My story is not so very interesting. I found out about it on the morning radio news, then turned on the television to get more details (not surprisingly, there were few to be found, just images. I really think the media made the situation far worse through their style of coverage) I woke up the rest of the family to let them know what was going on, and left for school. I was upset at the conditions that allowed it to happen but not particularly shocked or psychologically broken liek some were. I was expecting something like this to happen eventually, and was sort of mentally prepared I suppose. It wasn't until I got to school that I realized just what a severe effect this was having on most people.
The most unnerving experience I have heard was that of one of my professors. She was a curator working at the Smithsonian, and thus was at the national mall at the time. When she heard that another plane was headed towards Washington, she panicked slightly and tried to get home to her husband. But of course there was no way to get out of the Mall just then, since everyone else was trying to do the same thing and the transit systems were all locked down. She ended up walking the six miles to her house, found her husband safe and sound, and cried for a few hours. A few days later she got a phone call- as a physical anthropologist, they needed her to come down and help identify bodies from the crashed plane. Not surprisingly, she quit her job in DC soon after, and moved out West.
