Where were you on 9/11?
Just realised what day it is. I was in a restaurant in Assisi. Was on a big group holiday with friends, including a couple of New Yorkers - we were staying in a villa in the middle of nowhere and had specifically chosen one with no television and had to get details over the phone from people in the UK. One of the NYers ended up leaving and staying in a hotel in town so he could watch CNN for the next three weeks that he was stuck in Italy.
My brother was in New York on the day, but didn't deign to phone anybody to say he was alright for about a week.
At work, trying to answer users' helpdesk queries as to why the Internet was running so slowly ("It's not the firewall!"). Walked into one of the offices and was met by one of the Managers asking if we (the IT department) had chartered a plane for New York. At the time I had no idea what he was talking about but obviously the comment turned out to be in spectacularly bad taste...
In the office a normal work day till a colleague on holiday e-mailed in to say something was happening , withing minutes internet access ground to a halt and Helpdesk phones went crazy, We were desperately blocking/restricting access so core business systems were not affected , while as most people wondering what was happening then suddenly realising that this it was not a tragic accident.
Wife was at home cutting the grass and son (3) came out into garden and told her there was a problem with the TV as it keeps showing a plane hitting a building and when was Thomas the Tank coming back on....
I had just seen a client in Cobham, Surrey and returned to my car. The OH phoned me up and said a plane had flown into one of the World trade Centre. I thought it may of been a tragic accident but I switched the radio on, and I was mortified to hear that two (and not one) had violated the towers.
That's one day I'll never forget.
I was in the old What Hi-Fi Home Cinema testing room. Very surreal on the same big screen we normally watched clips of Armageddon.
In the evening I went to my one and only Mercury Music Awards - which was understandably quite a subdued affair.
Shaun Marin:I was in the old What Hi-Fi Home Cinema testing room. Very surreal on the same big screen we normally watched clips of Armageddon.
In the evening I went to my one and only Mercury Music Awards - which was understandably quite a subdued affair.
And of course we were both on that French press trip on 7/7, desperately trying to get info on loved ones in London - with no internet or phone signal - while others were obsessed with speaker designs 
I was at home watching it live on the news, After just flying back from Las Vegas on the 10th!
Clare Newsome:
Shaun Marin:I was in the old What Hi-Fi Home Cinema testing room. Very surreal on the same big screen we normally watched clips of Armageddon.
In the evening I went to my one and only Mercury Music Awards - which was understandably quite a subdued affair.
And of course we were both on that press trip on 7/7, desperately trying to get info on loved ones in London - with no internet or phone signal - while others were obsessed with speaker designs
Indeed we were. I think our plane took off about a minute after the bombs started going off - quite a shock on landing!
JohnDuncan:Just realised what day it is. I was in a restaurant in Assisi. Was on a big group holiday with friends, including a couple of New Yorkers - we were staying in a villa in the middle of nowhere and had specifically chosen one with no television and had to get details over the phone from people in the UK. One of the NYers ended up leaving and staying in a hotel in town so he could watch CNN for the next three weeks that he was stuck in Italy.
My brother was in New York on the day, but didn't deign to phone anybody to say he was alright for about a week.
I was on the sofa with my leg up (just torn my ankle ligaments in a football tournament). I was watching Sky News as it all happened and then was on the phone to work (it was our NY office), describing what I was seeing.
At work and saw it on tv later - I stayed up all night watching reruns in shock.
I still find pictures disturbing, it's as as though the mind cannot comprehend the massive scale of those buildings toppling.
RIP those tragically killed.
Graham_Thomas:RIP those tragically killed.
On that note, and given this is a music-related site, I think it's not too inappropriate to suggest people might want to have a listen to John Adams' On The Transmigration of Souls. Adams was commissioned to compose it for the first anniversary memorial of 9/11.
It's only 25 minutes long and features a recording of the names of the victims being read out. I'm not easily moved to emotional responses by anything much but the first time I heard it the hairs stood up on the back of my neck. It's quite something.
I was in Vienna. We saw a huge crowd outside the haagen das ice cream / coffee shop. So i walked over to see what was going on. This place has a monster tv screen, the city folk go there for the live football etc. Naturaly i assumed that there was a big game going on......
I was at work when I heard a customer mention that a plane had flown into a building in New York. Went upstairs to the office and watched the TV as it all unfolded. At first it was seen as a big accident and then suddenly the second plane appeared....
Stayed there for the rest of my shift and stayed up all night (literally) watching it all unfold.
I was a student working in Asda on the deli for 9/11, spent more time watching the news in the TV section than serving customers.
For 7/7 I was digging holes in a field on a volunteering day trying to listen to the van radio, we all knew lots of people in London and my someone in my family had a very close escape.
Two days you will never forget and hopefully never see again.
Finished work at 2pm that day, walked into the house and put on the TV. My first thought was that some sort of disaster movie was on,out to kitchen to fix a drink and back in to watch the TV and only then realised what was happening because of a repeated scene.They then switched back live as the second aircraft came into view.
Terrible terrible day, I sometimes fear for future of the human race.
I was at our magazine printers in St Ives, Cornwall, with our production manager, Julia, to press-pass a new issue of What Hi-fi? Sound and Vision. I hadn't long been on the magazine, and had gone down with her to see the issue coming off the presses and to check new design, colours etc (we'd just moved to add the 'Sound and Vision' bit) was printing properly.
We arrived in Cornwall @ lunchtime, and while eating our lunch at a cafe heard the first rumours of planes/New York.
We then went into the printing factory, where of course you can hear nothing but the presses...but emerged to take breaks in the 'rec' room, with TV, at which point the horror of the morning (US time) unfolded.
Going into the print room and trying to explain what had happened was surreal. Trying to care about the gradients of colour on an editorial page was suddenly the last thing on our minds.
Group PR Manager - Computers Unlimited;
Former Group Editor of What Hi-Fi? Sound and Vision and Whathifi.com
Twitter: @ClareNewsome