Norman Hornigold @SilverNHFox - Twitter Profile

A Hero That Trusted His Intuition. The problem wasn’t that Morgan Stanley didn’t believe him. Rick Rescorla had already been right once. After the 1993 basement bombing of the World Trade Center, the firm’s security chief walked the towers, studied the site, and reached a conclusion most people preferred not to hear: the World Trade Center was still a target. Next time, he said, it would not be a truck. It would be an airplane. An airplane. In a 1993 report. Executives listened. Then they looked at the lease. Morgan Stanley was the largest tenant in the complex—twenty-two floors of the South Tower, thousands of brokers, and a trading infrastructure that could not be packed into boxes and wheeled across the Hudson. They literally made it a trading center. The contract with the Port Authority ran until 2006. Walking away from premium Manhattan space of that scale would have meant penalties measured in the hundreds of millions, plus the operational chaos of relocating an entire downtown machine. So the company stayed. Rescorla adjusted. If they could not leave the building, they would learn to escape it. He built a protocol and treated it like doctrine. Unannounced drills. No exemptions. Brokers who billed by the minute were pulled off their desks and sent into the stairwells two by two, starting from the top floors, leaving a lane for firefighters coming the other way. People complained. He did not care. Practice, he believed, was the only thing that would beat panic. On the morning of September 11, 2001, American Airlines Flight 11 hit the North Tower. From the 44th floor of the South Tower, Rescorla could see the fire. Then the Port Authority came over the speakers: the South Tower was secure. Stay at your desks. Rescorla grabbed a bullhorn and ignored them. He started the drill his people already knew by heart. Floor by floor, two by two, down the stairs. He sang as he moved—Cornish songs from childhood, then “God Bless America”—keeping the line moving, refusing to let the stairwell become a stampede. Seventeen minutes later, the second plane struck the South Tower. By then, most of Morgan Stanley was already on the way out. Of the 2,687 employees in the building that morning, all but 13 survived. It was stunning. Rescorla could have been outside with them. He went back up instead. Colleagues told him to leave. He said he would, as soon as he was sure no one was left behind. He was last seen around the 10th floor, heading higher. The South Tower fell at 9:59 a.m. They never found him. He was one of the 13. He was a hero in every sense of the word. Remember Rick Rescorla, he remembered for us.

BrianRoemmele's tweet photo. A Hero That Trusted His Intuition.

The problem wasn’t that Morgan Stanley didn’t believe him.

Rick Rescorla had already been right once. After the 1993 basement bombing of the World Trade Center, the firm’s security chief walked the towers, studied the site, and reached a conclusion most people preferred not to hear: the World Trade Center was still a target. Next time, he said, it would not be a truck. It would be an airplane.

An airplane. In a 1993 report.

Executives listened. Then they looked at the lease.

Morgan Stanley was the largest tenant in the complex—twenty-two floors of the South Tower, thousands of brokers, and a trading infrastructure that could not be packed into boxes and wheeled across the Hudson.

They literally made it a trading center.

The contract with the Port Authority ran until 2006. Walking away from premium Manhattan space of that scale would have meant penalties measured in the hundreds of millions, plus the operational chaos of relocating an entire downtown machine. So the company stayed.

Rescorla adjusted. If they could not leave the building, they would learn to escape it.

He built a protocol and treated it like doctrine. Unannounced drills. No exemptions. Brokers who billed by the minute were pulled off their desks and sent into the stairwells two by two, starting from the top floors, leaving a lane for firefighters coming the other way.

People complained. He did not care. Practice, he believed, was the only thing that would beat panic.

On the morning of September 11, 2001, American Airlines Flight 11 hit the North Tower. From the 44th floor of the South Tower, Rescorla could see the fire. Then the Port Authority came over the speakers: the South Tower was secure. Stay at your desks.

Rescorla grabbed a bullhorn and ignored them.

He started the drill his people already knew by heart. Floor by floor, two by two, down the stairs. He sang as he moved—Cornish songs from childhood, then “God Bless America”—keeping the line moving, refusing to let the stairwell become a stampede. Seventeen minutes later, the second plane struck the South Tower.

By then, most of Morgan Stanley was already on the way out.

Of the 2,687 employees in the building that morning, all but 13 survived.

It was stunning.

Rescorla could have been outside with them. He went back up instead. Colleagues told him to leave. He said he would, as soon as he was sure no one was left behind.

He was last seen around the 10th floor, heading higher.

The South Tower fell at 9:59 a.m. They never found him.

He was one of the 13.

He was a hero in every sense of the word.

Remember Rick Rescorla, he remembered for us.

1K

61K

13K

6K

3M

SilverNHFox retweeted

J.K. Rowling

@jk_rowling

about 1 year ago

As another man who once worked with me declares himself saddened by my beliefs on gender and sex, I thought it might be useful to compile a list for handy reference. Which of the following do you imagine makes actors and directors who aren’t involved with the HBO reboot of Harry Potter so miserable? Is it my belief that women and girls should have their own public changing rooms and bathrooms? That women should retain female-only rape crisis centres? That men don’t belong in women’s sport? That female prisoners shouldn’t be incarcerated with violent men and male sex offenders? That women should remain a protected class in law, because they have sex-specific needs and issues? That language should reflect reality rather than ideological jargon, especially in a medical context? That women shouldn’t be harassed, persecuted or fired for refusing to pretend humans can change sex? That women should not be threatened with violence and rape when they assert their rights? That freedom of speech and belief are essential to a pluralistic democratic society? That troubled minors, especially those who are gay, autistic and trauma-experienced, should be given mental health support instead of irreversible surgeries and drug treatments on non-existent evidence of benefit? That gay people shouldn’t be pressured to include the opposite sex in their dating pools, nor should they be smeared as ‘genital fetishists’ when they don’t? That cross-dressing heterosexual male fetishists aren’t actually oppressed, but having the time of their lives piggybacking off gender identity ideology? That said ideology, and the privileged, blinkered fools pushing it because they suffer zero consequences themselves, have done more damage to the political left’s credibility than Trump and Farage could have achieved in a century? Let me have your thoughts.

11K

246K

41K

22K

18M