Anthony Gorman was checking his New York City Fire Department EMS truck the morning of 9/11 when his supervisor came in and said a Cessna, a small plane used for pilot training and recreation, crashed into the World Trade Center.
Not thinking it would be a big deal, Gorman agreed to go help. But as he and his colleagues approached Manhattan from Brooklyn, they realized it was much bigger than a Cessna.
Just then, the second plane hit.
Gorman eventually left New York to continue serving as a firefighter in Tallahassee. And Wednesday morning, 23 years after he watched the towers fall, tears streamed down his face as he was gifted the first flag flown over the capital city’s 9/11 memorial.
“He said it reminded him of being on the moon — dust, quiet, but but car alarms and fire alarms going off,” Mike Terhune said on Gorman’s behalf.
Members of the Tallahassee Fire Department, Tallahassee Police Department, Leon County EMS, Leon County Commission and Florida National Guard stood around the new Capital 9/11 Memoria l just outside the Capital Area Chapter of the American Red Cross building on Easterwood Drive in the drizzling rain.