The Only Plane in the Sky: An Oral History of 9/11

by Garrett M. Graff

Frederick Terna, Holocaust survivor and Brooklyn resident: As ashes were falling, I was back in Auschwitz, with ashes coming down. In Auschwitz, I knew what the

ashes were. Here, I assumed I knew what the ashes were—it was a building and human remains.

By the end of the day, they had collectively evacuated somewhere between 300,000 and 500,000 people from Manhattan—a maritime rescue larger than the World War II evacuation from Dunkirk.