The Falling Man. Do you remember this photograph? (The man who jumped from World Trade Towers)

esquire ^ | September 2003, Volume 140, | By Tom Junod

[colorado tanker]

This article has flaws, but at least it acknowledges the jumpers. The mainstream media want to blackout this story.

There is a legal doctrine called depraved heart murder. When a kidnapper is so depraved as to torture his victim to the point where death becomes preferable to continuted agony, the kidnapper is legally responsible for the death as a homicide. That is what happened here - the jumpers were murdered as surely as those who died in the towers.

Never, never, never forget.

[Freedom4US]

One of the most disgusting things I've read in a long time, worse because of its pseudo-scholarly tone.

[habs4ever]

Yes, it was good, in parts, though too much like a Roger Rosenblatt essay striving for poignancy...grrrrrr...but the most touching was the mother who recognized her two sons at Cantor, in one window frame, and suspects strongly what were their final choices....a very brave lady.

[blu]

I give the woman who told the photographer off a lot of credit. Who cares who it is!

I think the author was trying to find out who the man was because he (the author) thought maybe it would comfort someone to know how their loved one died. I know that sounds sick....but it may comfort a mother to see that her son had made his own decision about how he was going out, and that he looked defiant, and not afraid. Us mothers have this terrible fear of fear in our children.

I also think he thinks we should all "witness" the man's death. I mean, for cripes sake, THE GUY JUMPED TO WHAT HE HAD TO KNOW WAS CERTAIN DEATH....and we're too damn queasy to look? Who had the bigger "thing" to do, he and his jump, or us and our look? As angry, sad, fearful, vengeful as that picture may make you feel, think what he was feeling. Is your discomfort anywhere near the utter panic, desperation, resignation he was feeling? Is it too much for us to look and remember? The people who jumped/were pushed are heroes (not to take anything away from the other hero/victims of that day). They didn't just let it happen to them, they called their own final shot. That's brave....surely we can be 1/100th as brave as to look.

[habs4ever]

Dio, it isn't there.I have seen closer, better snaps of that frame, and there are three adults in that window frame, and what you suspect is a baby is in fact a man in a white shirt and dark pants,braced up against the frame, while a co-worker puts his arm across his body to support himself.It is an optical trick.You can ever see the adult's glasses.

[MEG33]

They were Israelis who had overstayed their visas and were working without a permit at an Israeli moving company.I googled and feel the understandable concern of the day over foreign looking men videotaping excitedly and speaking a foreign language .Google and the early articles have different info than later ones.I don't know if they were muslim or Jewish.I disputed Mr. Pinks'post that they were celebrating.

[El Gato]

The spaces were designed to be less than the shoulder width of the architect, who was intensely acrophobic.

The spaces were small because the outside structure of the towers, unlike that of most large buildings, was load bearing, the principal load bearing part of the structure. The openings had to be that narrow to provide enough strength. That said, the architect may very well have been acrophobic as well, although it would be passing strange for someone with that malady to take up designing skyscrapers.

[lawgirl]

For more than an hour and a half, they streamed from the building, one after another, consecutively rather than en masse, as if each individual required the sight of another individual jumping before mustering the courage to jump himself or herself.

This was something that even as we were watching was not being shown to us. When I think of 9/11, the images of the towers coming down is very clear, but I only remember one image of a body falling. It was shown early after the planes struck on Fox News and the commentator (was it David Asman?) said something to the effect of "were we supposed to show that?" I wish we had seen more- only for the purpose of keeping our fighting spirit alive.

[kidd]

I couldn't finish this article.

Is the author providing a critique of this picture as an art form???

There is something deeply disrespectful about that.

[King Prout]

bookmarked.

I was struck dumb with admiration for the man when first I saw the record of his flight, two years ago.
But me no buts: That man was flying... his strength, grace, and composure shining in every grim line.
I hope that I may die so well as he.

[El Gato]

Jumping up and down is excitement...but not necessarily celebration.

Indeed, "jumping up and down" is an observation. "Celebrating", is an interpretation of that observation.

[eddie willers]

I, too, thought it a fine and moving piece and am a bit surprise at so many of the responses.

The article reminds me of the set up for Citizen Kane.....
"Rosebud".

[mr.pink]

I googled and found they were deported for visa violation,and no work permits.

After being held for close to 70 days. I'm sure you would agree that is a long time for merely a visa violation...especially from such a close ally nation.

The owner of the moving company fled the country before authorites could finish questioning him....one would think he'd be willing to assist in an investigation into such a serious matter. I guess he had more important things to do.

[HenryLeeII]

For clarity's sake I usually tend to proffer both names in order to differentiate between the dual heads of the anti-Christ. They are usually seen separately, rarely together, and seem to have differeing agendas: The male entity seems to be hell-bent on assuaging his passion for physical violence against those who cannot retaliate against him as well as sexual conquest, while the butch entity seems hell-bent on obtaining political power in order to bring upon Armageddon. (Hey, you wanna buy a defensive lineman or a cornerback? I can get you one cheap...)

[DumpsterDiver]

Yes, but don't you think that this treatment actually increases the horrific realization thereof?"

I thought that the following paragraph captured a lot of the horror and terror the people in the towers were forced to experience.

THEY BEGAN JUMPING NOT LONG after the first plane hit the North Tower, not long after the fire started. They kept jumping until the tower fell. They jumped through windows already broken and then, later, through windows they broke themselves. They jumped to escape the smoke and the fire; they jumped when the ceilings fell and the floors collapsed; they jumped just to breathe once more before they died. They jumped continually, from all four sides of the building, and from all floors above and around the building's fatal wound. They jumped from the offices of Marsh & McLennan, the insurance company; from the offices of Cantor Fitzgerald, the bond-trading company; from Windows on the World, the restaurant on the 106th and 107th floors—the top. For more than an hour and a half, they streamed from the building, one after another, consecutively rather than en masse, as if each individual required the sight of another individual jumping before mustering the courage to jump himself or herself. One photograph, taken at a distance, shows people jumping in perfect sequence, like parachutists, forming an arc composed of three plummeting people, evenly spaced. Indeed, there were reports that some tried parachuting, before the force generated by their fall ripped the drapes, the tablecloths, the desperately gathered fabric, from their hands. They were all, obviously, very much alive on their way down, and their way down lasted an approximate count of ten seconds. They were all, obviously, not just killed when they landed but destroyed, in body though not, one prays, in soul.

[mr.pink]

If I remember correctly, they turned out to be working for a moving company, not terrorists.

Although their actions surely were suspicious, I never called them terrorists...I merely noted that they were reported to be celebrating as Americans were mass murdered....that's what lead to their arrest.

[El Gato]

And how many white vans were stopped in DC/VA/MD when the true perps were in a dark colored Chevy Caprice? This is an intitial report. It doesn't even indicate that the people were arrested, just detained. There were lots of false alarm detentions following 9-11. One was a couple of guys, who turned out to be Indian, who were pulled off a train in the Dallas area, carrying a signifigent amount of cash. They were on the train because all flights were grounded, and the money was for what turned out to be a perfectly legitimate reason, I think involving purchase of a convienence store or somesuch. After an investigation they were let go. Where is the record of what happened to these folks in the white van? Or even a follow up story.

[Last Visible Dog]

Chasing his family around the funeral trying to find out who he was is NOT OK, especially after they already refused to talk to him!

Try reading the article again. The person writing it did not chase anybody - he just reported the actions of other people (I don't think anybody chased anybody) in the context of the subject of the article. You have jumped to far too many unsupported conclusions.

[mr.pink]

Do you? Or even a link to a legitimate news story on their arrest?

No, I don't have any photos of them and wish the Justice Department would release their home movie for Americans to evaluate.

As to other links...do your own homework, but Carl Cameron has never retracted his reports on the matter, neither has ABC news nor the Bergen record.

[wolficatZ]

Yes, all who fell were murdered by the Islamic terrorists, regardless of whether they fell involuntarily, jumped willingly hand in hand, or were pushed out by others behind them desperate to escape the searing heat and smoke. All I know is that it was a very very bad scene up there, much worse than some can comprehend or even imagine. It's a mental monster those who witnessed it, either on tv or in person, have to deal with in their own way.
I have a 6 hour tape of different newscasts from that day, in the words of the cameraman who shot some of the jumper footage shown on Univision that day, "..muy miserable.." always sticks with me.