20 years ago of a catastrophe that shook the world: the fall of the Twin Towers after an attack carried out by 19 jihadists.
The next day, most newspapers had on the front page the smoke coming out of one of the towers or both before they became a dust that would plague the cosmopolitan city. “World Concussion” read on the front page of Daily List, no wonder, panic spread from New York to the rest of the planet.
On the morning of Tuesday, September 11, 2001, it promised to be one like any other. Journalists were preparing to meet their agendas for the day, while the head of Newspaper Information, Tomás Aquino Méndez, coordinated with drivers and photographers to distribute to their respective services.
At the same time, but more than 2,500 miles away, hundreds of employees began working from home in offices located on tall Wall Street buildings, including the symbol of American trade: the World Trade Center in the Twin towers.
With 15 minutes to go before 9:00 a.m., American Airlines Flight 11 hijacked by 5 jihadists, after taking off from Boston, crashed between floors 93 and 96 of the north building.
An analog television, of these “with the belly behind,” that always tuned CNN captured the attention of those around him in the bustling newsroom of Listín Diari, Dominican Republic. On the screen they showed the first images of what appeared to be a plane crash in the iconic 115-meter-high towers.
Aquino Méndez believed that this was an announcement of a new drama or science fiction film, while the then assistant director, Fabio Cabral, watched the audiovisual from a distance, thinking it was a simple accident; the reality was that it was an attack that claimed the lives of nearly 3,000 people.
“We thought it was an accident until we saw how the other aircraft hit the second tower; we immediately met,” Cabral said before Alícia Estévez, editor-in-chief, interrupted him, adding that “the awareness that it was a terrorist act was with the second “.
When they turn up the volume on the small screen they realize the situation and were discussing what they were going to do when suddenly and without anyone waiting the second crashed, stunning viewers.
It was 9.03am when United Airlines Flight 175 with 60 passengers and crew, plus five terrorists, which had also taken off from Boston bound for Los Angeles had just crashed into the 77th to 85th floors of the tower. south, causing a giant explosion.
Many people who were evacuating the building were trapped in elevators and above floor 85. It is estimated that between 50 and 200 people jumped or fell from both towers.
At that moment, the director of the dean of the press, Miguel Franjul, left his office, astonished after seeing the images on television in his office and immediately convened a meeting to discuss the next steps of the day because from that moment everything turned to this tragedy.
About 56 minutes after the impact of the second plane, the city heard the deafening noise of the collapse of the south tower that in ten seconds killed more than 800 civilians and rescuers, while its rubble covered the entire area . The north tower collapsed some time later, after burning for 102 minutes.
It didn’t all end there, because a third plane (American Airlines Flight 77) hijacked by five jihadists crashed into the west facade of the Pentagon’s reinforced concrete building at 10:15 p.m.
While a fourth plane diverted by four terrorists to Washington DC was shot down by its passengers over a rural area, with no one surviving to explain it.
The editor-in-chief, Alicia Estévez, recalls that for that occasion two extensive pages of the well-known “sheet” format were printed on which the dean of the press was printed for the Latin Grammy Awards, but what happened early on hours of unforgettable September 11 monopolized the eyes of everyone.
The impact in fact was such that it may have been the only time that almost every newspaper in the world tackled the same cover.
The implications for the Dominican diaspora and the country were so diverse that the World Cup section was not enough to address them so that, although several of the executives objected, an edition was prepared for the next day. special dedicated exclusively to this tragic episode.
exhausting day
“I remember it was a long day, we didn’t go, it was the whole day working on it,” Estévez said.
Journalistic services continued to stand; however, it all turned to the catastrophic event that had taken place in cosmopolitan New York, and the responsibility now was to seek feedback, contact correspondents, conduct analysis and get interviews, as well as statistics from those affected, which grew in agreement. the hours.
Although a separate special edition was prepared, the pages of the newspaper broke its design to address from a social, economic, sporting and even psychological perspective how the fact would affect nationally and internationally.
Nevertheless, it was not the first time that the Listín, from its reappearance in 1963, broke its schemes before an international fact and extended the cover around a same subject.
“We started looking for Dominican witnesses, we called Dominicans there, plus the things the journalists’ relatives explained, ”explains Franjul, who had taken over the management of Listín Diari just a year and two months ago.
The newspaper closed in the morning, too late for the time they used to do it. The editor of Mundiales, Adolfo Valenzuela, narrated that he survived with coffee and biscuits this intense day, having to his position next to the editor of Design, Yoni Cruz, the special edition.
However, the coverage did not end that day, a month later priority continued to be given to details that arose as investigations progressed.
Although they do not want to remember the experience, the Listín Diari team lived up to the international covers, positioning itself even among one of the best.
concern
“Images of thousands of citizens fleeing frightened through the streets of Mahttan or paralyzed with fright and weeping at the Dantesque images of the collapsing twin towers; an inventory of dead and wounded yet to rise; an economy shaken by this expansive wave of terror , they have disturbed the whole planet “, quotes one of the paragraphs of the editorial of September 12, 2001, entitled” Stunned by terror “.
The anguish of not knowing the conditions in which his relatives were plagued the journalists, who paused work from home to confirm that those relatives who lived or worked in what is now called the “zero zone” were still alive.
“Well, the first thing Fabio did was call a brother-in-law,” Alícia Estévez pointed out as an example, as she recalled the experience.
These calls were the raw material for the content to be published the next day, because although since 1995 the newspaper had a website, few readers had access to the Internet or a computer.
The atmosphere of the newsroom was described by his boss as a concern and tension, no matter if most Dominicans have relatives living in New York and, according to documents consulted, for the year 2000, the city of New York had the largest number of Dominican residents abroad.
Among the ruins of the World Trade Center were killed some 47 Dominican nationals, at least the official figures were handled for November 2001.
anecdotes
Interviews with surviving Dominicans were the main content of the newspaper, including the case of a cousin of designer Gabriel Mercedes.
The lady was working on one of the floors of the second tower. At the time of the first attack they were told to stay in their places, but she disobeyed the order by getting out of the building after running down the stairs.
Candida Acosta, current editor of Economics, recalls that she found out when she entered the newsroom after a meeting and saw the crash of the aircraft on television, a key means of communication in the dissemination of this news. The first thing he thought was that it couldn’t be an attack, but as if they had heard his thought, a CNN flashback answered his doubt.
“Everyone shouted and a girl from La Vida, named Silvana, fell to the floor screaming because a brother of hers was working on the approaches to the towers and had to be assisted,” says Acosta, the brother also worked in the band of the twin towers and coincidentally that day he had not gone to work.
But another of the stories told was the delay that saved the daughter of one of the collaborators, who was on her way to work at the World Trade Center when the first aircraft crashed.
Stars off
The 87 passengers and crew of the first plane died instantly in the collision with the north tower, this American Airlines flight was destined for Los Angeles, the city where Ramon Almánzar, Entertainment journalist, was waiting. of the Latin Grammys.
Almánzar had high expectations to cover the second edition of the Latin Grammys, but being canceled, they all wanted to return to their countries to feel safe while fear reigned throughout the United States in the face of the incredible attack, which describes as “a movie scene.”
Both he and the artists preparing for the event were in a state of shock and showed solidarity with the victims and their families, of the Dominicans among them Eddy Herrera.
Although the word fear is not in his memory, he lived in despair at the ignorance of when he would return to the middle Caribbean island and if he would arrive safely.
After countless adventures, they got a flight to New York and from there to Puerto Rico, before arriving in the Dominican Republic where they received him with great affection but also with thousands of questions.