The Consequences Of September 11Th Attack

The day of September 11th, there was an attack in New York. A terrorist organization planned an attack on American soil. The terrorist took two planes and crashed them into the World Trade Center.

I took time with my Grandmother, Susie Williams one evening in to share her experience with September 11th. Mrs. Williams is a kind-hearted woman who comes from Commerce City, Colorado with a loving family. I learned a lot from her with her experience that day. She at the time was working for a company called Quest which is now CenturyLink. She lives where she does now in Henderson Colorado. She claims that September 11th changed America forever All though my Grandmother did not witness the event in person, she still felt the horror of that day. She saw both the planes crash in to World Trade Center and all the people deaths that were caused that day. I asked various questions while interviewing my Grandmother. I was curious what kind of answers she would give since it is a very emotional subject.

The first question I asked was “What were you doing on September 11th” She took a second to think about it, then replied, “It started like any other work day but then just turned into a disaster”. She immediately started tearing up and responded “At the time I was working with Quest and I was getting ready for work for the day when I heard about the attack” She went on to say that how at first, she didn’t know what was going on. That when the first plane hit everybody just couldn’t believe that was happening. She immediately went for her phone so she contact our family.

One of my next more important questions was “How do you think our Country was affected by the attack”, to which she replied “I used to feel safe and secure before that day. September 11th changed everything”. She went on to explain that it felt like after that terrorist attack made us realize we were not safe in our own country. Before she felt comfortable leaving the house and going to work. After she always felt like anything could happen. Throughout the years until the present, there have been even more frequent terrorist’s attacks. We see a lot more shootings and disasters not just in America but throughout the world. It’s been 17 years and people still can feel the effect of that day. According to her it still feels recent and everybody knows where they were that day. The effect was not just in our country. The U.S troops were deployed to Afghanistan to stop Al-Qaeda. Then eventually our government and forces turned their attention to Iraq. Years of war and thousands of troops were deployed for America’s war on terror. I asked her “How else do you feel like it affected our country besides war”, to which she replied “Security became a lot more reinforced and Americans really started to hate people in the middle east” My Grandmother was never one to be racist but you can see how people started to treat people with middle eastern backgrounds. Also, airports started to take their securities to another level compared to the past. Not wanting to repeat the past. With item restrictions on the plane, identification, liquid ban, etc.

The American experience is not always a good one. We see a lot of tragedy in our lives and realize that sometimes those can cause big changes. With September 11th we see a lot of things come afterward that changed us as a country. We have had a hard time recovering from this attack. We see changes within our country and outside of it. It caused war, our view on the safety of leaving our houses, and security within large events or airports.