NEW YORK — New York paused Friday to mark 25 years since two hijacked planes crashed into the twin towers, killing nearly 3,000 people.
Two retired National Guardsmen from Western New York shared their memories of guarding ground zero and how the toxic air from the burning rubble caused both to develop cancer.
WATCH: National Guardsman and journalists recall their experiences 25 years ago during 9/11
Scott Wymyczak and Mike McGill were members of Charlie Company, 152nd Brigade Engineer Battalion, based in Lockport when news of the terror attack came.
I met with them at the Connecticut Street Armory on Buffalo's west side to talk about being sent to ground zero.
The National Guardsmen worked with New York City Police to maintain security around the recovery area.
"When we got there, it was still rescue. And it transitioned to recovery at some point or the other," Wymyczak said.
"They had walls with pictures just wherever you went; any place there was a fence or a wall," McGill said.
Wymyczak recalled noticing a woman near the site who appeared to be looking for someone.
The smell and the dust are something neither man said they will ever forget.
Neither man wore a mask while working at the site.
"They told us we did not need it. The EPA said that the air was safe," Wymyczak said.
But it wasn't. Both Wymyczak and McGill have battled cancer caused by inhaling the toxic air around the burning ruins of the World Trade Center.
Wymyczak was diagnosed after a spot was found on his lung.
"And there was a spot on my lung, and they said, 'Don't worry about it. Come back in six months,' and come back six months later in a second check — wasn't good," Wymyczak said.
McGill was diagnosed with prostate cancer during a routine checkup.
Both men have since recovered. Tens of thousands more people are sick, and more than 9,000 have died from 9/11-related illness.
Despite everything, neither man regrets answering the call.
"No, nope," Wymyczak said when asked if he had any regrets about going.
Wymyczak is now passionate about encouraging anyone who was sent to ground zero to get themselves checked out.
For the journalists who covered the attacks, the anniversary brings back a flood of memories.
I was a newspaper reporter at the New York Daily News on Sept. 11, 2001. I still have the notebook I carried that day. The first page holds quotes from an ATF firefighter I encountered coming out of the smoke.
"This is the field of evil," he said.
Todd Maisel was a photographer for the Daily News that morning, originally assigned to cover a primary election when word came that a plane had struck the World Trade Center.
"And I called the desk, and Mike Lipack gets on the phone. 'Go, go, go!' And I hung a heavy U-turn and got in behind an emergency service truck," Maisel said.
Maisel made his way directly beneath the towers, photographing the horror and emotion unfolding around him.
When the first tower fell, he took shelter inside a nearby building — but quickly went back out.
"And I heard something. I heard maybe somebody screaming for help, but I couldn't tell where it was coming from. So I started going out into the debris field," Maisel said.
In the rubble, he found fellow Daily News photographer David Handschuh.
"It just proved that photographers are not bulletproof," Maisel said.
Maisel and others pulled Handschuh to safety inside a deli in the World Financial Center. Moments later, the second tower came down.
For Maisel, the anniversary is a moment for reflection.
"It's one of those days where you should reflect on your life and realize how lucky you are to be alive and to be part of this world. These people didn't have a choice. They didn't have a choice to live another day. That was it for them, and we're here. And we're gonna tell that story," Maisel said.
Wendell Jamieson was a new city editor at The New York Times on Sept. 11. In the weeks and months that followed, he helped lead one of the most ambitious journalism projects to come out of the attacks — a series called "Portraits of Grief."
"It's called 'Portraits of Grief,' and an editor named Christine Kay came up with the idea that we would capture each different life; we would focus on one attribute of their personality," Jamieson said.
The project set out to profile every single victim — nearly 3,000 people.
"We used 140 reporters over the course of a year. Everybody came on, on the Times staff and business desk and other desks, national desk, spent a week or so doing it, and then had to be cycled off because it was such rough duty," Jamieson said.
Handschuh, the photographer Maisel pulled from the rubble, spoke from a new exhibit at the New York State Museum featuring photos by him and Maisel titled "Witness to 9/11."
He described what it was like to document the attacks through a camera lens.
"It's like watching a movie. It's definitely not like observing reality," Handschuh said.
"And when you look at it through a camera lens, it allows you to distance yourself from the reality of what's happening. Right in front of your eyes," Handschuh said.
One of his images captured the moment a plane struck the South Tower.
"It's a beautiful, beautiful, horrible picture is the only way to describe it, and it was taken just a millisecond after the, after the plane hit the south tower," Handschuh said.
Seconds after that image was taken, the tower fell on top of him.
"I was buried alive, and I owe my life to a bunch of firefighters who dug me out and saved me, and paramedics who took care of me, police officers who took me to safety on a boat," Handschuh said.
Twenty-five years later, Handschuh said he thinks about the phrase "Never Forget."
"I think I'd rather talk about 'Always Remember,' and for me, I'm always gonna remember the friends who were lost. I'm always gonna remember those who saved so many lives, and I'll always remember how lucky and fortunate I am to have survived," Handschuh said.
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