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Final survivor of south tower collapse struggles with scars of 9/11
Yahoo! News ^ | August 26, 2011 | Torrey AndersonSchoepe

Posted on 08/28/2011 10:08:17 AM PDT by Berlin_Freeper

Ron DiFrancesco's voice softens and trails off. He barely finishes his sentences as he recalls his experience on Sept. 11, 2001. He speaks as if it happened yesterday.

"It was a living hell," he says. "I was mere seconds from death. ... I didn't know I was going to get out."

DiFrancesco is believed to be the last person out of the South Tower of the World Trade Center before it collapsed. According to some reports, he was one of only four people to escape from above the 81st floor.

(Excerpt) Read more at news.yahoo.com ...


TOPICS: Extended News
KEYWORDS: 10thanniversary; 911; groundzero; survivors
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This is the watch DiFrancesco was wearing on 9/11. It broke at the exact time the second tower collapsed after he just barely made it out. He keeps it in an envelope inside a small box.

... "My car was left at the train station, and my wife didn't know where it was. A neighbor came and found my car and brought it back to us," he explains. "And I only had the one key that was melted in the World Trade Center, so he went and got new keys made for my car."

1 posted on 08/28/2011 10:08:21 AM PDT by Berlin_Freeper
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To: Berlin_Freeper

That’s a blessing of a neighbor.


2 posted on 08/28/2011 10:18:17 AM PDT by skr (May God confound the enemy)
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To: Berlin_Freeper

What a story!


3 posted on 08/28/2011 10:20:06 AM PDT by Cheetahcat (Carnival commie side show, started November 4 2008 ,A date that will live in Infamy.)
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To: Berlin_Freeper
DiFrancesco and his family have always been religious and involved in community service,

Put a muzzle on that if you come back for this year's ceremony, bud.

4 posted on 08/28/2011 10:20:27 AM PDT by the invisib1e hand
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To: Berlin_Freeper

I suspect this country will never again come together the way we did that first week after the attack. All the usual daily BS got left at the door. No racial tensions, no looking for angles, no one trying to take advantage of you. And then politicians had to start finding blame publicly instead of letting the professionals do the work.


5 posted on 08/28/2011 10:22:16 AM PDT by LRoggy (Peter's Son's Business)
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To: LRoggy

And our glorious media was at the front of the pack egging them on.


6 posted on 08/28/2011 10:29:13 AM PDT by nodumbblonde ("The ladder of success is best climbed by stepping on the rungs of opportunity." - Ayn Rand)
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To: Berlin_Freeper

Wow. What a story. It proves to me the existence of both evil and good. It proves to me there is a heaven.


7 posted on 08/28/2011 10:32:35 AM PDT by GOP Poet (Obama is an OLYMPIC failure.)
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To: Berlin_Freeper

oh and that God is ultimately in charge.


8 posted on 08/28/2011 10:33:27 AM PDT by GOP Poet (Obama is an OLYMPIC failure.)
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To: Berlin_Freeper

Amazing story! I often think of how grateful one would be to be alive after that but forget to consider the emotional burdens these survivors must carry with them every day.


9 posted on 08/28/2011 10:36:25 AM PDT by nodumbblonde ("The ladder of success is best climbed by stepping on the rungs of opportunity." - Ayn Rand)
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To: Berlin_Freeper

Awesome story. I’m so glad he made it but my heart breaks for the bad memories he has to carry. God bless them all.


10 posted on 08/28/2011 10:37:05 AM PDT by mardi59
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To: nodumbblonde

I hope that ABC will play the first few hours of their coverage, verbatim, no edits. I was asleep when the first plane hit, it took my wife a few moments to realize what was going on, and she woke me and turned on the television in the bedroom. I watched about 3 hours without getting out of bed, and one of the unusual details I recall was Barbara Walters being asked to join the commentary. At some point she realized that some entertainment industry executive that she knew had been listed on one of the two flights that struck the WTC, and then she goes into this lengthy spiel about what a great guy/industry leader/greatest fellow since sliced bread he was.

It was really appalling to hear someone go on and on about a single person caught up in this tragedy, when at the time she was speaking there was no way to know that the toll wasn’t more like 20,000 than ~ the less than 3,000 it turned out to be. I’d really like to hear that again, but something tells me that she has enough star clout to have it hit the cutting room floor.


11 posted on 08/28/2011 10:38:35 AM PDT by Wally_Kalbacken
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To: nodumbblonde

I hope that ABC will play the first few hours of their coverage, verbatim, no edits. I was asleep when the first plane hit, it took my wife a few moments to realize what was going on, and she woke me and turned on the television in the bedroom. I watched about 3 hours without getting out of bed, and one of the unusual details I recall was Barbara Walters being asked to join the commentary. At some point she realized that some entertainment industry executive that she knew had been listed on one of the two flights that struck the WTC, and then she goes into this lengthy spiel about what a great guy/industry leader/greatest fellow since sliced bread he was.

It was really appalling to hear someone go on and on about a single person caught up in this tragedy, when at the time she was speaking there was no way to know that the toll wasn’t more like 20,000+ than the less than 3,000 it turned out to be. I’d really like to hear that again, but something tells me that she has enough star clout to have it hit the cutting room floor.


12 posted on 08/28/2011 10:40:30 AM PDT by Wally_Kalbacken
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To: Berlin_Freeper

Good post.


13 posted on 08/28/2011 10:53:18 AM PDT by Lazamataz (SmithL stole my tagline and won't give it back.)
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To: Berlin_Freeper
By the way, Bloomberg -- that ass -- vows to have the Mosque built right next to the site of the tragedy and declares we are all Muslims.

What a lousy POS mayor he is.

14 posted on 08/28/2011 10:56:21 AM PDT by Lazamataz (SmithL stole my tagline and won't give it back.)
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To: Lazamataz

I also just read the previous article about Bloomberg claiming “we are all muslims”.

He deserves a special place in Hell.


15 posted on 08/28/2011 11:20:48 AM PDT by TheConservativeParty (PALIN 45 -The cure for "meet the new boss, same as the old boss." Resisting Tyranny Since 1-20-2009)
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To: Berlin_Freeper

Yahoo has done a great job with collecting stories about people’s experiences that day.


16 posted on 08/28/2011 11:31:20 AM PDT by rabidralph
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To: Lazamataz

Well, you got that right!


17 posted on 08/28/2011 11:34:36 AM PDT by Berlin_Freeper
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To: Berlin_Freeper

Amazing story, thanks for posting. It’s difficult to imagine the extended stress that survivors have likely felt over the years.

A guy from our church (we lived in NJ at the time) worked in the South Tower above where the second plane hit - his office was in the 90s. He and his wife would take the Path train in every morning and part in the WTC station - she worked several blocks uptown. He said he was standing by his desk first thing that morning with a couple coworkers, they were facing the window and he watched their faces change as the first plane hit the other tower behind him. Announcements were made over the PA system saying stay put, but he and his coworkers decided to leave anyway. Saved their lives.

They headed down the stairs (I don’t remember why they opted to avoid the elevators, maybe they were too full) and had managed to make it several floors below impact when the second plane hit. They took the stairs dozens of floors more and then he tried to contact his wife - no dice, cell service was out and as a result his wife thought he was dead for half the day. Then he managed to talk to his son out of state, who somehow got a message to his mom that Dad had made it out and was looking for her. They finally met up mid-afternoon in the lobby of her office building. Incredible story to hear first hand.


18 posted on 08/28/2011 11:56:01 AM PDT by agrace
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To: Lazamataz

Look at the money trail, bloomy has contracts with the rag heads so he will do whatever they want and not offend them in any way so scre* America.


19 posted on 08/28/2011 11:58:30 AM PDT by chiefqc
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To: Berlin_Freeper

FYI

Tonight on National Geographic Channel 276 (Direct TV)

7:00-9:00 PM Inside 9/11 (2005)

9:00-10:00 PM Inside 9/11 (2011)

10:00-11:00 PM George W. Bush: The 9/11 Interview. (2011)


20 posted on 08/28/2011 12:14:35 PM PDT by faucetman (Just the facts ma'am, just the facts)
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