How a Blind Man and His Dog Survived 9/11 from the 78th Floor

Paula Pant (0:00)

On the morning of September 11th, 2001, Michael Hinkston was on the 78th floor of the North Tower of the World Trade Center at 8:46 a.m. He joins us to describe what happened next. Welcome to a very special episode of the Afford Anything podcast, the show that knows you can afford anything, not everything, which means it's a show all about making choices.

And fear and hope and everything that comes along with it. Welcome, Michael.

Michael Hingson (0:36)

Thank you. Good to be here.

Paula Pant (0:38)

Michael, September 11th, 2001 Let's start at 1230 a.m., just after midnight.

Where were you? What were you doing?

Michael Hingson (0:48)

I was sleeping.

I and my wife, we had two dogs, my retired guide dog, Linnie, who now was more Karen's dog than my dog, and Linnie got to sleep on the bed. But my guide dog, Roselle, the number fifth guide dog, had to sleep on the floor. But she didn't seem to mind too much. But one of the things that happened with her after we moved to New Jersey is that she developed kind of a fear of thunderstorms. And so if there were a thunderstorm coming, she would start to shake and shiver and pant and the closer the storm got, the worse it got. And at 12.3 on the morning of September 11th, she woke me up. She was panning and she was clearly fearful. And we didn't hear any thunder yet. She was our early warning system. And so it was clear though that something was bothering her. So since she woke both of us up, I told my wife I would take her down to my office in our basement, which I did. And as I was going down the stairs, I started to hear a little bit of thunder. But we got her down and she went under my desk.

Anybody who says that God doesn't have a sense of humor doesn't know what they're talking about. Because the thunderstorm literally came right over our house. And it sounded like explosions. It didn't even sound like thunder anymore. It was just that crazy and that loud. But I did a little bit of work. I had a braille embosser and I was printing some material that I was going to use later in the day because we were going to be conducting some special sales seminars, teaching some of our reseller partners how to sell our products. I worked for a company called Quantum Corporation, which was a Fortune 500 company at the time. And I was hired to open an office in New York City because Wall Street likes manufacturers to actually have a real physical presence in the area. And Wall Street kind of dictates what happens in the world especially when you're selling to them. So we opened the office. I never thought I would open it in the World Trade Center, but there was a bombing in 1993 that wasn't serious, but it caused a lot of people to move out. And so when I went searching for office space and talked to the Port Authority real estate people, they, as I love to put it, made a big mistake by expressing that kind of a weakness to a sales guy who's trying to negotiate a rate. And we got a wonderful rent, and we ended up moving into the World Trade Center on the 78th floor of Tower One. So we were on the south side of the building.

Paula Pant (3:14)

The south side of the North Tower.

Michael Hingson (3:16)

The south side of the North Tower.

Anyway, so with Roselle at 1230 and afterwards, she was pretty fearful until the storm passed us by. And then, of course, she calmed down. And she and I went back upstairs, and by 2, we were back asleep. And then at 5, I got up to get ready to go into the World Trade Center.

Paula Pant (3:38)

So you were on three hours of sleep.

Michael Hingson (3:41)

Well, I had gotten to sleep before then. I went to sleep probably around 930 or so. So I got a few hours. So I got 5 to 6 hours of sleep, which was sufficient.

Paula Pant (3:51)

Okay, good.

Michael Hingson (3:52)

Good.

Paula Pant (3:52)

But speaking of sleep, I don't know if the microphones are picking up the sound of snoring right now. But the sound of snoring, if you can hear it, is coming from your current guide dog.

Michael Hingson (4:03)

He breathes very heavy. Even if he's awake, he'll kind of breathe heavy. But my current guide dog is a black Labrador Retriever. His name is Alamo. He is number eight.