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“It was a Friday.”
Wayne Bush, a freelance carpenter who now lives in North Petersburgh, New York, recalls what happened on that particular Friday in 1993. He was working on the 84th floor of the World Trade Center; he no longer remembers which tower. He and his partner, Walt, had just finished a one-day job installing a chalkboard unit. It went quickly and they finished early; they were looking forward to going to Hop Kee’s in Chinatown for lunch.
They had to wait 45 minutes before getting a service elevator to take them and their dollie loaded with tools back down to the loading area on level B-1; with a building that tall such delays were commonplace but still annoying. The loading area was large, with a curved concrete loading dock spanning the space under the buildings. Around this curve were a series of tunnels, like spokes on a wheel, leading to the various facilities that constantly needed supplies. Opposite the concrete loading platform, beyond the spaces allocated for the large container trucks that used it were parking spaces for those with more modest vehicles to load and unload their equipment and supplies. You weren’t supposed to park there, but it was difficult to find parking for a construction van in that part of Manhattan. So he and Walt had parked there anyway. “That’s what you do to get the job done,” according to Wayne.
When they reached the loading area they opened the back of the van to load up. But Walt had another job that needed to be completed. “He took off to find a bathroom,” Wayne said, leaving him to finish loading the tools by himself.
“Next thing I knew I was waking up, face down, inside of my van.”
Wayne doesn’t know if he was momentarily knocked unconscious or was just dazed but he doesn’t remember feeling the shock of the explosion. As he awoke he turned his head and saw the dome light inside his van; that told him where he was. His first thought was that the roof had collapsed, but when he realized that wasn’t true he backed out slowly. Everything around him was black, but then as if on cue the emergency lights came on.
It looked eerie. The ceilings there were 20 feet high and “the first thing I saw was a layer of dust about two feet thick from the ceiling down, and watched it slowly settle to the ground.” All of the dust and debris that had collected over the years on the ledges, beams and wires had been shaken loose by the explosion.
There were four or five other people in the loading area near him and “everyone looked as dazed as I did.”
His next thought was, “I got to find Walt.” He listened for any creaking or other signs that the building might be collapsing, then threw the rest of his tools in his truck. He started it up and turned it around so it pointed towards the exit. Leaving the engine running, he went to look for Walt.
He found a Port Authority policeman nearby and asked him where the bathroom was on this level, explaining that he was looking for his friend. The officer went with him to help him search. They opened up a door; there was no light in the room beyond. Suddenly three kitchen workers from the Vista Hotel above came stumbling out. “Their white uniforms were now gray and black, and they had debris sticking in their skin like shrapnel,” Wayne recalled. He and the officer helped the three workers before continuing their search.
They attempted to go down another corridor, but everyplace was filling up with thick, black smoke. Wayne could hear periodic explosions from below; he later decided it must have been the fires burning up some of the cars on the B-2 level. Wayne took the bandana he was wearing off of his head and wrapped it around his face like a mask to help him breathe.
He had no sense of time, although it must have only been a few minutes since the original blast. Wayne reluctantly concluded that looking for Walt wasn’t working. The officer with him told him that if he wanted to get out he’d better do so now; soon the police and emergency workers would arrive and once they did he’d never be able to get his vehicle out of the garage. So Wayne got back in his van and drove up the ramp to the street level, thinking about Walt. He was also wondering what to tell Mary, Walt’s wife. Wayne had known her all of his life; they grew up in the same Long Island neighborhood just three houses apart. As he pulled out he saw the first fire truck responding to the emergency as it entered the loading dock area.
When Wayne pulled out onto the road, there was Walt, standing on the side of the street, jumping up and down as he saw the van emerging from the smoke. The bathroom on B-1 smelled terrible, so he had gone up to the concourse level to find another. After being knocked down by the blast Walt tried unsuccessfully to go back down the stairs. Then he walked around the building to the entrance of the loading area. Security wouldn’t let him go in, so he was pacing on the sidewalk, watching the black smoke pour out of the opening.
Wayne stopped and Walt jumped into the van. They headed away from the WTC and out of Manhattan. It wasn’t until they had reached Brooklyn that they stopped to find a pay phone to call Walt’s wife and let her know they were okay.
For the next year Wayne avoided large public places; every time he went to a mall all he could think about was how good a target it would be for a terrorist bomb. The fear eventually subsided but the memory lingered.
***********
On September 11th, 2001, Wayne was working by himself, repairing the roof of house on the shore of Babcock Lake. He had the radio on but was concentrating on the job at hand. Gradually he realized that they were saying something about a plane crashing into the World Trade Center. Thinking it was a radio show stunt, he went inside and turned on the customer’s television. The first thing he saw was a picture of one of the towers burning. Fifteen seconds later he saw the first tower collapse; continuing to watch as the second tower collapsed. Then he packed up his tools. When finished, he walked out on the dock at the back out the house. Sitting down on the edge he gazed out, thinking about how peaceful it was there. He also though about the chaos going on at the World Trade Center, and how many people could be dead or dying.
“I didn’t feel like working that day. Later, alone, I drove up to the Peace Pagoda in Grafton and prayed.”
Erwin Bush
April 2006
