LEVY COUNTY JOURNAL AROUND LEVY COUNTY THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 7, 2006 Where were you on Sept. 11, 2001? What were you Linwood Koonce. I was working for DOT and I was driving out to Oviedo to pick up signs. I was listening to an oldies station from Crystal River, WRGO. The DJ, Rick Craig, was talking to the traffic coordinator, Chuck Whitaker. Chuck got his reports by listening to the police scanner and it was on live that morning. He said, “Just a minute; I just heard a plane crashed into the WTO in New York.” I listened to that for a few minutes and then channel surfed trying to find another station with more information. I felt sick, mad. I’ll never forget it. I felt like I’d lost my best friend. I kept thinking about all those people being incinerated— here one minute and gone the next. I felt sick to my stomach. When I started watching it that night on TV, I got angry. Not at the Muslim world in general but the radicals who would do such .a hideous thing. One hundred some countries lost lives in that [| thing. What really burned me up was the bureaucracy. Those people were trained ,to fly planes hére‘ ‘in’ ‘the’ United: States. _ When I think about all this today, I just about want to say, “I dare you.” I’d really like to go out there and-help find those guys that did this to us. Gina Purvis. I was working at the Levy County forestry camp as a corrections officer in one of the, housing units. We were getting ready to do our regular count when another officer came in and told me what had happened to the first tower. We went and turned on a TV and pretty much watched it for the rest of the day. We saw the second plane hit. I felt fear, anger and empathy for what those people in the towers must have been feeling. I remember a sense of disbelief—wondering who it was that was doing this and why they were doing it. I remember thinking if this is starting all at once, how many more attacks were we going to have to have? I appreciate more than ever now our veterans—the past and present soldiers—as well as our firefighters, civil workers and police. One thing I will never Melanie Allen worked in the media center at Chiefland High. School. “The phone rang. My mother said, ‘Turn on the TV, turn on the TV.’ The librarian turned on the TV to see what was going on. We didn’t do anything the rest of the day. We were just totally glued to the TV. It brought chills up and down forget is that when I got off my arms. work I went to pick up my kids at.day care. The kids had made a banner that-said, “Our hearts are in New York.” That was when I started crying. Dennis Webber was teaching history at Hilltop High School the morning of Sept. 11. “It was a small . class. We went to a TV. and watched for a good two hours. Then we went back to the classroom and began talking about current events and how everything in our ~ society touches everything else—how global our society is now. The students were shocked. We all heard the president’s statement, that we were at war. That really struck my students, trying to figure out the who, what, when, where and why. “Everything that has ever happened has happened while I’ve been in school, beginning with Kennedy and Oswald. I saw the Challenger go up. But this was the most | devastating. There were so- many lives involved. “I’ve bought every book about it. Some people have said we should just forget about it. But we should never ever forget. I do think about one thing nobody ever talks about. The survivors who were injured. They carry the scars with them. I wonder how they cope. “What can we do to remind people of the importance of all this? I didn’t know anybody personally who was caught up in this but that doesn’t make any difference. It is still very personal.” Megan Webb said she was in the sixth grade at Chiefland Middle School on that day. “I was sitting in math class. I was totally shocked and remember thinking Oh, my God. We stopped working to watch the news.” i & Sis able ale able alle ale Alle nee ne thle hae Re Nae Kolan Durrance was in seventh grade the day the terrorists attacked. “We were out for PE. and when we came’'back into the classroom our teacher, Ms. Henderson, was sitting there crying. We were watching TV when the second one-hit. We were in school all day but most of the teachers were in tragedy. The ‘kids were trying to figure out what the trade towers. were, and what it meant and what the attacks meant.” Bob Bray Jr. “My mother has these dreams or visions. A couple of days before she couldn’t sleep. She felt a horrible pain. She saw people dying. She couldn’t tell anybody. We all have dreams sometimes. It’s so strange when they come true. Mom feels guilty because she could have told somebody.” Bud Allen. I was working at the Crystal River Nuclear Plant getting ready for a refuel shutdown. The plant made an announcement on the intercom .and said we were in a terrorist attack. Security came through and said, ‘Everybody out,’ so all us contractors had to leave. Nobody stayed who wasn’t a permanent employee of Florida Power. The next day the only people who could go back to work were those with security clearances. Security was very tight and just got tighter as the weeks went by. We were all watched very © closely, especially when we. were in areas pertinent to the plant. They’ve had very tight security ever since. I don’t think we’re any safer today than we were that day five years ago. We don’t safeguard our country. How do we know there’s not sleeper cells all over the U.S.? When my wife Judy and I flew to Hawaii last year, I was scared to death. And. it would only be worse now, after the recent incident with the planes. It’s a psychological thing, you know. They’re trying to’ keep us scared to death. Compilation and photos _ drained, thinking? Adele Beront said that like so many others that dreadful day she was glued to the TV set. She said she.felt emptiness, and absolutely “It was like Pearl Harbor or the Challenger explosion. Your emotions. are so overwhelming that there are no words to describe it: “And now these people are asking us to change religions? It all sounds. :so scriptural...We need to pray for. the Islamic people.!.let them believe what they want to...we’ll still come feed them when they are hungry.” Ralph Briggs. On Sept. 11, I was watching the Good Morning America. I. can remember Charlie (Gibson) saying, ‘Get Chet down here—this is not an accident.’ Of course, Chet or somebody else whoknewthe background of this stuff took over at that point. But I couldn’t get away from it. I watched it on TV all day. I’m a vet—I volunteered for Korea. by Cassie Journigan Enrolled to Practice Before the IRS Nancy Bell Westbury: Enrolled Agent le Personal and Business Tax Returns ~ e Partnership & Corporate Tax Returns — e Computerized Monthly Accounting e New Monthly Clients | Welcomed ! 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