Rudy: I Thought I Might Die

By Pete Bowles | STAFF WRITER

September 18, 2001

Mayor Rudolph Giuliani, who has received praise from all corners for his steady presence and leadership during the city's calamity, last night said he thought he might die during the attack on the World Trade Center.

In an interview with Barbara Walters on an ABC News special, the mayor described how he escaped from a makeshift command center at 75 Barclay St., adjacent to the Twin Towers, as the first tower was falling.

The mayor said he and his aides had set up an emergency command center in a Merrill Lynch office at 75 Barclay shortly after he had been told that a plane had crashed into the World Trade Center.

"The vice president called," he told Walters. "And when I got on the phone to talk to the vice president, the phone line got cut off. And it was at about that time that I heard a tremendous noise, and I heard someone say one of the World Trade Center towers had come down."

Giuliani said he and an entourage of 15 aides ran down to the basement, only to find two exit doors locked. They then ran back upstairs to the lobby, where, he said, "Things had gotten worst."

"When we looked outside, it looked like Armageddon, and it was black and white, and there was no visibility at all," he said.

Giuliani has said that a building worker led him and his aides to an opening that led to safety through 100 Church St.

Asked by Walters whether he was thinking he was going to die, Giuliani said: "Now I do ... when I think back on it."

Giuliani said he has tried to be "sensitive but honest" in disclosing the grim statistics on the missing and dead.

He agreed that as time goes by, the hope of finding more missing victims lessens. "But I'm told by the experts who do recoveries that there's still a chance that we can save some lives," he said.

Giuliani said that during the crisis he has leaned on a number of staff members and his girlfriend, Judith Nathan.

Asked how he had been able to remain calm during all the turmoil, he gave credit to his father, who "taught that when there's a crisis going on, the most important thing is to become calmer."