Ex-York firefighter recalls Ground Zero after 9/11 attack

Bruce Reid, then a 35-year-old serving firefighter, said he felt “complete and utter dismay and shock” after hearing that 2,977 people, including 343 firefighters, were killed in the attacks on September 11, 2001.

He, along with three other UK firefighters, travelled to New York to attend funerals of firefighters who were killed after two passenger airliners were flown into the World Trade Center.

Smoke billows across the New York City skyline after two hijacked planes crashed into the twin towers on September 11, 2001 (Image: AP Photo/Patrick Sison)

Speaking to The Press for the 25th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks, Bruce, who retired from North Yorkshire Fire and Rescue Service in 2020 after 36 years, said: “The fire service has always seemed to me to be like a brotherhood.

“Regardless of where you’re serving, you belong to a collective family.

“And I felt I would have to pay respects to any family member.

“That’s why I wanted to make the trip [to New York] – I just felt the connection.

“I would have thought that if it would have happened over here, there would have been people from all over the world doing the same job, coming to England.”

“Being in the fire service and knowing that 343 firefighters were killed, you just can’t imagine it,” he added.

A photograph Bruce Reid took of the damage caused by the 9/11 attack (Image: Bruce Reid)

Bruce, now 60, from Knaresborough, said he arrived at Ground Zero after the attacks on September 11 to see buildings still on fire as bodies were being carried out by firefighters.

“Just to see these fire trucks crushed nearly beyond recognition – it all seemed surreal,” he said. “It was like a set off a far-fetched movie. It’s just something you can’t comprehend.

“Actually being at Ground Zero, buildings were still burning. Debris was all over the place.”

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Bruce said it was “extremely moving” to attend the funerals with processions of bagpipers and fire engines parked outside.

By the third funeral, the New York firefighters knew who Bruce and the other three UK firefighters were and they got to know each other.

Bruce Reid during his days at North Yorkshire Fire and Rescue Service (Image: Supplied)

Bruce said he met one firefighter who was the sole survivor of his 11-man crew after they were called to the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001.

“In that morning, he lost 10 of his colleagues,” Bruce said. “We went to see him at one of the stations in Manhattan and the mental and emotional affect that it had on him – he just felt so guilty.

“Eleven of them went down and it was just him that came back. And that was probably repeated all over.”