The camera zooms in on the flames and black smoke pouring out of the building more than 90 stories up. Papers fly down as people on the street stare up. The cameraman says it was an explosion.
But then the second tower is hit, and he realizes it’s even worse. “Oh my God,” the man says over and over. He tells people around him to go home and not look up.
The video was recorded a block from the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001, by a man named Edward Sferrazza, who then rushed to his work van to drive away. Blocked in by standstill traffic, he got out to film again with his camcorder and became engulfed in the racing dust cloud that covered Lower Manhattan when the first tower fell. He kept recording even as he coughed, stumbled and sought refuge back in his van.
That footage was on an hourlong Hi8 videocassette that captures not only the events themselves, but the raw shock people felt as they were happening. And it was largely unknown to the public before it was digitized and posted online – in full for the first time – this year, having been discovered by a volunteer group of digital sleuths, tech experts and information-seekers who collectively form what they call the 9/11 Media Preservation Group.
Join the conversation as a VIP Member