Some facts you probably didn't know about 9/11

In 2001, whatever you were doing, your attention was somehow turned to the news that startled the whole world: The United States had been the target of a huge and catastrophic terrorist attack involving 19 men. .

The Twin Towers went down and nearly 3, 000 people died. Of the dead, 343 were New York firefighters, 23 were police officers, and 37 were New York Harbor officers. The victims were between two and 85 years old, and about 80% of the dead were men. Twenty people in the buildings survived and were saved.

Just to give you an idea of ​​the extent of the damage, the firefighters only managed to put out all the fire caused by the collisions on December 19, 99 days after the bombing.

At the Pentagon in Washington, 184 people died when the building was hit. In Shanksville, Pennsylvania, 40 people, including passengers and crew members, died when their plane crashed into a field. The accident is also believed to be related to the attack.

On the same day, another building in the Twin Towers region also crashed: this is another skyscraper, the 47-story Building 7. At the time, the fall was hardly reported because the building was not hit by a plane. It is believed that the structure was already damaged before the fall of the Towers.

Interestingly, this all took less than two hours:

  • At 8:46 am an America Airlines plane from Boston to Los Angeles hit the north tower of the World Trade Center;
  • At 9:03 a United Airlines plane from Boston to Los Angeles hit the south tower;
  • At 9:37 AM an American Airlines aircraft from Dulles, Virginia, to Los Angeles hit the Pentagon building in Washington;
  • At 9:59 the south tower collapsed;
  • At 10:03 a United Airlines plane from Newark to San Francisco crashed in a field near Shanksville, Pennsylvania;
  • At 10:28 the north tower collapsed.

The exact number of deaths was not reported until January 2004, when New York medical experts released the number of death certificates issued: 2, 749. The following year, genetic investigations into human remains found at the crash site were canceled. Of the dead in the attack, only 1, 585, the equivalent of 58%, had their bodies identified.

In 2007 a medical announcement stated that the death of one more person was related to the attack, increasing the number of victims to 2, 750. Currently this number is 2, 753, after all doctors also consider victims of the attack people who died from exposure to smoke or dust over the years.

A report released in May 2014 found that 41% of those killed in the attacks were never identified. The clearing of the region did not end until May 30, 2002. In all, 1.8 million tons of wreckage were produced as buildings collapsed. The total cost of cleaning was $ 750 million.

And it wasn't just Americans who died as a result of the attacks: citizens of more than 80 different nationalities were at the scene at the time. Of the dead, 372 were foreigners, of which 67 were British.

Financial data

  • According to CNN, it took $ 500, 000 to plan and execute the attacks;
  • The economic damage caused by the attacks was $ 123 billion in the first four weeks after the fateful Sept. 11;
  • Damage to the Twin Towers is $ 60 billion, including damage to neighboring buildings and subway structures in the region;
  • On September 14 of the same year, the US government approved an emergency anti-terrorism package, which cost $ 40 billion;
  • Affected airlines received $ 15 billion in government aid;
  • Insurance charged by relatives of the victims of the attacks reached US $ 9.3 billion.

Investigations into the bombing uncovered a message sent by one of the terrorists, Abu Abdul Rahman, via an internet chat saying: “The first half will start in three weeks. Two high schools [the Twin Towers] and two universities [points in Washington] ... This summer is sure to be hot ... 19 [the number of kidnappers involved] certified for private education and four exams [the number of used aircraft]. Keepsakes to the teacher. Bye".

One of the companies, Cantor Fitzgerald, lost 658 of its 960 employees. After the tragedy, CEO Howard Lutnick told one of his colleagues, "We can close the company and go to our friends' funerals or we can work harder than ever to help their families." After ten years, the company had already disbursed more than $ 180 million in compensation to the victims' relatives.

Coincidences

  • In 1987 then-US President Ronald Reagan declared September 11 as Emergency Number Day to draw attention to 911, used for emergency situations;
  • Hawley Harvey Crippen, born September 11, 1862, was sentenced to hang in 1910 for murdering his wife;
  • Robert Laurel Crippen, test pilot of the first US space shuttle program in 1981, was also born on September 11;
  • Russian cosmonaut Gherman Titov, who became the second man in space in 1961, was born the same day;
  • September 11 is the first day of most years in the Coptic and Ethiopian calendars.

* Posted on 9/11/2014