9/11, one decade on: Day of evil that changed the world forever

It was a slow news day, the headlines in the city being dominated by mayoral candidate Michael Bloomberg telling a joke in poor taste. That was a story of particular interest to the thousands heading towards their offices in the World Trade Center, towards the southern tip of the island.

Bloomberg had made his fortune in finance, and was a familiar figure in the landmarks that dominated the New York skyline – the Twin Towers, reaching a quarter of a mile high, home to the city’s legal and financial professions.

They liked to start early at those companies, and by 8.30, most people were at their desks, making the first phone calls, reading the emails that had come in overnight. Another busy, if routine, day was under way.

And then, a little more than a quarter of an hour later, at 8.46am, the world changed.

American Airlines Flight 11, which had taken off from Boston just over half an hour before, slammed into the north tower with devastating force, tearing a huge whole in the building, exploding in a ball of flame and sending thousands of tons of burning aviation fuel cascading down the interior of the tower.

Rolling news broadcast the shocking pictures across the world, which was stunned by what it saw and tried to comprehend what had happened. How was this possible? How could such an accident have happened – for surely this had to be a terrible accident?

It was no accident. Confirmation that this was the beginning of the most spectacular and murderous terrorist attack in history came at 9.03, when United Airlines 175 came roaring across the bay at 568mph and slammed into the south tower. Cameras now trained on the Twin Towers after the first impact caught every detail as the airliner exploded.

The world looked on in shock and disbelief. It would be hours yet before any detail emerged of the men who had hijacked the two airliners that hit the Twin Towers – and two more besides.

They were in the hands of 19 fanatics, followers of al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden, who had managed to board the aircraft carrying blades, which they used to slit the throats of terrified passengers, cabin crew and pilots, before taking over the controls in suicide missions that turned passenger jets into flying bombs.

US President George Bush was meeting Florida elementary school pupils when his chief of staff whispered the news in his ear seven minutes after the second tower was hit. He narrowed his eyes but continued listening to the children read a story.

At 9.30am the grim-faced President went on television to tell his nation and the world: “Two aeroplanes have crashed into the World Trade Center in an apparent terrorist attack on our country.”

There was more horror to come. At 9.37am American Airlines Flight 77 crashed into the Pentagon, the headquarters of the US Department of Defense, in Washington DC.

If the news of the third crash registered in New York, it came amid a desperate battle to save lives in the stricken towers.

Those trapped above the inferno by heat and smoke called their families to tell them they loved them, many leaving poignant answerphone messages to say goodbye. And then some chose to jump rather that burn or suffocate. As a disbelieving world watched, bodies came tumbling down from more than 1,000 feet up, eventually an estimated 200 of them.

It was at 9.59am, less than an hour after it was hit, that the south tower gave way and collapsed, falling in on itself, millions of tons of steel and concrete crashing to the ground, crushing those trapped inside and sending a vast dust cloud billowing through the streets of downtown Manhattan.

Four minutes later the final hijacked aircraft, United Airlines Flight 93, crashed in a field in Pennsylvania after a group of passengers fought back against the terrorists to stop them reaching their intended target, now thought to have been the White House or the Capitol.

Those inside the north tower had less than half an hour to live. At 10.28am, 102 minutes after the first plane hit, it too collapsed.

The 9/11 attacks claimed the lives of 2,977 innocent people, including 67 Britons, making them the deadliest terrorist atrocity America has ever experienced.