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Mark's 9am Monologue. · The Mark Simone Show

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  Speaker 1: Mark Simone on 710WOR. Well, I hate this day every year,
• 0:14
  Speaker 1: looking back, reliving that horrible, awful nightmare that day. But
• 0:20
  Speaker 1: it's the 25th anniversary of the ceremony taking place at
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  Speaker 1: the World Trade Center right now. It'll take place also
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  Speaker 1: at the Pentagon, Shanksville, Pennsylvania. It's the 25th anniversary. Pearl Harbor,
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  Speaker 1: they still do it every year. It's 85 years later.
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  Speaker 1: On December 7th this year, they'll have a full ceremony.
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  Speaker 1: It's a big thing in Hawaii, all over television. Officials
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  Speaker 1: even from Japan come to be at it with apologies.
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  Speaker 1: But it's 85 years later at Pearl Harbor. They still
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  Speaker 1: do it every year. This will be the first year,
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  Speaker 1: by the way, that there's not a single survivor left. Well,
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  Speaker 1: the World Trade Center... 25 years later, we look back
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  Speaker 1: on it throughout the morning. We'll have a lot of
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  Speaker 1: people that covered it that were there. I'll never forget
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  Speaker 1: that day, that morning. A lot of people on the radio,
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  Speaker 1: you know, television, of course, covering it, but a lot
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  Speaker 1: of people on the radio that stayed on for hours
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  Speaker 1: and hours and hours covering it. We'll talk to some
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  Speaker 1: of them. I was at the other place at the time.
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  Speaker 1: Curtis was over there doing the morning show. We had
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  Speaker 1: a great newsman, George Weber. And as soon as it happened,
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  Speaker 1: George Weber, great newsman, grabbed his recorder. We didn't have
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  Speaker 1: iPhones then. It was 25 years ago. It was kind
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  Speaker 1: of a big, he had cell phones, just basic cell phones.
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  Speaker 1: But he grabbed a recorder and a microphone and he
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  Speaker 1: went down there to cover it. And then we never
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  Speaker 1: heard from him again. He never called in. So it
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  Speaker 1: turned out the cell towers were all down. And he
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  Speaker 1: couldn't get a signal, but we didn't know what happened
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  Speaker 1: to him. It was hours and hours before we found
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  Speaker 1: out he was okay. You know, that was another thing
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  Speaker 1: that happened with the trade center going down. Everything got
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  Speaker 1: knocked out underground there. All the cell service, all the
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  Speaker 1: cable service, everything. That all had to be repaired overnight.
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  Speaker 1: It was an amazing 24 hours. Just the gloomiest time
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  Speaker 1: in New York. Everybody frightened. We didn't know what was
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  Speaker 1: coming next. The First tower was hit. Everybody assumed it
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  Speaker 1: was an airplane accident. A pilot went out of control.
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  Speaker 1: The second plane hit. We knew it wasn't an accident,
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  Speaker 1: that it was deliberate. There was a moment where the
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  Speaker 1: first tower fell and it was gone. And then I remember,
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  Speaker 1: I remember I was watching NBC at the time. I
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  Speaker 1: forget who the anchor was. Maybe it was Brian Williams.
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  Speaker 1: And they showed it and they said, from now on,
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  Speaker 1: there'll only be one tower. not knowing that a half
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  Speaker 1: hour later, the other tower would fall. Warner Wolf, we'll
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  Speaker 1: talk to him later in the show. He was covering
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  Speaker 1: it live. He was on with Imus. Warner lived right now,
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  Speaker 1: right near the World Trade Center. He could watch it
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  Speaker 1: from his window. He was the one talking about the
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  Speaker 1: tower going down. Warner? It's gone. What? It's gone. What's gone?
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  Speaker 1: The tower. It's gone. It's gone. It collapsed. It's gone.
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  Speaker 1: It's not there. The whole tower. The whole tower. It's gone.
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  Speaker 1: There's only one tower. Oh, God. This is horrible. It's gone.
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  Speaker 1: It's not there. It's like it disappeared. It just collapsed. Now,
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  Speaker 1: there was an architect that in 1965, that's when it started,
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  Speaker 1: the project. In 1965, he designed the World Trade Center towers.
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  Speaker 1: And he made them strong enough to withstand a plane crash.
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  Speaker 1: And the reason he did that is a plane had
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  Speaker 1: once hit the Empire State Building in the 40s. So
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  Speaker 1: he made sure these towers could withstand a plane crash.
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  Speaker 1: But it was 1965. There were no 747s then. The
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  Speaker 1: biggest plane was a 727. So he calculated how much
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  Speaker 1: fuel was on that plane and how much it could
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  Speaker 1: burn or explode, and he based it on that. He
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  Speaker 1: didn't know that in the next couple of decades there
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  Speaker 1: would be much bigger planes with much more fuel And
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  Speaker 1: it was enough to burn and melt down the whole tower. Now,
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  Speaker 1: the good thing is when he designed the World Trade
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  Speaker 1: Center towers, there's different ways of architecture. You could build
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  Speaker 1: it so the building would topple over, or you could
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  Speaker 1: build it in a certain way that would make it,
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  Speaker 1: instead of toppling, what they call pancake. It would come
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  Speaker 1: straight down. And luckily, he chose that method of architecture
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  Speaker 1: because had it toppled, It would have gone for many, many,
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  Speaker 1: many blocks and taken out lots of other buildings. But instead,
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  Speaker 1: it pancaked down. And I had a friend who was
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  Speaker 1: a demolition expert. They brought him in right afterwards to
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  Speaker 1: figure out the cleanup. And he said when he got there,
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  Speaker 1: walking through, they call it rubble. It was basically just
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  Speaker 1: dirt and dust. And he said, where's the glass? Where's
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  Speaker 1: the pieces of metal? He said, I've never seen one
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  Speaker 1: of these where there isn't. pieces of metal, pieces of glass.
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  Speaker 1: He said it was 100 stories of offices. There should
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  Speaker 1: be typewriters here. There should be metal all over the place.
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  Speaker 1: And there wasn't. That's how strong that fire was. It
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  Speaker 1: just melted everything down. Back then, there were big, huge,
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  Speaker 1: heavy metal typewriters. Everything was just melted into dust, into powder.
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  Speaker 1: That's why identifying bodies and all that was impossible. It
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  Speaker 1: had to be done through, you'd have to find a
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  Speaker 1: speck of dust that had some DNA in it. There
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  Speaker 1: were almost 3,000 people killed. They've identified, I think, about
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  Speaker 1: 1,900 of them. But they got like another 900 to
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  Speaker 1: go that haven't been identified yet. There's a part of
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  Speaker 1: the city medical lab. That's all they do in there,
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  Speaker 1: this handful of guys. They go through every particle, every
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  Speaker 1: piece of dust, looking for DNA, trying to identify who
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  Speaker 1: perished there. And they still got about 800, 900 to go.
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  Speaker 1: And they swear they'll never give up. Every so often,
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  Speaker 1: they find a piece of DNA and they're able to
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  Speaker 1: identify one more person. It's going to be a slow process.
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  Speaker 1: It's going to take a lot of years to get
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  Speaker 1: this done. Now, the time after that, after 9-11, I
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  Speaker 1: was doing shows every day on 9-11, interviewing people. And
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  Speaker 1: I remember interviewing everybody involved. There was Vice President Cheney.
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  Speaker 1: I remember interviewing him. He was in the White House.
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  Speaker 1: President Bush, you'll remember, was in Florida doing a little
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  Speaker 1: speech to some kids in a classroom. Cheney was in
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  Speaker 1: the White House. The plane hit. They came in and
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  Speaker 1: they told him he should be moved to a bunker,
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  Speaker 1: a secure bunker. He said, no, no, I'm going to
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  Speaker 1: stay up here. He didn't want to go underground yet.
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  Speaker 1: And every time something happened, the Secret Service would come
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  Speaker 1: back in and say, I think we should move you
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  Speaker 1: to the bunker. And he said, no, no, no, I'm
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  Speaker 1: going to stay here. I'm going to stay here. And
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  Speaker 1: this happened a bunch of times. Then he told me
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  Speaker 1: One time, about 15 of them came in and just
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  Speaker 1: grabbed him. They didn't say a word. They just grabbed
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  Speaker 1: him and took him. And he said his feet were dangling.
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  Speaker 1: They weren't even touching the ground. They rushed him to
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  Speaker 1: the bunker. That's when the second plane hit. I asked
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  Speaker 1: him what the scariest thing was that day. Now, you
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  Speaker 1: might not remember this, but there were a lot of
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  Speaker 1: planes up in the air. Two planes hit the World
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  Speaker 1: Trade Center. A plane hit the Pentagon. There was another
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  Speaker 1: plane that was brought down in Shanksville, Pennsylvania. So that's
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  Speaker 1: four planes. They didn't know. How many other planes were
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  Speaker 1: going to be like that? How many other planes were
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  Speaker 1: targeting buildings? So they ordered every plane out of the sky.
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  Speaker 1: They ordered every pilot to land immediately, every pilot to
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  Speaker 1: land at the closest airport. And that started happening over
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  Speaker 1: about a half hour. And they were worried there was
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  Speaker 1: another plane up there that was going to attack. So
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  Speaker 1: Cheney said the scariest moment, he got on the phone
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  Speaker 1: with the FAA director. His name was Peñas. And he said,
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  Speaker 1: are they all out of the sky? He goes, we
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  Speaker 1: got some that are pilots aren't responding. We got a
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  Speaker 1: few that aren't responding. And Cheney said, the scariest moment
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  Speaker 1: was he said, well, how many, how many are not responding?
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  Speaker 1: And Pena said, 1200, 1200 up there that they couldn't
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  Speaker 1: get to land. Eventually I got them all down. And
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  Speaker 1: that was the final attack. I remember also interviewing, here's
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  Speaker 1: the other problem, a problem we had. We have, uh,
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  Speaker 1: all kinds of, uh, air force and, uh, fighter pilots
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  Speaker 1: and fighter jets and they're patrolling all over the world
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  Speaker 1: we didn't have any patrolling the the homeland we didn't
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  Speaker 1: have any patrolling here we never figured on an attack
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  Speaker 1: here so they had to quickly scramble some pilots and
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  Speaker 1: some jets they got a couple up in the air
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  Speaker 1: fighter fighter jets with pilots equipped with uh bombs and
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  Speaker 1: all of that but the one they got up in
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  Speaker 1: washington wasn't armed. It didn't have any missiles. It didn't
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  Speaker 1: have anything on it. It was just pilots up in
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  Speaker 1: the air. So that Shanksville plane was coming. They could
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  Speaker 1: see the path. They looked like it was coming for
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  Speaker 1: the White House. So the pilot was told to stop
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  Speaker 1: the plane that was coming. And he said, if you
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  Speaker 1: have to, you got to have to just hit it
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  Speaker 1: with your plane and just take it out that way.
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  Speaker 1: This pilot would have killed himself in the process. Eventually,
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  Speaker 1: they got another plane up there that could fire on
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  Speaker 1: that plane. It was an American Airlines plane that looked
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  Speaker 1: like it was headed to the White House, and they
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  Speaker 1: ordered that pilot to shoot it down when it got
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  Speaker 1: to a certain point. It was an American Airlines plane.
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  Speaker 1: Turned out this National Guard pilot up there was also
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  Speaker 1: in real life an American Airlines pilot. He would have
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  Speaker 1: to shoot down one of his co-workers. And he asked him,
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  Speaker 1: he said, could I just hit the wing? Could I
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  Speaker 1: disable it? And he said, no, you're going to have
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  Speaker 1: to shoot it down. It was a frightening thought. Now, luckily,
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  Speaker 1: the plane was brought down before it got anywhere near
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  Speaker 1: the White House. So they never had to shoot it
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  Speaker 1: out of the sky. But it was an incredible day.
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  Speaker 1: It just went on this nightmare all day long. Sean Hannity,
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  Speaker 1: the day before, September 10th, 2001, had just begun a
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  Speaker 1: new national radio show, which of course is on here
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  Speaker 1: every day, three to six. It's the most listened to
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  Speaker 1: radio show in America. He had just begun the show.
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  Speaker 1: First day was September 10th, 2001. So the second day
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  Speaker 1: of his big new national show, It's 9-11. Manhattan was closed. Remember,
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  Speaker 1: they closed all the bridges, all the tunnels. You couldn't
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  Speaker 1: get into the city. Sean lived out in Long Island.
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  Speaker 1: So he had to find a studio out in Long Island,
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  Speaker 1: do the show from there. And Curtis was on all
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  Speaker 1: morning and kept going. John Gambling was on. We were
• 11:03
  Speaker 1: all at the other station back then. They told me,
• 11:09
  Speaker 1: go to sleep. I said, go to sleep? Yeah. These
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  Speaker 1: guys are going to need reinforcements in seven or eight hours.
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  Speaker 1: So I went to sleep for a few hours because,
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  Speaker 1: sure enough, it turned out I went on the air
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  Speaker 1: at 10 o'clock that night. And by then, every radio
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  Speaker 1: station in America decided to take us, to take our
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  Speaker 1: programming because they weren't really equipped to cover New York
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  Speaker 1: City and 9-11. So we became national for the entire night.
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  Speaker 1: I went on about 10, stayed on until about 7
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  Speaker 1: in the morning. And it was quite a night. Rudy Giuliani...
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  Speaker 1: somehow got out of the World Trade Center area, found
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  Speaker 1: a command center. His actual command center was destroyed. It
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  Speaker 1: was near Ground Zero, but he found another command center
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  Speaker 1: to operate out of, and he was going to speak.
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  Speaker 1: I said, well, let's take that speech. It turned out
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  Speaker 1: it was amazing. He was like Churchill, reassuring the nation,
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  Speaker 1: calming everybody down. It was amazing. So he made one
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  Speaker 1: of those briefings every half hour we took it. every
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  Speaker 1: half hour throughout the night. And that's where Rudy really
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  Speaker 1: became America's mayor. Everybody was up. Nobody went to sleep
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  Speaker 1: that night. They were all listening to it, listening to him.
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  Speaker 1: It was, uh, it was, uh, a frightening night. It was,
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  Speaker 1: and then you remember the days after nine 11, actually
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  Speaker 1: the weeks and the months after nine 11, you were
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  Speaker 1: afraid to come into Manhattan. You're afraid to walk by
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  Speaker 1: any landmark. It was the empire state building. Everything could
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  Speaker 1: have been a target. You're afraid when you're on the
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  Speaker 1: bridge or the tunnel. Uh, I was also on New
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  Speaker 1: York one at the time and we started to do
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  Speaker 1: a daily show every day. I think it was at noon.
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  Speaker 1: We do an hour show where, uh, we'd reassure people.
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  Speaker 1: We had every expert on, uh, to talk about things. And, uh,
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  Speaker 1: we had grief counselors on, but, uh, I would ask
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  Speaker 1: them everything about what to worry. You know, people were
• 13:00
  Speaker 1: worried about being in the tunnel. We were worried about
• 13:03
  Speaker 1: more terrorist attacks, blowing up the tunnel, uh, One thing
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  Speaker 1: we learned from the experts, you're a little safer on
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  Speaker 1: a bridge. They can't really blow up a bridge. If
• 13:12
  Speaker 1: you're in a tunnel and you set off a huge explosive,
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  Speaker 1: you'll shatter the whole tunnel. If you do it on
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  Speaker 1: the bridge, it'll just go up into the air. Maybe,
• 13:20
  Speaker 1: maybe it might take out the concrete on the bridge,
• 13:22
  Speaker 1: but everybody was afraid to go anywhere. It was just frightening.
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  Speaker 1: And you'll remember, as soon as it was that night,
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  Speaker 1: police from all over the country came to New York
• 13:34
  Speaker 1: to help out. And remember, in New York City, in
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  Speaker 1: the coming weeks, there'd be military vehicles all over, in
• 13:41
  Speaker 1: every corner, every intersection. There'd be some kind of military,
• 13:45
  Speaker 1: a jeep, a tank, something there. And then there'd be
• 13:48
  Speaker 1: these police cars from all over the place, from Albany,
• 13:50
  Speaker 1: from Georgia, from Pennsylvania. All these cops came in to
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  Speaker 1: help out in New York. It was a frightening time.
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  Speaker 1: It was maybe, maybe nine, ten months before people felt
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  Speaker 1: safe walking around. It just never stopped. So today's the
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  Speaker 1: ceremony at, uh, the world trade center ground zero. I
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  Speaker 1: think it was Greg Kelly that first gave it the
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  Speaker 1: name ground zero. He was, he was on New York one.
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  Speaker 1: He was just a reporter at the time. And he
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  Speaker 1: was the first one to broadcast from there alive. And
• 14:22
  Speaker 1: he was a military guy. So he said ground zero.
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  Speaker 1: And then everybody at New York one started saying ground zero.
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  Speaker 1: And then that became the phrase ground zero. So today, uh,
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  Speaker 1: A very, very solemn ceremony. There's always been six moments
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  Speaker 1: of silence. They've added a seventh moment of silence, and
• 14:41
  Speaker 1: that'll be for those lost there, the victims. And a
• 14:51
  Speaker 1: little controversy. Mayor Mamdani will be there. I'm watching all
• 14:56
  Speaker 1: the screens. We don't see him yet. It's a very, uh, big, uh, ceremony,
• 15:01
  Speaker 1: a big problem. Security wise, you got a lot of
• 15:03
  Speaker 1: ex presidents there. In fact, all the living ex presidents
• 15:06
  Speaker 1: are there. Bill Clinton, uh, George W. Bush, Barack Obama,
• 15:12
  Speaker 1: Joe Biden. I guess he's still a living president, right? Barely,
• 15:18
  Speaker 1: but he's a living president. And then you've got a
• 15:20
  Speaker 1: mom Donnie there. A lot of controversy over that. And, uh,
• 15:25
  Speaker 1: Kathy Hochul is supposed to be there. A little controversy there.
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  Speaker 1: The Port Authority Police Union asked her not to come.
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  Speaker 1: There's some people that have some grievances with her about
• 15:36
  Speaker 1: all this stuff. But also September 11th, that day, it
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  Speaker 1: was Tuesday. It was a bright, sunny day. It was
• 15:46
  Speaker 1: primary day. It was primary election day. Candidates like Mark
• 15:50
  Speaker 1: Green were running for mayor. It was the primary election. And,
• 15:53
  Speaker 1: of course, it never happened that they had to be canceled. Now,
• 15:56
  Speaker 1: the day before was September 10th. It was a Monday.
• 16:02
  Speaker 1: And all of us doing talk radio on September 10th,
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  Speaker 1: the biggest story that we were all focused on was
• 16:08
  Speaker 1: a congressman named Gary Condent. Gary Condent was a good-looking
• 16:12
  Speaker 1: young congressman. And it turned out he was having an
• 16:16
  Speaker 1: affair with a young intern. Was her name Chandra Levy,
• 16:20
  Speaker 1: something like that, I think? He was having an affair
• 16:23
  Speaker 1: with this young, good-looking intern. Well, the young, good-looking intern
• 16:27
  Speaker 1: turned up dead in a field not far from Condit's house.
• 16:32
  Speaker 1: So everybody thought he had killed her. Now, it turned
• 16:34
  Speaker 1: out later this wasn't the case, but this is all
• 16:38
  Speaker 1: everybody was talking about on talk radio. And this guy,
• 16:41
  Speaker 1: no matter how hard he tried to prove his innocence,
• 16:44
  Speaker 1: he couldn't get it to stop. It was front-page news.
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  Speaker 1: It was the topic of every talk show night and day.
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  Speaker 1: September 11th happened. It wasn't mentioned again for about a year.
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  Speaker 1: So it changed everything. But that was the topic the
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  Speaker 1: day before. And then the next day, September 11th, we
• 17:03
  Speaker 1: knew what we'd be talking about 24-7 for many, many,
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  Speaker 1: many months. Hey, we'll take a break. We'll talk to
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  Speaker 1: some of the people that covered it live. We'll take
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  Speaker 1: some calls next if you want to talk about what
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  Speaker 1: you went through that day. 800-321-0710. Mark Simone here on
• 17:22
  Speaker 1: the 25th anniversary of 9-11.