Greg Carafello was getting ready to join a work call from his office on the 18th floor of the World Trade Center when the building suddenly jolted around him.
The time was 8:46 a.m. on September 11, 2001 — the moment American Airlines Flight 11 struck the 110-story North Tower, sending shockwaves through the complex.
On most mornings, Carafello would not have arrived until about 9:30 a.m., but that day’s routine had changed after he took his son to school earlier than usual.
With the scale of the devastation still unclear and danger unfolding nearby, his employee Joe urged him to evacuate, despite the South Tower appearing to have escaped damage.
“Nobody knew a second plane was going to come in,” Carafello, now 66, told the Daily Mail.
The businessman grabbed his coffee, his Palm Pilot and a few personal belongings – leaving behind his checkbook and briefcase.
He headed toward the claustrophobic stairwell, which was only 2.5 feet wide. Down they went, believing they would only be gone for a few minutes.
In fact, it took them 16 minutes just to get outside.
Greg Carafello, 66, survived the terror attacks on New York’s Twin Towers 25 years ago
Carafello was preparing to make a phone call in the South Tower of the World Trade Center when the attacks began
He had evacuated from the South Tower and was standing beneath it just moments before the skyscraper was struck by the second plane (pictured) at 9.03am
Initially they had stopped on the first concourse, where people usually bought lunch.
‘It looked like Lebanon in ’83,’ Carafello said, referring to the suicide bombing at the US Embassy in Beirut 18 years before.
‘It was just destroyed,’ Carafello said of the North Tower, where his friend Jimmy Martello died on the 110th floor. ‘And that wasn’t the second plane, that was only the first plane.’
After seeing the damage, and ‘just wanting to get the heck out of there’ they went to the level below in an attempt to catch a train out of the city.
The level known for its packed shops was in ruins.
‘There’s no canopy, there’s nothing to stop anything from falling a quarter mile,’ Carafello said. Unlike most skyscrapers, the Twin Towers had been built with no core, leaving a wide open space that contributed to their collapse.
Left with no choice, the pair headed back up to the main concourse and sprinted across the street.
‘Some people were just walking, taking pictures, and debris was falling all over,’ the father of four said. ‘I thought they were nuts, to tell you the truth.’
Carafello volunteers at the 9/11 museum, where he is a docent of artifacts. He describes his work there as one of the most important things he has done is his life
Carafello’s friend, Jimmy Martello (left), was killed in the North Tower, where he was on the 110th floor
Still unaware of the horrors to come, he told Joe to ring their Jersey offices and explain that they would be back in 20 minutes.
That call, just two minutes before United Airlines Flight 175 struck the tower they had been in moments earlier, was the only reason his wife, Christine, knew he was alive.
As Joe called the other offices, Carafello, who had his back to the South Tower, watched him fall to his knees.
‘I’m like: “What the hell? What are you doing?”‘
Flying just behind Carafello’s head was the second plane. Joe watched it as it slammed into the South Tower, crashing through floors 77 through 85.
At this stage everyone took off, dashing for safety as dust and debris rained down on them.
‘You knew it wasn’t an accident. It wasn’t a small plane. It wasn’t any of the stuff that in your mind,’ he said.
‘So, at that point, everybody runs.’
Carafello said he felt numb as he witnessed smoke rising from the scene when taking a ferry back to his home in Jersey in the immediate aftermath of the attack
Carafello did not return to Manhattan for six years after the tragedy, but in 2007 decided to go back into business there
A total of 2,977 people were murdered by the al-Qaeda terrorists who hijacked jets across the US on 9/11
He and Joe took off toward South Seaport, before heading uptown. At Alphabet City they found a police officer, who they asked how to get off the island. They were told Manhattan had been sealed.
They ended up walking to the Waldorf Astoria hotel in Midtown, roughly an hour and a half from where the World Trade Center.
‘We begged them to give us a room,’ Carafello recalled. They had already been turned away from two other hotels, despite his premium memberships.
‘By this point, we were dirty and sweaty and shaky. We’re out of juice,’ he said.
They bought new clothes at the gift shop at Bull and Bear Steakhouse Bar. They went upstairs to shower before returning to the restaurant, where they watched the TV footage of the attack with the rest of the customers.
‘That’s when we started to realize the depth of what had happened,’ Carafello said.
Carafello and Joe still had to make it back home to Jersey, where Christine had been in church with friends, praying for his safe return.
He learned there was a boat that would take him to Jersey at 7.30pm.
Carafello (pictured with his daughter Rachel) said what happened to him that fateful day did not begin to sink in until he saw the TV footage
Carafello, pictured with his family, did not make it home safely to Jersey until almost midnight
Along the route, Carafello saw the remnants of the Twin Towers. Smoke was still rising from the ground after the buildings’ collapse. First responders were still pouring over the rubble looking for survivors.
When Carafello looked at the ruins of his old office building, he simply felt numb.
‘It had been such a stressful day that you were kind of out of emotions.’
At that moment he was left wondering just how many people had died, how many were still trapped, and what would come of Manhattan afterwards.
A total of 2,977 people were murdered by the al-Qaeda terrorists who hijacked jets across the US that day. At least 3,000 people have died from 9/11-related cancers and other conditions, according to the WTC Health Program.
It was almost midnight by the time Carafello made it safely back to his wife and four children, who were aged four to 14 years old at the time.
Save for a brief visit to the Federal Emergency Management Agency, which was helping his 30 employees in the immediate aftermath, Carafello would not step foot back in Manhattan for six years.
‘You could feel it, the minute you got off the ferry, you could feel your whole body jazz up again, because of the memory,’ Carafello said.
Further to those killed directly in the attacks at least 3,000 people have since died from 9/11-related cancers and other conditions, according to the WTC Health Program
It wasn’t until 2007 that Carafello would change his mind. His son convinced him to buy his friend’s business and get back into the Manhattan market.
‘I wasn’t going to buy, because I was kind of done with New York,’ Carafello told the Daily Mail. ‘[But] he was right. So I bought the business and went back.’
On the 10-year anniversary in 2011, the 9/11 Memorial opened with two reflecting pools where the Twin Towers once stood.
Carafello began volunteering at the 9/11 Museum, educating visitors about the artifacts on display there. He watched as the new World Trade Center was built.
In April 2015, he took the extraordinary step of signing for a lease on the 85th floor of the newly constructed Freedom Tower.
Though he struggled with visiting the office at first, Carafello credits his volunteer hours with helping him.
‘You just kept going until you felt better,’ he told the Daily Mail. ‘When you’re up there, and you’re in a meeting, and you see a helicopter below you… It never bothered me before, and doesn’t bother me today at all.’
‘It’s very cathartic,’ he told the Daily Mail. ‘I’m proud of returning.’
The businessman now has an office on the 85th floor of the rebuilt One World Trade Center
He started volunteering at the memorial (pictured) and museum that were built at Ground Zero
Out of the 400 businesses inside the old World Trade Centers, Carafello’s is believed to be the only one to have made a return
‘When they first opened [the museum and new buildings], I didn’t know if … I wanted to be more involved. But it’s one of the best things I’ve done in life.
‘I still do it. I’ll do it till I’m 100.’
He believes he’s impacted thousands of lives through his volunteer work. On a single Friday, he speaks to 300 to 400 people.
‘They didn’t know the amount of fuel in the plane. They didn’t know the speed of the plane. I mean, you start hearing 540 miles an hour and 440 miles an hour and it brings to light the explosive power these things had.’
Carafello plans to mark the upcoming anniversary of the attacks by honoring the fallen at the museum. He says he will arrive for his volunteering shift at 5.30am.
‘It’s 25 years later, but it happened,’ he said. ‘It’s not a movie.’
‘This was not an accident… This was a murder scene.’
