Edmonton firefighter recalls 'unbelievable' destruction at Ground Zero ahead of 9-11 memorial

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Nearly 20 years after seeing the devastation and destruction caused by a terrorist attack in New York City on Sept. 11, 2001, Edmonton firefighter and district chief Todd Weiss still finds it difficult to describe.

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Then 38 years old and working at a fire station in central Edmonton, Weiss was in shock and disbelief seeing footage of the attacks on the World Trade Center attacks on TV, and he wanted to do something. He spent the next two weeks helping the Red Cross with a call centre for people looking for family members, then spent three weeks volunteering on the ground at the first aid respite centre for first responders just steps away from Ground Zero. When he arrived, what he saw blew him away.

“Every day I saw the destruction first-hand. People ask me, ‘What was it like?’ It’s hard to describe. The enormity of it was unbelievable … I just could not believe the immensity of the area that was affected,” he said Thursday outside the fire station on 96 Street.

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“It’s overwhelming … nothing prepares you for that. Nothing has prepared me for it then, and nothing has come even close to that since.”

Weiss remembers speaking with New York firefighters about what they saw on the day of the attack and in the days after as they sorted through the carnage. He was glad to be there to listen and support them after the horrible things they had seen.

“I know from my job it’s important to talk, it’s important to share with each other so somebody can learn from what your experience was, but it also helps to get it out,” he said.

“Just the trauma they went through, the difficulty — it was more than I imagined … Firefighters from all over the world share a common bond.”

9-11 was the single deadliest foreign attack on U.S. soil and precipitated America’s longest-running war in Afghanistan. Nearly 3,000 people were killed in the al-Qaida-orchestrated attacks on the twin towers and the Pentagon with four hijacked airliners, including around 400 New York City first responders.

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Sometimes Weiss thinks about what it would have been like if it happened here. A major incident at one of Edmonton’s downtown highrises would have meant he would have been one of those firefighters rushing in to help, he said.

In the two decades since Weiss said he’s gained some perspective and he knows the experience affected him.

“I’ve come to realize that it did change me, and it changed me quite a bit,” he said. “You really appreciate the day-to-day things. I didn’t really, before, appreciate the journey, I was always about the destination, and now I appreciate the journey so much more.”

Firefighters routinely gather at the Edmonton Firefighters Memorial Plaza on 83 Avenue NW every Sept. 11 to remember local members who have died.

lboothby@postmedia.com

@laurby