[Al Skierkiewicz]

I was in my car on the way to work when I heard a small plane crashed into the first tower. Traffic seemed very heavy after that. I made it into work and turned the corner into the shop. The monitor was on a live news feed just as the second plane hit. I remember thinking this was no accident. I was assigned on a remote production the station was working on. Our location was a bar in Chicago south of the loop. I tried to convince the producer that we should postpone but he wouldn't hear of it so we packed and headed out to the site. When we arrived the TV at the bar was on. I remember it was an old Sony, in need of a new picture tube and a better antenna. We continued to set up for the scenes we were scheduled to shoot. It was dark in the bar and we had trouble finding power and place to run cables. Around 11 I received a call to return to the station and assist with live news and commentary with phone interviews, intercity live shots, etc. By the time a cab would come for me, downtown Chicago had been evacuated, Sears Tower being one of the proposed targets. The cab had to drive through downtown and there was no one, it looked like an early Sunday morning. The cab driver asked if I had a preference to get back to the station as the expressways were jammed. We elected to take Lake Shore Drive and began our drive north along the lake. I remember the drive was peaceful and relaxing. The sun was shining and the water was calm. There were very few vehicles during that drive and I remember the car radio was on. Traffic reports stated that there was a three hour travel time to O'Hare airport about 15 miles away due to all the traffic. I made it back to the station in record time and stayed at the station for the rest of the day.
I heard later that a transmitter engineer for WNET (PBS) was at the top of one of the towers working on their transmitter. Knowing there was no way for him to escape he used his cell phone to say goodbye to those he loved. I also received a report that several fellow IBEW union brothers working on the towers, also perished.
I think I was most disturbed to find out about the flight from Washington that struck the Pentagon was carrying a group of young students to a National Geographic ecology conference. I remember thinking that the terms we were using were all wrong. Even 'coward' doesn't seem to fit the people who would use innocents to further their beliefs.
In the weeks and months that followed, people in Sears changed their habits. They began looking people in the eye and engaging them in conversation in elevators. They wanted to be sure you weren't another terrorist trying to take down a building. They wanted to know who you were and what you were doing. It was actually kind of nice.