Unit 1 “Weve Been Hit!”With the building in flames, one man needed help. Another man refused to leave him. Adam Mayblum used to enjoy watching as storms lashed the windows of his office: You think thats power? Mayblum would scoff. Im on the 87th floor of the World Trade Center. Thats power. The drawstrings on his window shades would appear to sway slightly, but it was an illusion. Although they were 1,040 feet in the sky, The WTC was quite steady. When Mayblum felt a devastating rumble on that September morning, he glanced at the drawstrings. They were careening wildly, three feet in either direction. Mayblum would be one of thousands cast into an extraordinary purgatory that morning1. While as many as 25,000 would find their way to safety, 5,000 would not. For some, it was a matter of geography2 not just which tower they worked in or on which floor, but in which corner of the building. For some, the choices were as basic as which staircase to use. Others faced the ultimate moral dilemma: Save yourself, or save another. The confusion inside Adam Mayblums office at May Davis, a financial services firm, lasted just seconds. He knew he needed to get out. He ripped his T-shirt into pieces, soaked the pieces in water and gave them to colleagues to cover their faces. Among them: Harry Ramos, head trader at May Davis. Mayblum had worked with Ramos off and on for 14 years.3 Sparks bit at Mayblums ankles as he raced for the stairs. He bolted down two flights before realizing that his trading partner, Hong Zhu, had been left behind. He went back upstairs, the whole area now filled with smoke and burning jet fuel. There was no sign of Hong. Mayblum hurried down again and made it to the 78th floor, a transfer lobby where one set of elevators and stairs ended and another began. He saw a reassuring sight; Ramos had waded into the pandemonium to help panicked workers into a stairwell. Mayblum continued his descent, the muscles in his calves contracting in spasms. On the 53rd floor, he came across a heavyset man whose legs just wouldnt move anymore.4 “Do you want to come, or do you want us to send help?” Mayblum shouted. The man asked him to send help. Adam said he would. In the noise, smoke and sparks, Mayblum didnt realize that his friend Hong Zhu was behind him in the stairwell the whole time. When Hong got to the 53rd floor, he came across Harry Ramos. Ramos had stooped to help the heavyset man Mayblum had seen earlier. “Ill give you a hand,” Hong said. Together, Ramos and Hong helped the man down one more flight to an elevator. “Dont take it,” a Port Authority official screamed. Hong and Ramos tried to send a magazine down in the elevator to test its safety. But when they pressed the “down” button, the doors wouldnt close. So Hong decided that he would be the guinea pig instead.5 He stepped inside, and the doors shut behind him. Hong took the elevator down to the 44th floor, the next transfer lobby. So far, so good. He pressed “52,” went back up and collected Ramos and the heavyset man. On 44 Hong and Ramos helped the man toward the last bank of elevators that would take them all the way down. Hong pressed the “down” button again. Nothing. They would have to take the stairs. Ramos and Hong tried to support the man. “One step at a time,” Hong said. They had been trying to get out for an hour and five minutes. They were on 36 when they felt the South Tower collapse. “We really have to move,” Hong said. The rumbles of the collapsing tower next door seemed to sap the heavyset man of his last gasps of energy. “I cant do it anymore,” he said, sitting down. Hong and Ramos tried to persuade him to continue. “You dont have to move your legs!” Hong shouted. “Just move your butt. Lets go!” But the man couldnt go on. A fireman ran up to them. Hong expected that he would join in to get the heavy man to move. Instead, the fireman turned to Hong. “Who are you, screaming at him to get out?” the fireman shouted. “You get out!” Hong looked at Ramos, who was still standing with the heavyset man. “Im coming down with you,” Ramos told the man. “Im not going to leave.” “I left,” Hong says sorrowfully. “Alone.” The next day, Adam Mayblum sent an e-mail describing his experience to friends and relatives, who sent it to still others. The e-mail was read by someone in San Francisco who knew a woman in New York named Rebecca. Her husband, Victor, a heavyset man, was missing. On Saturday, September 15, May Daviss chairman had a gathering at his New Jersey home. Adam Mayblum was there. So was Hong Zhu. Rebecca was also there, learning how her husband, Victor, had been comforted in his last moments, how Harry Ramos had refused to leave him behind. Ramoss wife, Micky, was there too. She kept asking Mayblum and Hong where her husband was, convinced that somehow, H