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Student reflects on 9/11

By Jon Amell

On December 14, 2009

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It's been eight years since the Sept.11 attacks on the World Trade Center, but for one student the attacks are still as real as they were the day it happened, when he was a mile and a half away from them.

Matt McClellan was in seventh grade when the attacks happened and he can remember everything like it was yesterday.

He said he was sitting in class when a friend came up to him and told him that the Empire State Building was hit. After looking out the window and seeing no smoke or anything from the building he didn't think much of it until the principal of his school spoke to students.

"Five minutes later we heard the principal come over the PA system and said, ‘Ladies and gentleman, stay calm; the World Trade Centers have just been hit,'" said McClellan, a 20-year-old, junior communications major from New York City, N.Y.

Overcome with emotion McClellan looked at his friend whose father worked in the World Trade Center. "I dropped my jaw to the ground and looked at my friend because his father works on the 102^nd floor of the building," said McClellan.

With the school being so close to the attack the kids were kept in class for another hour and then were evacuated into the school yard to wait for their parents to pick them up.

"My parents picked me up at noon and brought me home and I remember I was hysterically crying because I didn't know what was going on. We turned on Fox News and we were able to see reruns of the World Trade Center fall the whole time."

McClellan said he could have never imagined the two biggest buildings in New York City collapsing. He then thought about his aunt who worked in 7 World Trade which collapsed a couple hours after the first two towers fell. Thankfully she wasn't in work that day. McClellan then thought about his friends who had parents who worked there and again thankfully they were not in the building at that time due to meetings.

"It definitely hit home for me because my aunt worked in 7 World Trade which collapsed two hours later and the only reason she wasn't in the building was because her daughter was sick that day and she missed the train to work," he said.

The aftermath of the attacks really amazed McClellan because the city residents came together and helped each other out.

"It was amazing how it all happened, people always say New York City isn't a heartwarming place and people don't really care about each other, but people just came together and brought people into their houses. We actually brought in one of my best friends and his parents because they were three blocks away from the World Trade Center and they couldn't go back to their house for about six months."

McClellan is in the corps at Norwich and pursuing a military career. The experience of the attack was a big reason to why he came to Norwich.

"It was just amazing to see the whole city come together and work as a team to bring the city back together and show that we care about each other, that's what put me in a military state of mind," he said.