The largest sea evacuation in history used to be the 1940, nine-day evacuation of 339,000 British and French soldiers following the Battle at Dunkirk, when the Germans battled them back to the coast.
That changed in 2001 when the largest sea evacuation took place in our time, in our country, on the southern shore of Manhattan, the day the Twin Towers fell. Estimates run as high a half a million people rescued in less than nine hours.
The YouTube video “BOATLIFT: An Untold Tale of 9/11 Resilience” covers the story of that day in a 12-minute documentary using the testimony, images and voices of ship captains, ship owners and their crews. It is also told in the book “All Available Boats: The Evacuation of Manhattan Island on September 11, 2001.”
It is easy to forget after all these years that on Sept. 11, no one knew when or if another attack might happen. At Ground Zero, a cloud of ashes and smoke descended over the island. Uncertainty reigned. People feared for their very lives.
“Millions of people ran for safety. Hundreds of thousands ran south and that’s when they realized it was an island and they were trapped. They were feeling helpless and that’s the worst feeling in the world,” narrates Tom Hanks.
Every mode of transportation out of Manhattan was shut down. The subways, the bridges, the roads. Boats were, for the first time in 100 years, the only way in or out of Manhattan, according to Kirk Slater, captain, NY Waterway.
At the shoreline, people begged to be taken aboard any boat going anywhere as long as it was away from the island and the day’s catastrophe.
Watching from the water, Michael Day of the U.S. Coast Guard saw a boat filling with evacuees. “I thought the boat was going to flip, there were so many people trying to get on. And as I looked behind them, they were 10 deep. We decided it has to get better organized and that’s when we did it. We made the call on the radio to ‘All available boats. Anyone wanting to help with the evacuation of New York report to Governor’s Island.’”
The response was awesome. “I never saw so many tugboats – a fleet of tugboats headed to Manhattan. Ferries, party boats, private boats. There were boats all over the horizon. Literally a 100 on target,” one man says on the video.
A partial list of about 150 rescue boats that came that day can be found at harborheroes.com/boats. It is only a partial list: Numerous boats and ships have never been identified.
“They were streaming out of the buildings. The first mode of transportation was a ferry. They did not care where it was going. They saw the boat and that’s when they knew, ‘this is how I am getting out of here,’” recalled Rick Thornton, Captain, NY Waterway.
Right after the first tower fell, those on the scene observed “people were jumping in the river and swimming. Boats were nearly running them over.”
“Boats, usually an afterthought in most people’s minds, were the only way in or out of Manhattan,” the narrator says.
“It is just human nature, you saw people in distress, you had to pick them up,” said Andrew McGovern, captain, NJ Sandy Hook Pilots.
Vincent Ardolino took his yacht, the Amberjack V. When his wife asked “what if there is another attack,” he simply replied, “Then I will have to deal with it. Even if I only save one person, that is one less person who will suffer.”
“One guy … jumped onto the boat. … I said what you doing? He said ‘I’m jumping for my life,’” reported Robin Jones, engineer of the Mary Gellatly.
“Out of nowhere you saw people coming like zombies through the fog and you knew they were human beings (calling) ‘Don’t leave us. Please take us,’” recalls Marcus Carter, tankerman.
At that point, the lessons and laws that usually dictate the loading and operation of a boat were set aside.
“It was not ‘how many are you allowed’ but ‘how many can you fit,’” he said.
Boats would take a bed sheet off a bunk and paint their destination on it.
“The best part … everyone helped everyone,” Ardolino said.
Four businessmen reportedly lifted an older woman like a surf board over the crowd and onto the boat.
“We went back and forth all day long, taking as many as we could. You could not have planned nothing to happen that fast, that quick,” said Robin Jones.
“You forget all about what they teach you at school. Morally, and deep down, you say this is what I am going to do,” Carter said.
“It was an honor … the greatest day in my life on the water,” concludes Kirk Slater, captain, NY Waterway.
“I have one theory in life, I never want to say. ‘I should have.’ If I do and I fail, I tried. If I do and succeed, better for me. Never go through life saying, ‘I should have.’” Ardolino said.
Hundreds of sailors and boat owners agreed. That day they did what they could to evacuate the folks waiting at the south shore of Manhattan.
(Joan Hershberger is a reporter at the News-Times. E-mail her at jhershberger@eldoradonews.com.)