Our New Pearl Harbor

Weehauken, N.J. -- It's almost impossible to reconcile the cool, clear, cloudless day with the scene across the water. There are no World Trade Centers, and up above the giant white clouds steaming from the spot where they used to be, pairs of F-15's circle over Manhattan, around and around the encircled island. Along the closed entrances and highways into the city, ambulances, fire engines and police cars line up for miles waiting to take the thousands of casualties out of New York City and all over the Northeast. At the blood bank in Paramus where I tried to give blood, there were five-hour lines, and the police turned us away.Reporters break down on the air and sob. At the closed-down bridges and tunnels, people stand alongside their cars by the score, staring and crying. I keep calling the cell of one of my closest friends, who went to work inside the Towers at 8:30, and kept getting his voice-mail, until 11:00 a.m., when a recording said his phone was no longer in service. All around New York City, psychologists are showing up at school bus stops to deal with kids whose parents aren't coming home. It's impossible to stare at the TV and not think of the horrific convergence between technology, politics, and information.

Eerily, the scene invokes disaster movies -- a number of which have actually shown the World Trade Center towers being blown up. Staring across the harbor on this gorgeous day, it takes a few seconds to realize that this isn't the evocation of something new and horrible, but the real thing, our own Pearl Harbor, perhaps even worse, since it struck us closer to home and reminded us all how technology can bring us all nose-to-nose with war in seconds, and there are no real barriers between people willing to use it in evil ways and us. Technology allows us to see the building collapse before the reporters even know what has happened. We have to try and make sense of it ourselves.

The silence is stunning, unprecedented for mid-morning, mid-week anywhere near Manhattan island. Everyone is in shock. Stories, malls, business are closing, their workers crying, distracted, unsure of how to behave.

Technology turns planes into weapons. It tracks aircraft hundreds of miles away. It brings us instant and horrific images. It sends us to e-mail, telephones and cell phones to spread news, facts, rumors and stories.

We are both shocked and oddly prepared. Sci-fi and other forms of popular culture have been preparing us for this kind of Techno-Armageddon for years. Technology can do all sorts of amazing things, but it can't protect us from a handful of determined people. We've never seen anything like it, yet in a strange way we have thought of it for years.

Standing over the harbor, I did something I haven't done in 20 years. I dropped to my knees -- following the lead of a bunch of strangers -- and prayed. I have a bunch of friends in somewhere in that Techno-Armageddon, and just wanted to post these thoughts. If anybody wants to post their own, hopefully here's a good place.

Comments

rebuilding the towers...

[mach-5]

After a discussion with some co-workers, we agreed that the towers should be re-built, and in the some location as the former towers. Not only as a memorial to those who died, but also as a sign of this country's strength.

Any other thoughts on this matter? Should the towers be rebuilt?

Re:rebuilding the towers...

[Communomancer]

Personally, I'd like to see three towers built in their place, with the middle one much taller than the other two. That way, it would look like a giant middle finger, directed straight at the fuckers who did this.

Re:rebuilding the towers...

[dolanh]

Maybe I should clarify...

"As a sidenote, shouldn't there be a way for the ground control to override the controls of a hijacked plane?"

read: a hijacked plane. not *any* plane, but one that's already been hijacked. Reinforce the cockpit door and walls, add a system where the pilots could monitor the cabin via hidden video cameras, and where they could notify ground sources of their situation if necessary, and in case of breach, hand control of the aircraft over to ground control. However, this hand-off could only be initiated by the aircraft itself. The facial/fingerprint recognition is a good idea as well.

This way a hijack would need to be two-pronged. It would have to attack the plane, but also take hte ground control. Exponentially harder to coordinate.

As another poster already mentioned, 90% of the systems are already in place. Autopilot is used all the time during takeoff and landing.

One other failsafe possibility. Install a safety mechanism to handover control of air traffic from one tower to another in case of attack. For those of you who never saw "pushing tin" or any documentaries on air traffic control, skilled terrorists could probably do 10x the damage they did today if they had targeted the towers at laguardia, newark, and JFK all at once, and directed the aircraft to fly into eachother.

But i'm sure you've all seen Die Hard 2...

Notes for the day...

[Ron Harwood]

It's International Peace Day and the anniversary of the start of the 1978 Camp David Peace Accord talks...

It's ironic and sad...

Well, US intelligence is enamored of high tech

[typical geek]

and not as interested in low tech, face to face survelliance. Somewhat like a certain web page, the US intelligence community believes there is a high tech solution to every problem.

When your biggest enemy is Russia, almost as technically advanced as you, this may make sense.

When your biggest enemy is a terrorist living in the mountains of Asia, and plotting an attach face to face over Coleman lantern light, the best spy satellites in the world won't help you, you need someone on site.

Iran was overthrown becuase we had no agents in the Ayatollah's movement, and this may be a similar situation.

Technology?

[FTL]

> Technology turns planes into weapons

What technology? Guy walks into a plane, shoots pilots, and turns the yoke. These events could have happened at any time since the towers were first constructed 30 years ago. What is this rant about technology for?

And yet...

[krmt]

And yet it's still the people that matter, not the technology. We all know that, and despite this being a site for nerds, this is stuff that Matters. I don't know anyone in New York, and I'm all the way out here in California, but every five minutes I feel like I'm going to break out in tears just from what I've heard and read. I am scared, saddened, and humbled by this today.

This isn't Armageddon. That sounds too much like the stupid movie and it cheapens the fact that someone somewhere is responsible for this. This is the real thing, and it's not about the planes or the black boxes or the television. It's about the people, because that's what Matters.

Ghandi said,

[Moray_Reef]

'An eye for an eye leaves the whole world blind.'

M.K. Ghandi

This following is only a sig.