A message of hope

• Picciotto

JULIE BUNTJER/DAILY GLOBE FDNY Battalion Commander Richard Picciotto autographs a copy of his book, “Last Man Down,” following a public presentation Monday night at Luverne High School.

Talk about it

LUVERNE — As images of the World Trade Center’s twin towers — amid a sea of destruction — flashed before a large gathering inside the Luverne High School gymnasium Monday night, few words were needed to remind people of the horror felt across this country when terrorists flew jet airliners into the north and south towers under a clear blue sky on the morning of September 11, 2001.

Amid the images appeared one simple phrase — “he saved thousands of lives … and changed his own.”

Richard Picciotto, FDNY Battalion Commander, had shown up at the fire station more than an hour before his shift was to start that fateful morning. He had the radio on, and when he heard an airplane had flown into the World Trade Center’s south tower, he knew it had to be the work of terrorists. No one would just fly into a building like that, he said during a public presentation Monday night at the Luverne High School gymnasium.

Standing at the podium before rows of firefighters, law enforcement personnel and hundreds of people from throughout the area, Picciotto delivered a story of determination, strength, heroism and survival as he recounted the minutes and the hours of that September day.

Picciotto, author of “Last Man Down, A Firefighter’s Story of Survival and Escape from the World Trade Center,” had spoken to students in the school district earlier in the day and, after his public presentation in the evening, stayed around to autograph copies of his book.

His story began with the telling of his involvement eight years prior to September 11 — during the World Trade Center bombing in 1993. Response to that act of terrorism, he said, helped prepare him for the chaos and uncertainty that faced him in this latest tragedy.

Picciotto responded to the scene and found the north tower in flames.

“I knew a lot about that building,” he said. “I called dispatch and said, ‘I have to be there — I can help.”’

When he arrived on the scene, Picciotto encountered heavy, thick black smoke. He saw people jumping. He heard them fall.

Thump, thump, thump, he pounded on the podium.

“There are some things you just shouldn’t have to see, and I saw them,” he said.

Picciotto was put in charge of evacuation of the north tower that morning. It, like the south tower, was 110 stories tall — 120 if you counted the 10 stories below ground.

“Two hundred and forty acres of office space, computers and people, and that was just building 1 and 2,” Picciotto said. Each tower had 99 elevators and only three stairwells, and those were only 36 to 42 inches wide.

The elevators were rendered useless upon impact by the airplanes — 767s filled with 20,000 pounds of jet fuel.

“A lot of the fuel went into the elevator shaft,” he explained. “It spontaneously ignited up and down the elevator shafts … (they) shot out fire like blow torches.”

Initially assigned to go to the 22nd and 23rd floors of the north tower, Picciotto carried 60 pounds of gear as he trudged up the narrow stairwell. He had it a bit easier — the firefighters he was leading were carrying 100-pound packs.

Along the way, they encountered throngs of people working their way down the stairwell toward safety.

“It was great to watch these people coming down — civilians helping civilians,” he said. Many were injured, some were carried down in wheelchairs and all were looking for direction and leadership from anyone willing to offer it.

Picciotto kept climbing the stairs, eventually deciding he and his firefighters needed to go up to floors 90 through 93, where the plane had struck the building. They needed to rescue any survivors.

He made it up to the 35th floor before an unforgettable, deafening, booming sound surrounded them.

“It was coming down fast,” Picciotto said. “In a matter of seconds, it wasn’t above us anymore, it had completely enveloped us.

“When it stopped, I can’t describe how silent it was,” he added. He and his men were frozen, staring up at the ceiling. “The expression ‘silence is deafening’ — well, that’s what it was.”

Picciotto’s men stared at him, as fire chief, waiting for answers, but he didn’t know what the explosive sound was and didn’t know what to do.

It took radio contact with other firefighters for Picciotto to find out what the noise was — the falling of the south tower.

“My first thought was how many friends of mine were in that building — how many firefighters, how many people — how many people were just killed,” he said.

The news forced the commander to make a decision — the toughest decision of his life — to begin the descent and save those below him.

“Firefighters take risks — we take calculated risks,” he said. “Someone has to make that calculation. I gave the order to evacuate — I had to get as many people out as possible, including my firefighters.”

He knew that those victims still higher up in the tower had little chance of getting out. Most, he figured, had already succumbed to smoke inhalation.

As Picciotto and his crew began their descent, he went through every floor to make sure people had left.

Twice along the journey he found people to rescue — one man on the 27th floor who didn’t want to be disturbed because he was working (Picciotto actually had to grab him out of his chair and toss him to firefighters to get him out), and a group of about 40 nonambulatory people who had gathered on the 12th floor. They had wheelchairs, walkers and canes, and each had a person with them who “wouldn’t leave without their friend.”

Picciotto sent the ambulatory people down the stairwell, and had his firefighters help those who couldn’t make the journey unassisted.

“We got everyone off the 12th floor and going down — 12, 11, 10, 9, 8 — and that sound started a lot louder, a lot more violent,” he explained. Then, everything went dark.

Thump, thump, thump, he pounded on the podium again.

“Pancake, floor upon floor, it’s pushing all the air down,” he said. “We’re being tossed around like rag dolls.”

In that short span of time — a lifetime to Picciotto — he thought about his family, he thought about his friends, and he prayed to God to “make it quick.”

The south tower took 10 seconds to come down. The north tower took just eight seconds.

As the floor disintegrated and he began to freefall in darkness, Picciotto said to himself, “Well, I guess I’m dead now. I really thought I was dead. I didn’t even realize I had a body.”

Then, he was surrounded by smoke and heat.

“I thought, ‘Uh oh, if I’m dead, I don’t want hot and smoky,” Picciotto said as the audience shared in a bit of laughter.

Hours later, Picciotto and 13 other people, including 11 firefighters, one Port Authority policeman and one grandmother, found their way out of the stairwell somewhere between the fifth and sixth floor and into freedom. They were the lucky survivors.

Picciotto said the experience has caused a shift in his life’s priorities.

“I can’t tell you and no one should tell you what priorities you put on your life,” he said.

For him, it’s family and friends.

“When life is good, you have to remember that and cherish that,” he advised.

The terrorists who attacked America on September 11 had anticipated their actions would divide the country, but instead, it united the people, he recalled. That lasted for a couple of years, and then it was lost to political bickering about who was to blame, and who is to blame for what has happened to this country.

“These politicians have to realize they’re elected for the people, not for the political party they endorse,” Picciotto said. “I think they’re finally realizing it.”

He encouraged audience members to not only find their priorities, but to also support the men and women who continue to serve our country today in war.

And, as a parting thought, he reminded them of that day in the stairwell, when he prayed to God to “Make it quick.”

“Did God answer my prayers? No,” Picciotto said. “Sometimes, unanswered prayers are the best things you can have.”

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