'It feels like yesterday' - Families remember those lost on 9/11, 21 years later

Record ID: 1688401

  • Title: 'It feels like yesterday' - Families remember those lost on 9/11, 21 years later
  • Date: 11th September 2022
  • Summary: (SOUNDBITE) (English) DIANE MASSAROLI, WHO LOST HER HUSBAND, MICHAEL MASSAROLI, DURING THE 9/11 ATTACKS, SAYING: "I put on the TV in my son's room and we saw 1 World Trade Center (North Tower) on fire. And my son said, 'Isn't that daddy's building?' I said, 'Yeah, but everything will be fine.' I just rushed him off to school. I figured, let him be in school today because I didn't know what I was going to have to do." MASSAROLI HOLDING FLOWERS AND A PHOTOGRAPH OF HER HUSBAND (SOUNDBITE) (English) DIANE MASSAROLI, WHO LOST HER HUSBAND, MICHAEL MASSAROLI, DURING THE 9/11 ATTACKS, SAYING: "He worked at Cantor Fitzgerald on the 101st floor. That's actually how we met. He was my boss. I didn't work there at the time though. I also knew a lot of the coworkers when I had worked there, who had passed away. Oh he was the best person ever, best father, best husband, hard working, loved to bowl, just an awesome (person). That's why I go every year and I hold up his picture. Even with people that never knew him just to know him and remember his face because he was a life that was worth a lot." MASSAROLI (SOUNDBITE) (English) DIANE MASSAROLI, WHO LOST HER HUSBAND, MICHAEL MASSAROLI, DURING THE 9/11 ATTACKS, SAYING: "There's a build up over the summer with a little more anxiety every day to this point. It's just always an anxious day. And after the day's over, when I go home, then you're just, like, physically exhausted, like you ran a marathon. It's never changed at all. I thought maybe it would get less, people said that, never, it's exactly the same. The rest of the year you get by, but this time of year is exactly the same."
  • Embargoed: 25th September 2022 14:08
  • Keywords: 9/11 Twin Towers World Trade Center attacks
  • Location: NEW YORK, NEW YORK, UNITED STATES
  • City: NEW YORK, NEW YORK, UNITED STATES
  • Country: USA
  • Topics: Conflicts/War/Peace,International/National Security,United States
  • Reuters ID: LVA002452011092022RP1
  • Aspect Ratio: 16:9
  • Story Text: Twenty one years after hijacked airliners smashed into New York City's World Trade Center and the Pentagon outside Washington, Americans came together on Sunday (September 11) to honor the nearly 3,000 lives lost on Sept. 11, 2001.
    Relatives read aloud the names of 2,977 victims to the thousands who had gathered on the cool, clear morning.
    Diane Massaroli lost her husband Michael Massaroli, a 38-year-old vice president of operations for Cantor Fitzgerald.
    "It's just always an anxious day," she said. "After the day's over, when I go home, then you're just, like, physically exhausted, like you ran a marathon. It's never changed at all. I thought maybe it would get less, people said that, never, it's exactly the same. The rest of the year you get by, but this time of year is exactly the same."
    Michael Massaroli was on the 101st floor of 1 World Trade Center (North Tower) when he died, 21 years ago. Financial services company Cantor Fitzgerald lost 658 employees, two-thirds of its New York workforce, on Sept. 11, 2001.
    Sam Pulia, a retired Willow Springs, Illinois police chief, lost his cousin Thomas Casoria. Casoria was a firefighter who died in the North Tower during the 9/11 attacks.
    "It's a sad day," he said. "We all know exactly where we were when we saw the second plane more often than not hit the building and going, 'What the heck is going on here now?' When I got here on September 22nd, I couldn't believe what I was seeing. And then the news would show you some pictures. But when I got a ride down there that night, it was like, 'Hey, we're not in Kansas anymore, Toto.' It feels like yesterday. I don't think the image has ever dissipated of what we saw."
    Nearly 3,000 people were killed, including more than 2,600 at the World Trade Center, 125 at the Pentagon, and 265 on the four planes, on Sept. 11, 2001, when commercial airliners crashed into the New York World Trade Center Twin Towers, the Pentagon and, after passengers mounted a counterattack, a Pennsylvania field.
    (Production: Hussein Waaile, Roselle Chen)
  • Copyright Holder: REUTERS
  • Copyright Notice: (c) Copyright Thomson Reuters 2022. Open For Restrictions - http://about.reuters.com/fulllegal.asp
  • Usage Terms/Restrictions: Footage contains photographs or artwork. User is responsible for obtaining additional clearances before publishing this clip.
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