Little did I know how the ‘93 WTC bombing would lead to a Port Authority rebuilding effort that saved countless lives, including my own, on 9/11.
In ‘93, trapped in an elevator with eight fellow workers, we managed to get out, and safely walked down 58 flights of stairs in total darkness, with one hand extended to hold on to the person’s shoulder in front. Imagine this chain of nine “blind” individuals, taking a lot of time to descend from the 58th floor to light and street level.
As part of the rebuilding effort that followed, we installed emergency backup lighting in all stairwells and photoluminescent paint strips on the edge of each step to provide for speedier and safer egress. We also renovated the lobby of the Vista Hotel, which by 9/11 had become the Marriott.
To open up a portion of the hotel’s second floor, so that more natural light could enter the street level lobby, we installed 80” deep steel girders to support an enlarged entrance area.
Fastforward to 9/11: That morning, I was sitting in my office on the 72nd floor when the first aircraft hit 20 floors above. I could feel the building oscillating back and forth several times, and, at first, thought that the building’s movement was due to an earthquake. It wasn’t until I saw out of the south window wall a ball of fire coming from above and parabolically falling on the roof of the Marriott Hotel, that I realized something other than an earthquake had occurred.
Conditioned by the ’93 bombing, we left the 72nd floor and started to walk down a lighted and undamaged stairwell. However, unlike ’93, we were not descending in total darkness. So, it was a much speedier and safer egress.
Eventually about a dozen of us ended up in the lobby of the Marriott. To find a place where we could sit and talk about what we should do, we walked south along the lobby’s inside wall. At that point, we did not know that Tower Two had also been hit earlier during our stairwell descent; and, we had no clue that, at that precise moment, the building was collapsing on the hotel and on us. Because the Tower floors pancaked as they fell on each other, the air in between the floors had to go somewhere. At street level, this extreme rush of air acted like a gigantic bomb.
The lobby windows suddenly exploded inward. A tremendous force of wind picked us up and flung us like leaves. I thought: This is it! Everything went dark, and the air became extremely sooty. Lying on my belly, I reached down to feel the rest of my limbs. I got a handkerchief to help me filter the difficult-to-breathe air. Everything was intact. My eyes burned. But, I was OK.
In that chaos, in that sooty darkness within the lobby and within that ash-gray outside, some of us worked our way south to Battery Park. That’s when I looked back. Stunned, I thought: Where was Tower Two? I could not compute. With its upper floors still burning and still spuing clouds of black smoke, Tower One was still standing, but there was no Tower Two. Then, a few minutes later, to my utter horror, Tower One came down.
Back at a make-shift office in NJ, I figured out what had saved us in the hotel lobby. With the emergency backup stairwell lighting in place, we were able to walk down to street level in minutes rather than hours. And, miraculously, we happened to be beneath those very same girders that we had installed after the ‘93 bombing! Acting like giant umbrellas, the girders shielded us from the rain of falling debris!
It was hard for me to come to terms with the tragedy that transpired that morning and why we made it out alive while others did not. If we had been 10 yards in any other direction, surely in the lobby, we would have died. I was full of both gratitude and sorrow.
And, personally, I had pangs of survival guilt. Yet, so much was happening in the days immediately following 9/11 that there was no time to dwell on these thoughts.
For many of us, adrenaline surged and duty called. A lot of work needed to be identified, planned and accomplished.
Diving into the rescue, recovery and rebuilding efforts helped me mask these feelings and thoughts. That was until I started to recount my story and share it with others. This story-telling activity morphed into an ongoing series entitled “Report from Ground Zero”. Every time I spoke, my voice cracked less in severity, and less often.
A couple of months after 9/11, a former Executive Director and his daughter, came to visit the site to see the progress. Here are Karen Goldmark’s observations:
"The sadness and disbelief that this part of our lives (yours more than mine) is gone is difficult. But what I saw also left me with a strange feeling of hope. More than the wreckage, I noticed people working. I felt a purposeful energy of lives dedicated to rising to this challenge. The wound is huge, but today I saw the healing effort is just as big. I must add that I never viewed cranes and bulldozers as instruments of healing before…"
Can you imagine: Viewing construction equipment as instruments of healing?
It was not only the construction equipment but also the operators who exemplified Teddy Roosevelt’s apt adage: “Working hard at work worth doing”. These operators were also aided by hard working engineers, architects, rescue workers, and other construction laborers - some - from all over the country – all working hard to accomplish a common goal.
It was clear to PA staff that we had a cause. The 16 acre site was not a blank slate. We needed: to respectfully clear it; to plan for the Memorial and Museum; to plan for rebuilding office towers, retail spaces and a permanent train station.
Of these, our immediate project focus was getting commuters back directly to the WTC. With sheer determination, we finished the Interim WTC PATH Station, in record time!
Shakespeare said it: “Action is eloquence”; but, I believe that: Purposeful action is simply divine.
Looking back after 25 years, we owe it to the families of all the souls lost, to all those lost since, to ourselves, to the city, to the region and to the world.
By remembering the acts of February 26, 1993 and September 11, 2001, both tragic and heroic; and, by remembering how unified we were, working hard at work worth doing, we continue to renew our spirit, and, in turn, our willingness to serve others.
Thank you!
Francis Lombardi
Chief Engineer, PANYNJ, 1995-2010
Assistant Chief Engineer, PANYNJ, 1992-1995
