WORLD TRADE CENTER TASK FORCE INTERVIEW
EMT BRIAN GORDON
Interview Date: October 30, 2001
Transcribed by Nancy Francis
2
B. GORDON
LIEUTENANT DUN: Today's date is October 30,
2001. The time is 0820 hours. I'm Richard Dun of the
New York City Fire Department working with Murray
Murad. We're here interviewing Brian Gordon.
Q. Please state your title and your shield.
A. EMT, xxxx.
Q. Can you give us the story or your account of
what happened on the day of September 11th, 2001?
A. Me and Brian Smith had just gotten back from
a late job and we were -- we had come in and dropped
off the vehicle, changed over vehicles because we were
31 Henry, Tour 1. We had come into the station, did a
few things, dropped off our equipment, and Brian -- we
were leaving and we were walking up the ramp out here.
We got into the parking lot and Brian said did you hear
that boom? We had heard just a boom and we looked over
and we saw a big ball of fire coming out of the tower.
So we ran back down here and we said somebody
just bombed the tower. So Lieutenant McCarthy gave us
ambulance 217 and he told us be careful and go over,
sign on, but be careful.
Q. So your lieutenant told you you were going to
be an extra unit?
A. Yes.
...
BRIAM SMITH
MR. DUN: Today i s October 23, 2001. The
time i s 813 hours.
I am Richard Dun, New York City F i r e
Department, working with Marisa Abbriano, a l s o New
York City F i r e Department. We a r e conducting an
interview with --
MR. SMITH: BRIAM SMITH, EMT, XXXX.
Q. Brian, can you d e s c r i b e t h e events or t h i n g s
t h a t happened on September l l ?
A. Yes. T e l l you t h e s t o r y now?
Q. Right.
A. You want me t o follow t h i s thing?
Q. You know, j u s t go through it, and i f you
remember t h i n g s , you know.
A. I n i t i a l l y , we -- l i k e I s a i d it before, we
had g o t t e n off of duty a t q u a r t e r of nine. I was going
out t o my v e h i c l e t o d r i v e home, and we -- my p a r t n e r
and I saw t h e -- r i g h t a f t e r t h e f i r s t tower had been
h i t , and so we came back i n s i d e , and we t o l d them. It
h a d n ' t even gone over t h e r a d i o s y e t , because i n i t i a l l y
he d i d n ' t -- he thought t h a t we j u s t --
Q. So you a c t u a l l y saw t h e f i r s t plane go in?
A. I heard t h e explosion and looked up, and then
I saw it s t a r t t o b i l l o w o u t .
BRIAN SMITH
So I came back inside, and I told my
lieutenant, Lieutenant McCarthy -- he was the desk
lieutenant -- and I told him I was going to go inside
and get changed, put my uniform back on, because I was
in my civilian clothes, and that we needed an extra
unit, and we need to go back out, and, like I said, he
initially didn't believe us, but then a couple of
seconds later they came over the air with the
announcement, you know, "Units, an MCI has been
announced the Borough of Manhattan," so on and so
forth.
So I went inside. I got changed into my
uniform real quick, very quickly and very sloppily, I
might add, but we went back into the office. I grabbed
keys. My partner was outside. He was checking the
back of the ambulance, because he was going to be
teching, he's not evoced, so he was in the back, and he
was going through all the stuff to make sure that we
had what we needed just to get out on the road. Went
in and logged on the computer right away.
Before I left, my lieutenant told me that we
were going to be 31 Mary, and if they needed us, they'd
call us, so we got on. I logged on right away and told
them that we were the next unit available if they
BRIANSMITH
needed us, and they t o l d us t o proceed t o t h e MCI i n
Manhattan.
So we l e f t t h e parking l o t , and we s t a r t e d
going over t h e Brooklyn Bridge, and we made it down
t h a t -- it was heavy t r a f f i c , but normal Tuesday
morning t r a f f i c , but r i g h t by t h e foot of t h e bridge,
it was p r e t t y congested, but with v e h i c l e t r a f f i c . I
guess because they -- t h e p o l i c e had shut down a l l t h e
v e h i c l e t r a f f i c going over -- t o allow p e d e s t r i a n
t r a f f i c t h e r e , I guess going over t h e bridge, so
everybody was b o t t l e d up, but I was a b l e t o d r i v e up on
t h e sidewalk a l i t t l e b i t and make my way t o t h e
bridge, and they j u s t waved us r i g h t through, so we
were going over t h e bridge, and when we were -- when we
i n i t i a l l y l e f t out of t h e s t a t i o n , c e n t r a l gave us a
cross s t r e e t t o s t a g e . They gave us a spot where they
s a i d they were going t o have EMS s t a g i n g , but again,
l i k e I s a i d e a r l i e r , I ' m not very f a m i l i a r with lower
Manhattan. I d o n ' t know t h e s t r e e t names or, you know,
i t ' s not l i k e upper Manhattan where t h e r e a r e numbers,
and t h a t ' s easy. I t ' s a l i t t l e tougher down on t h e low
s i d e i f you d o n ' t r e a l l y know your way around.
So my p a r t n e r was t r y i n g t o look a t t h e
Hagstrom's and t r y i n g t o f i g u r e out, you know, where we
BRIAM SMITH
were going, and, l i k e I s a i d , going over t h e bridge
t h e r e was no o t h e r t r a f f i c besides us, and t h e both of
us were, l i k e , looking out enroute t o t h e alarm. We
see t h e -- a t t h i s point only t h e one tower was h i t ,
and t h e r e was a l l kinds of s t u f f coming out of it.
Looks l i k e paper, and i t ' s smoking, and we were going
over t h e bridge, and again, l i k e I s a i d , my p a r t n e r , he
c o u l d n ' t -- we c o u l d n ' t f i g u r e out e x a c t l y where we had
t o go once we got off t h e bridge, so t h e r e was an
unmarked p o l i c e c a r coming up behind us. He had t h e
l i g h t going, and I s a i d , you know, j u s t follow t h i s
guy. He's got t o be heading t o t h e same p l a c e .
So we -- so I s a i d a l l r i g h t I ' l l j u s t follow
him i n . I followed him i n . I got off t h e b r i d g e . We
c i r c l e d around, and we s t a r t e d heading i n t h i s
d i r e c t i o n , I guess west. I d o n ' t know what s t r e e t we
ended up on, because I d o n ' t r e a l l y know where it drops
you off when you g e t o f f t h e bridge, but a l l I know we
ended up somewhere down, l i k e , I guess, i n t h i s
v i c i n i t y because where we i n i t i a l l y stopped when we
were heading south, you could see down here.
I mean, it was -- you know, t h e r e must have
been a crossing somewhere, because you could see t h e r e
i s , l i k e , a foot bridge or something somewhere around...
So I s a i d , "All r i g h t , w e ' l l go down t h e r e . "
So we went down. We went up t o t h e 10-10 house. As
soon as we got t h e r e , we backed i n t h e engine bay, l i k e
you guys have seen where it i s , so i f you a r e looking
a t t h e f r o n t of t h e b u i l d i n g i t ' s t h e engine bay on t h e
l e f t , and t h e r e was a c a p t a i n t h e r e , one of t h e f i r e
c a p t a i n s . He wasn't i n t u r n o u t , but I s a i d t o him,
"Cap, l i s t e n , you know --" because, l i k e , he was
c a p t a i n a t t h e house t h e r e . I d o n ' t know i f he was
from Ladder 10 or from Engine 10, but we backed it i n ,
and t h e guy s a i d , "Yeah, we got a bunch of people
i n j u r e d i n here, seven or e i g h t people, some of them
h u r t p r e t t y bad. I f you guys want t o grab a couple of
people and run."...
I s a i d , "All r i g h t . Let me get out a take a
look," and t h e guy s a i d , " J u s t make sure you back it
a l l t h e way i n , because t h e r e was a l o t of d e b r i s , and
t h e r e i s a l o t of s t u f f going over t h e b u i l d i n g . "
Like I s a i d , by t h i s p o i n t , Two World Trade
Center i s on f i r e . You know, l i k e you can look a l l t h e
ways up t o t h e top, you know, I mean, t h e r e ' s q u i t e a
b i t of damage up t h e r e . Like I s a i d , t h e second plane
had already h i t it.
Q. People jumping a t t h a t point?
A. Not when I f i r s t g o t o u t of t h e ambulance.
They were p l e n t y of jumpers t o come, but not a t t h a t
p o i n t . I f t h e r e had been, you know, l i k e I s a i d , I
d i d n ' t n o t i c e .
Q. Was t h e r e a l o t of d e b r i s when you were
p u l l i n g up i n t o t h e firehouse?
A. Yes.
Q. You saw a l o t of d e b r i s ?
A. A l o t of d e b r i s on t h e s t r e e t . A l l t h e ways
over here.
Q. A l l t h e way up t o Church?
A. Yeah. I mean, I wasn't crazy. It wasn't
l i k e I had -- I mean, I could d r i v e through it, but, I
mean, I had, you know, t o kind of go around a couple of bigger pieces of debris.
So we backed into the firehouse, and we got
out, you know, after a quick assessment of how many
patients were in there. I kind of guesstimated by how
much time had passed from the initial incident. I
mean, again, like I said, coming over, only because I'm
not really familiar with the way the things are set up,
I thought that this tower right here is the tower that
I saw burning on the way in. I don't know that it's
this tower burning, because when you look at the bottom
and you look up, it's tough to get a sense of where it
is in proportion to the top of the tower.
So I figure maybe 20 minutes went by, 15
minutes. Like I said, it's kind of hard to tell,
because time is kind of like -- it was like in slow
motion, but we got out. I got a quick assessment of
the amount of patients in there, you know, immediately,
and, like I said, some of them were pretty bad, so I
said to the captain -- I said, "Cap, listen. I haven't
seen any ambulances over here either, and what we are
going to do is, being that everyone is going to be
familiar with the firehouse over here, you know, we are
just -- we will take this station over, and we are
going to -- my partner and I are going the set thestation up as a triage station, and I'm going to radio
out to dispatch, and we'll let them know what we are
doing, but I need a few guys to give us a hand," and
the guy's -- you know, he was, like, whatever you need,
you just let us know. We will do whatever we got to
do. And I said -- I asked him if he had anybody there
that was medically trained. I figured there was an
engine company there that maybe they have some CFR
guys. He said, "I don't have anybody, no CFR,
nothing." He's like, you know, whatever you got, you
got.
There was a volunteer firefighter from
Commack on Long Island. He worked in the trade
center. He came over, and he's, like, you know, trying
to offer his services, I guess, and, you know, so the
captain gave this guy to us to help out. He said the
saying thing, like he wasn't medical or anything. Like
he knew CPR or something. ...
That is enough for now...go to the website and download Adobe PDF...
. Anyway, it is the thought that counts, right??? it was a way for people to feel like they did "something"
