Stopover on U.S. tour

Suzie Harrison

On Monday morning, the skies in Huntington Beach were as blue as

they were in New York the moment before the South Tower of the World

Trade Center was hit by an airplane on Sept. 11, 2001, surviving

firefighter Bob Senn told Spring View Middle students during an

assembly.

Senn, one of 37 New York firefighters who have pledged to travel

the country to speak about that day, came to Southern California to

share his story. Senn spoke to firefighters in Redondo Beach, where

13-year-old Arin Fazio’s father heard him speak and was deeply moved.

Arin, a student at Spring View, asked if Senn would speak to his

school. It is the only school Senn has visited.

The sea of students sat in silence as they listened to Senn’s

story.

That morning, he said, he kissed his wife, left his house and

didn’t look back.

“Within a half-hour in lower Manhattan I realized the value of my

family that day and how important those people are in your lives,”

Senn said to the 800 sixth-, seventh- and eight-graders.

“I learned life can change in an instant,” he said.

He saw the plane fly into the South Tower from his vantage point

in the North Tower, which is where he was when the South Tower

collapsed.

“I got there after the first plane was flying over their heads,

everything shook, and I couldn’t focus,” Senn said.

Glass and people where everywhere, he said. The debris flew into

the North Tower lobby.

“I was buried. I thought I was going to die,” Senn said.

He called his wife before the collapse of the second tower to tell

her he loved her. He didn’t think he was going to make it.

Senn lost 100 friends on Sept. 11, 2001. But he had to carry on,

he said.

“After the collapse it was very difficult to get to people,” Senn

said, adding that while 2,801 were lost, there were about 30,000 in

the World Trade Center towers that day. “We saved quite a bit, but

not enough. At 2 a.m. we were digging in the rain. It was very

disheartening, upsetting trying to find people.”

Senn said he realized how often people take things for granted in

life.

“Whatever you do and where you go you always have your family,” he

told students. “My home is my home and my family is my soul.”

Senn’s story was met with thunderous applause from students.