At 8:46 am on September 11th, 2001, Battalion 1 Chief Joe Pefiefer was conducting a routine inspection for a gas leak. Incidentally joining Battalion 1 was French-American filmmaker Jules Naudet who, along with his brother, had been in the process of producing a documentary on the F.D.N.Y. With no warning, the men of Battalion 1 hear the unmistakable sounds of what is a low-flying jet aircraft, the sounds of a jet are not uncommon in New York City, however this was a plane flying through buildings, only hundreds of feet above the crowded New York skyline. Confused, the men of Battalion 1 looked above to see a commercial airliner aim and crash into the North Tower of the World Trade Center.
With an understandable "Oh shit!" from the firefighters, they immediately went into action. F.D.N.Y. mobilized. Within minutes the first apparatus had arrived on scene, together they would be joined by a battalion-sized force of 750 firefighters and over 300 emergency vehicles that would be dispatched to the World Trade Center. As the leadership for the department began to assemble and create a plan of action, another commercial airliner struck. This time it was the South Tower that was impacted. Undaunted F.D.N.Y. only expanded its operations further. Within half an hour the North Tower, South Tower, as well as the 800-room hotel between the two, World Trade Center 3, had active rescue operations underway with more resources pouring into the city.
At 9:30 am the first F.D.N.Y. firefighter would be killed when Daniel Suhr, arriving with Engine 216, would be killed when a jumper from the North Tower impacted him on his head, killing him instantly.
While one of the largest rescue operations ever conducted by any fire department in history, there was little new when you boiled it down for F.D.N.Y. Various companies arrived into the lobbies and command posts in the buildings they were assigned to, were given orders, and marched into the floors above them into the unknown. No one refused the order to ascend, though some firemen did hug their comrades before going up, but they were resolute and climbed into danger regardless.
The command teams on the ground were of the opinion that they had some time to rescue the trapped civilians above the impact sites. The goal was a single avenue for escape in each building. This, along with ascending the over 70 plus floors however was not an easy task. In both buildings, teams had to traverse up the stairs as the elevators had stopped working, however in the South Tower Battalion 7 Chief Orio Palmer had managed to fix a freight elevator which brought him and members of Ladder 15 to the 41st floor, halfway the South Tower's impact zone. From there Palmer, an avid marathon runner, began to ascend the stairs at roughly a flight per minute. Like the other firefighters, Palmer had on him some 70 pounds of bunker gear as he ran up the stairs. Along the way he encountered Marshal Ronald Bucca, a former Green Beret and Vietnam vet, and the two would climb the stairs together.
Orio and Bucca would make it up to the impact zone on the 78th floor. Upon arriving Orio immediately assessed his scene, informed dispatch of numerous civilian fatalities, as well as began to plan with Ladder 15 on how to attack the fires presented before him. A minute later the South Tower would collapse.
With the collapse of the South Tower, the still operating command structure began to order the string of teams located up and down the North Tower to evacuate. However many of these firefighters outright refused or did not hear the order due to a break in communications that also came.
Along with evacuating the North Tower, efforts were immediately organized to begin rescuing trapping civilians and firefights in the rubble of the South Tower, whose radio chatter began to fill the air. Chief of Department Peter J. Ganci went to the South Tower to directly supervise the efforts himself. About half an hour would pass and the North Tower would then collapse.
Multiple entire companies would be lost with the collapse, including Ladder 3, Ladder 105, Ladder 21, Ladder 7, Ladder 25, Rescue 3, Squad 41 to name a few.
After about 100 minutes of struggle, F.D.N.Y. would lose 343 of the 750 personnel that had been dispatched. Of the 23 battalion chiefs who arrived, only 4 would survive. With other leadership killed, Chief Ganci would also be killed during the collapse of the North Tower. Additionally 91 F.D.N.Y. vehicles would be crushed or damaged so much they'd be written off. After the collapse of the North Tower, an eerie calm would come over the disaster site. Radios were silent, only broken by the calls from dispatch asking for any leadership to respond, to which, for a period of time, none could. Once order had generally been restored, rescue efforts began, and after a period of time rescue turned to recovery.
While the local fire teams had lost almost half of their personnel, it was only a 3% loss throughout the entire force. Response times increased only a single minute as well from 4.5 to 5.5 minutes. In the time since, an additional 343 firefighters have died since from illnesses related to the 9/11 attacks.
Ladder Company 3 was dispatched to the WTC following the attacks loaded with both night and day shifts, some 11 firemen in total. Arriving at the North Tower, Fire Captain Patrick John Brown and his men would begin to climb up the stairs to the impact zone which started on the 93rd floor. At 0921 hours on the 35th floor Captain Brown radioed what was to be his last known recorded words. After finishing up a report to dispatch, he finished it with;
"This is 3 Truck and we're still heading up!"
Captain Brown, along with the 10 other firemen of Ladder 3, would all be killed when the North Tower collapsed. His remains were identified some months later in December and, in accordance with his wishes, his ashes would be spread throughout Central Park.
Ladder 3's fire apparatus would be crushed with the North Tower fell, the cab being ripped off of it. It would however not be the end for the 1994 fire engine, and instead it would be later preserved at the 9/11 memorial as a grim monument to the firemen of Ladder 3 as well as all the firefighters of F.D.N.Y. who perished that day.
Paramedic Unit 311 was one of many ambulances that responded to the WTC and would be damaged after. Later it would be written off.
Unit 2733 shows up in photographs of the time after the collapse of the towers and represents the period of rescue to that of recovery, as well as representing the overlooked NYPD response to 9/11.
Oh its an AU so these are all fake. Its the Freedom Fighters timeline.