When people FINALLY get the truth gold will go to 5,000.00
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Message 22511023
"Firefighter “heard this huge explosion that sounded like a bomb [and] knocked off the lights and stalled the elevator . . . [then] another huge explosion like the first one hits. This one hits about two minutes later . . . [and] I’m thinking, ‘Oh. My God, these bastards put bombs in here . . . .”"
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File No. 9110501
WORLD TRADE CENTER TASK FORCE INTERVIEW
FIREFIGHTER THOMAS TURILLI
Interview Date: January 17, 2002
Transcribed by Nancy Francis
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T. TURILLI
BATTALION CHIEF KENAHAN: The date is January
17th, 2002, the time is 1635, AND this is Battalion
Chief Dennis Kenahan from the Safety Battalion of the
Fire Department of the City of New York. I'm
conducting an interview with Firefighter Thomas Turilli
of Engine 47 in the quarters of Ladder 2.
Q. Thomas, just tell us the events as you recall
them from September 11th.
A. All right. On September 11th, we were
watching the news and they broke in and said that the
first tower had been hit by a plane. We were watching
that for some time, and then it appeared another plane
had hit the south tower. At that point they
automatically made it a fifth alarm and we responded.
We parked on West Street, I think it is, as
far as this map is concerned. Yes. We were making our
way in with my officer and the guys I was working
with. Just a lot of glass breaking, there were like
car fires going on on the side of the street. We
actually went through an overpass and we were standing
underneath that just waiting for the glass or anything,
just so we can actually -- we were actually going in
the hotel lobby. I'm not sure what hotel it is there.
Q. Marriott? Between the towers?
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T. TURILLI
A. Yes.
Q. Okay.
A. That connects the two towers?
Q. Right.
A. We went in there and then we saw Chief Galvin
and we saw other companies. I saw Ladder 2 there, 22
Engine, 13 Truck. My officer said try to find a
stairwell if we have to walk, so me and another guy
went and saw there was a maintenance guy working
there. We went up to almost like, I guess like an
atrium, and we walked up that way and I saw a
maintenance guy there and he said you can pick up the
stairs from the third floor on up after walking up like
I guess an access stairs from the lobby up.
I came back out, told him we can find a
stairway over there, and he said, all right, that they
want us to go to the south tower, which is I guess the
first actual tower to fall down. He said there was a
report of fire actually on -- the lowest report of fire
they had was on the 33rd floor at that point.
There was kind of a little chaos. We didn't
know really where we were going to go, guys were
deciding to take elevators, not to take elevators.
There was a security guy there who said, actually, I
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T. TURILLI
can get you up on an elevator if you want to follow
me. So we went with 22 Engine, 13 Truck and us, walked
I'd say about maybe 100 feet. We went through like a
turnstile. But what he was actually doing is he
actually led us through the lobby of the hotel into the
north tower. We were actually, you could say, in the
wrong tower at that point.
They went up. I actually had the control
that day and 22 Engine went up. The elevator came back
down, 13 got on and said, listen, if you guys want the
elevator, we're not coming back with it. You've got to
send somebody up. The officer actually said for me to
give my radio to a senior guy there, Louie Cacchioli,
and he took the radio off of me and he went up. We
were waiting in I guess like a little almost like a
cutout area of the lobby, an elevator bank. One
elevator was only working out of like four elevators in
that bank.
The door closed, they went up, and it just
seemed a couple seconds and all of a sudden you just
heard like it almost actually that day sounded like
bombs going off, like boom, boom, boom, like seven or
eight, and then just a huge wind gust just came and my
officer just actually took all of us and just threw us
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T. TURILLI
down on the ground and kind of just jumped on top of
us, laid on top of us. There were rocks falling and
all that. The lights were still on at that point and
all of a sudden the lights went out and you couldn't
see anything.
At this point, there's a guy from my
firehouse on his way up in the elevator. They got up
to the 22nd floor and 13 Truck got off the elevator.
He said to the guy -- this is before the actual
collapse happened. He said to him stay here with us,
stay here with me, because if this elevator closes, I
don't have any tools. As soon as he said that, the
elevator closed and that's when the actual collapse of
the building happened. He made his way out into a
stairwell and he made his way down.
When we were down in the lobby, like I said,
the lights went out, there was a lot of dust and all of
that kind of stuff. After about a minute or so,
everything kind of calmed down. My officer just told
everyone relax, just hold onto each other. He was
radioing the guy upstairs to see if he was all right.
He was making his way down. He said he was in the
stairwell with 13 Truck, he's coming down right now.
My officer knew how to actually get out and
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T. TURILLI
we just held onto each other. There were security
guards and some civilians, and he just told people,
just hold onto us, like a human chain, just grab onto
another person and we'll make our way out. We went
about 20 feet, 25 feet, and we saw a light. It turned
to be a light of almost like I guess a restaurant
area. He said no, that's not the way out, and he said
just keep on going straight. In about another 25 feet
to 30 feet, there was windows, I guess, lobby,
ground-level windows that were blown out, and we just
walked out of there.
Two guys I was with said they were hurt and
everything. So my officer, myself and the few guys who
said they were hurt, we walked them across the street
and we brought them to an ambulance. At that point we
were kind of standing on the street and I looked to my
left and actually I noticed the tower was down. I
didn't even know what it was when we were in there. It
just seemed like a huge explosion.
Then my officer said you all right? I said
yeah, I'm fine. That whole time he was actually going
over the radio with our control man saying you making
your way out? He said I'm out in the street right
now. I'm fine. So my officer said all right -- you
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T. TURILLI
could hear Maydays going over the radio at that point.
It was just so many, I really didn't know where they
were coming from.
Then we started walking actually back towards
Tower 1 and a cop and a Battalion Chief came up to us
and said just start running the other way. The other
tower is coming down.
Q. Who told you this; a cop?
A. A cop and a Battalion Chief. We were kind of
like standing next to them. I stayed with him -- I was
with the Battalion Chief at one point and I started
running up the street and I kind of lost track of all
the guys I was with. The two other guys who I actually
brought to the ambulance, the ambulance guy said you've
got to get out of the ambulance. They just started
running towards the water. We started running, myself,
the Battalion Chief, the cop, my Lieutenant was with me
at that point, up West Street, and you just heard a
rumbling, a huge amount of rumbling, and I just dove
under a car, and I was with a guy from I think 138
Truck.
The tower came down, the second tower came
down, and then just a lot of chaos, you know, the same
thing it was like inside, it was dust and all that
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T. TURILLI
other stuff flying around. I think it was like five
minutes before things cleared up, and I saw a light and
it was just the light of a rig, the flashing lights,
and then it seemed like more and more guys were coming
out of the cars or wherever they were hiding. I met up
with my officer and the guys I work with, and they were
just saying everyone just go back a couple of streets
just to regroup and then we'll go from there, and
that's about it.
Q. Okay. That's it?
A. Yes.
BATTALION CHIEF KENAHAN: All right. Well,
thank you, Thomas. This concludes the interview. The
time now is 4:45. |
