am, I had reached Grand Central Terminal. In its great hall, where hundreds of people are normally in constant motion, travelers stopped and stood silently beneath the massive domed ceiling. The familiar buzz of Manhattan vanished. The stillness lasted only a few moments before people began moving again, as New Yorkers always do.
After 9/11: The Folly and the Glory
