YouSaid · the spoken record

Niels Jorgensen

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208
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2021-09-11
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2021-09-11
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1
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podcast

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  1. “And I was hitting that curve pretty fast. And then right around the curve is the exit to the firehouse. And I had to decide, well, am I driving right in to the battery tunnel, to the city? Am I going to the firehouse? And then I said, But I have no gear I'm going to be ineffective. How do I show up with no gear, no protection? She said, Do what your dad would file the recall, go to Firehouse. I said, hung up the phone. I love you. Got to go. And I did. I went to the firehouse. And I'm glad I listened to her. I had my father ringing in my ears. My dad, beautiful guy. He's 82 in 34 years in New York City fire department. He came down and end staged on Hodson's lymphoma. He's 38 back in going on 39, 1978. And this guy. He's my hero. He was going to die. They sent him home. They said there's really not much we can do. Go get your affairs.”

    2021-09-11 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #220 – Niels Jorgensen: New York Firefighters and the Heroes of 9/11 · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  2. “As my beloved friend Bobby Adams would say to me, I was driving around in a clown wagon and he also says, I have a waving hairdo, waving bye. So thanks, Bobby. Good luck, but yeah, he's a great friend. Yeah, so I took the Volkswagen and I flew in, and I was heading over to Arizona Bridge and hit the Brooklyn Queens Expressway. And my phone rang, and my wife normally doesn't curse a raise of voice and she was yelling at me. And she said, don't go in there, go to your firehouse. First, she asked, well, she knew I was on the way, but she just wanted to know where. And I said, I'm on the curve, which is 65th Street on the Brooklyn Queens Expressway called Dead Man's Curve. We actually used to do a lot of car wrecks up there.”

    2021-09-11 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #220 – Niels Jorgensen: New York Firefighters and the Heroes of 9/11 · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  3. “So I said, all right, they're not going to need us. It's probably going to be a fifth alarm. And, you know, there'll be 255 firefighters there. They'll handle it. It's going to be a bad day for those guys. But, you know, our guys take on some heavy stuff and they'll be fine. Few minutes later, the second plane hit, and I knew immediately I'm like, okay, we're under attack. So I just flew the truck back in. I told my boss I have to go. He understood he knew something was way wrong. And I just was flying at the time I actually had a yellow Volkswagen beetle, kind of a goofy car to be driving, but I loved it.”

    2021-09-11 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #220 – Niels Jorgensen: New York Firefighters and the Heroes of 9/11 · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  4. “I believe the one prior to that was like in the 1968 riots, possibly, and then maybe in the 70s there was another blackout in riots. And I remember my dad talking about it, and he actually always said, just remember if something bad's going down, don't just rush in. You await the recall. Or at the very least, if there isn't a recall, you get to your firehouse And because if you show up somewhere, there's a good chance that no one knows you're there. And now you, in your well-intended movement, you get lost or trapped or no one's looking for you. So that's the whole thing with, you know, checking in. And now you're with a squad or, you know, group of guys and everyone knows, hey, there's Nails, there's Lex. Okay, they're on this team.”

    2021-09-11 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #220 – Niels Jorgensen: New York Firefighters and the Heroes of 9/11 · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  5. “I was initially scared for anybody involved. I realized I said there's going to be lots of fatalities, obviously, depending on the size of the aircraft. The business day there had started probably at 8, 8 30, so those buildings should have been packed at that moment. So that was a thought crossed my mind. But from our being responder perspective, if you're off duty, normally you do not go to a scene. They don't want you to because of accountability and safety. The on duty platoon will handle it. And if it's something very horrific, then they will have something called a recall, which is any police firefighter or EMS personnel is obligated to go to their command immediately, check in with their command, get their gear, and stand by and await orders for deployment or to remain in that command for routine duties.”

    2021-09-11 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #220 – Niels Jorgensen: New York Firefighters and the Heroes of 9/11 · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  6. “I'm a big news radio guy, a bit of a buff. I've been that way since I was a kid, and I had the news radio on. Local New York radio station, and as I was driving the truck, I heard, you know, a emergency report this just in aircraft has just struck the World Trade Center where Quinlan's is located. It's on the north rim of Staten Island, which is right on New York Harbor. And you could see Statue of Liberty mile or two away in your distance and then past that as the towers. So I just literally stopped the truck and looked out and I saw the smoke.”

    2021-09-11 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #220 – Niels Jorgensen: New York Firefighters and the Heroes of 9/11 · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  7. “So my daughter said, Oh, so you should be safe because you're on the oil truck. I said, I'll tell her I was going on an oil truck that day. So you should be safe today, Daddy. So I left and worked for this great company on the North Shore of Staten Island, Quindlin Fuel. Very nice people. Treated me very well. And it was my first day back, actually, for the winter season. Usually get laid off a couple months in the summer because things, you know, too hot to need oil. So he took the truck, started my route that day, and clean, hit the tower. Initially, I'm like, oh, it's probably some silly Learjet pilot. And he veered off track to get a better picture for a client and he hit the building. Probably Know bad turbulence, gust of wind. It's very windy down in that area, Manhattan. So that was my first thought.”

    2021-09-11 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #220 – Niels Jorgensen: New York Firefighters and the Heroes of 9/11 · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  8. “September 11, 2001 was a bright, beautiful, sunny Tuesday morning late summer. There's a lot of folks who go to the beaches in New Jersey call it the short summer. Everybody's left there for Labor Day, but it's still beautiful enough to enjoy the weather. I left my house about 6 30 in the morning and my four and a half year old daughter said to me daddy which truck are you driving today the fire truck the oil truck or the boar's head truck because I had three jobs at the time most New York City firefighters and police officers EMS we make the most amount of money so in order to live in that city you have to you have to hustle and my wife stayed at home raising her children”

    2021-09-11 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #220 – Niels Jorgensen: New York Firefighters and the Heroes of 9/11 · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source