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PEOPLE & ARTS Wednesday 11 september 2019
“The Only Plane in the Sky” is compelling history of 9/11

By WILL LESTER counts of people telling tions of passengers on
Associated Press their loved ones that they United 93 to fight back, the
“The Only Plane in the Sky: were trapped in the upper frantic phone calls to loved
an Oral History of 9/11” floors of the towers or on hi- ones trapped in the tow-
(Avid Reader Press), by jacked planes, the gradual ers and planes, the peo-
Garrett M. Graff realization that the towers ple leaping from dozens
People born at least a had been hit by passenger of floors up to their death
quarter-century ago prob- jets, the eventual crash- and, throughout, the hero-
ably remember the exact ing of those towers and ism and humanity of all in-
details of what they were the suffocating clouds of volved, especially the res-
doing on that beauti- dust that made it impos- cue workers.
ful blue September day sible to breathe and sent It makes for a gripping read
when terror was unleashed legions of New Yorkers flee- — and a reminder of the
across the country. ing through the streets like country at its best while un-
Now, 18 years later, the a scene from a sci-fi movie, der attack.
memories of hundreds of and the incredibly coura- President Bush summed it
firsthand witnesses tell the geous decision to over- up well in his address to the
story of the 9/11 attacks power the hijackers and nation that night.
in their own words, provid- bring down United 93 over “Today, our nation saw evil,
ing a riveting step-by-step Pennsylvania. the very worst of human
account of the day that The oral history details the nature and we responded
brought out the best in decisions of the President with the best of America,
many Americans. This cover image released by Avid Reader Press shows “The George W. Bush adminis- with the daring of our res-
Garrett M. Graff and his Only Plane in the Sky: An Oral History of 9/11,” by Garrett M. tration on how to deal with cue workers, with the car-
team have assembled in- Graff. a terror attack of unknown ing for strangers and neigh-
terviews from 480 people Associated Press dimensions, the delibera- bors ...”q
who share their terrifying
and often inspirational
memories of the day when
hijackers used two pas-
senger planes as weapons
to topple the twin towers
of the World Trade Cen-
ter and another to attack
the Pentagon. A fourth hi-
jacked plane went down
in flames when heroic pas-
sengers fought back to
bring it down in rural Penn-
sylvania before it could
strike another high-profile
target, probably in Wash-
ington.
The technique of letting
the witnesses tell the story
does a remarkable job of
bringing to life the horrific
day in a way that a writer’s
narrative would have a
hard time matching.
The day starts with people
going through their morn-
ing routines before work,
admiring the spectacular
September day and then
coming to the realization,
often haltingly, that this
would be the most fright-
ening day of their lives.
People were just settling
in for the workday or just
arriving at work when a
plane hijacked from Bos-
ton crashed into the North
Tower of the World Trade
Center at 8:46 a.m.
Most people are aware of
the events that followed,
but what has faded from
memory over the years
are the dramatic details,
like the emotional ac-