OPINION: This article may contain commentary which reflects the author's opinion.
Fox News host Maria Bartiromo got emotional when recounting what she experienced on September 11, 2001, and the immediate aftermath of the attacks that resulted in nearly 3,000 Americans being killed.
Fighting back tears, the popular Fox News host urged Americans to come together and stay strong.
Below is a transcript of her comments:
Well, good morning, everyone. Such an incredibly solemn day, an important day for us to remember our friends and neighbors who perished and to give tribute and love, and support to those first responders who saved so many. I’m glad you brought up September 17th.
Because on September 17th, when I was on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange, and we were all still in shock, we looked up at that podium and it was the firefighters and it was the NYPD and it was the first rear responders and it was the mayor and the governor and the senators and the congressmen, and we all looked at each other, I looked up, everybody on the floor was looking up, and we were still in shock. We were in such mourning. We lost our friends. We lost our family.
We could not believe what just happened. But we had strength. We looked at those people at the podium and they moved us forward and they gave us the strength and the confidence to say, ‘We will rise again and we will get through this, and we will fight back and we will get tougher and we will be strong again.’ And it was such an important message on September 17th, just a week after the dreadful day of September 11th. On that day, I was in the New York Stock Exchange doing the morning show for another network, I saw the first plane go into the first tower on television. I ran outside, ran to the corner of Broadway and Wall Street, and I stood there on Broadway and Wall Street with everybody else, onlookers, and we were shocked, trying to figure out what happened. I went back up, went back down.
When I was down on the street corner, I watched the second plane go into the second tower. And that’s when somebody next to me said, ‘Oh my God, this is terrorism. The world will never be the same.’ And I said, ‘What?! Is that what…?’ And we were just trying to figure out what happened. When I went back into the exchange and I was talking about that third explosion, I was talking about when the buildings began to come down. The buildings come down, everybody is on the street, we all run for our lives. We don’t know what noise and what just happened, but the whole area turns black. You couldn’t even open your eyes. There was so much stuff in the air from the buildings.
So you were walking, but you had to keep your eyes closed because of the soot and the computers and the papers and everything flying out of those buildings. I don’t have to tell our viewers the extraordinary day it was and the emotion that we all feel. But what we have to remember is the strength and the unity that we got after we understood what took place; the strength and the unity that we had when we knew we were under attack. The adversaries are against freedom.
The adversaries are against America. We must stay strong and unified. Somehow, we must come together. I just pray for my friends that they’re in heaven with my dad and they are looking down on us and trying to give us the strength we need.
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