‘We help people’: Local firefighter reflects on Ground Zero experience 25 years after 9/11

Local firefighter Peter Rivers stands in front of the firefighters memorial along Windsor’s waterfront ahead of the 25th anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. Rivers travelled to New York two days after the attacks to assist with the search and recovery effort at Ground Zero. (Chris Campbell/CTV News Windsor)

WARNING: This story contains details some readers may find disturbing. Readers’ discretion is advised.

When Peter Rivers looks back on the morning of Sept. 11, 2001, one image remains especially vivid.

Two days after the terrorist attacks, on Sept. 13, 2001, Rivers travelled to New York City on his own initiative to help with the search and recovery effort at Ground Zero.

Driving across a bridge into Manhattan, the local firefighter looked toward the right and saw two massive pillars of smoke rising over New York City.

“I just saw two massive pillars of smoke just going up,” Rivers recalled.

“And at that point, I’m like, what is happening? What am I doing?”

Twenty-five years after the terrorist attacks that killed nearly 3,000 people in New York, Washington, and Pennsylvania, Rivers remembers feeling shocked and compelled to help.

“Just pure shock. I’ve never seen anything to that degree,” he said.

“And just felt compelled to see what we could do to help.”

Rivers said he was scared as he made the trip, not knowing what he would encounter.

“But again, I felt compelled to go,” Rivers said. “Just, I went.”

When he arrived in Manhattan, a military blockade was turning people away from the disaster zone.

Rivers said he identified himself as an urban search and rescue specialist and firefighter and showed officials the equipment in the back of his truck.

“They actually gave me an escort right down to Ground Zero,” he said.

Once there, Rivers found himself working alongside first responders from across North America.

He was paired with a group of 12 Chicago firefighters, who helped support him as he began setting up rigging and descending into the rubble.

“We just basically went to work,” Rivers said.

Rivers remembers crawling down into the pile with a flashlight and headlamp, searching for voids where survivors might be found.

The experience was physically and mentally demanding.

“The entire pile was vibrating because they had all the heavy equipment, cranes picking stuff off,” Rivers said.

“So, the entire time you’re in there, you’re wondering if the pile’s going to come down on you. That has stuck with me.”

The search also meant recovering human remains from the rubble.

“Finding, unfortunately, finding different body pieces that they would take out and put that in a bucket and that gets to where it needed to go,” he said.

For Rivers, the sheer scale of the destruction remains difficult to describe.

“It was just the grand scale,” he said.

“It wasn’t just a building. It was like a half the City of Windsor is just massive, overwhelming.”

But amid the destruction, Rivers said he also saw an extraordinary level of co-operation among first responders and other workers.

“It showed when things got bad, we actually did all get together and worked as a team,” he said.

The response, he added, went far beyond traditional firefighting.

“You had to be multitasking on so many different levels, on so many different trades to do it,” Rivers said.

“I was working beside ironworkers in there.”

Rivers also remembers the support provided to those working at Ground Zero. With the area closed off by the military, responders were fed on site, including by chefs from restaurants in downtown Manhattan.

He recalls seeing celebrities such as Sarah Jessica Parker and Marisa Tomei helping out during breaks.

But it is the people he worked alongside who have remained most prominent in his memories.

Rivers said he stayed in touch for a time with some of the Chicago firefighters he worked with. He said all of them have since died after developing brain, stomach, or colon cancer.

“I’m the last one,” he told CTV News.

Rivers, who has also responded to other disasters during his career, said the experience reinforced his belief that first responders have a responsibility to help wherever they are needed.

“I believe that firefighters, EMS, police, first responders have the calling that no matter where you are, how old you are or the time in, you’re still first responder,” he said.

“And that’s what you do for a living. That’s how you’re built.”

With the 25th anniversary approaching, Rivers said he wants people to remember the first responders who answered the call... and the physical and mental toll that work can take.

“Just remember your first responders,” he said.

“What they go through physically and mentally, you know, and we’re here for you when you need us. That’s what we do.”