Eyewitness Mark Schutzman shares his 9/11 reflection

I was a newly admitted partner at the global firm PricewaterhouseCoopers. My partner career began just seventy-one days before the terrorist attacks. Our New York leader, John Hatab had called a partner meeting for 8 a.m. at the Yale Club on 45th and Park.

The partner meeting wasn’t memorable, except for the fact that I was there. It ended promptly at 9 a.m. when several of us walked together from the Yale Club to the PwC office on Sixth and 44th.  We were unaware that sixteen minutes earlier American Airlines Flight 11 had flown into the North Tower of the World Trade Center.

I arrived at the office to see nearly everyone huddled around a small television.  It was 9:15 a.m. and United Airlines Flight 175 struck the South Tower twelve minutes ago.

We watched the news coverage for a few hours and saw the towers collapsing. At some point after noon, we walk outside to the corner of 6th Ave and 44th Street. From this spot, and on every clear day since their completion in 1973, the top 1/3rd of the Towers are visible against the sky. Today, in their place, we see plumes of gray smoke blowing southeast over the harbor.

What I saw next is my most vivid and lingering memory of that day. We remain on the street corner as a man approaches from the west, heading east on 44th Street. Passing directly in front of us as he crosses 6th Ave., maybe heading to Grand Central, returning home to his relieved family.

He wears a suit, dress shoes, and tie. He carries a briefcase.  As he walks closer, the peculiar details begin to reveal themselves. His hair is full of soot, tousled, almost crusted with powdered cement. One eyeglass lens is shattered but remains intact within the frame. The frame sits slightly crooked on his nose, but he doesn’t seem to care.

He wears the somber expression of a man who realized he has escaped life-threatening danger and knows others didn’t. His clothes aren’t torn, but every inch is covered in grey ash. Small concrete pebbles are nestled tightly within the laces of his once expensive-looking shoes. His briefcase is entombed in particles that earlier this day, stood proudly 1,000 feet above the streets of the financial district.

He passes by quietly. Head down, walking slowly. He doesn’t acknowledge us. We want to help. He doesn’t want help. He wants to be with those he loves.

The phone lines are jammed but somehow my sister reaches me. She works in the garment district not too far from my office. She offers to drive me home. I accept.

We cross over 11th Ave at 57th Street and merge onto the West Side Highway, heading north to Westchester. To home. To my family.

It is 2 p.m., on Tuesday, and the West Side Highway is one of the busiest roads in all America at any time of day. But on this day, there are no other cars within sight. A post-apocalyptic scene. Not a vehicle in sight—anywhere. 

I lost a neighbor on 9/11. He worked in one of the Towers. I didn’t know him well, but I think of him and his family. I think of the men and women who commuted to work that day just as I had, but who did not come home. 

Mark Schutzman

Sept. 9, 2026

Provided.

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