Gordon Huie calls himself the world’s only “triple survivor” from the September 11th, 2001 terror attacks. After surviving the World Trade Center attacks, the orthopedic surgeon and rescue worker began operating on patients at Beekman Hospital. He also lost his sister on 9/11.
Today, as he suffers from cancer caused by the dust at Ground Zero, Huie travels to colleges and universities around the world, delivering commencement speeches and meeting with students.
On Wednesday, Huie told his story to journalism students at the University at Albany. WAMC’s Lucas Willard spoke with him to learn more…
Well, the three things that make me triple is I'm a survivor of Tower Two. I'm a family member. My sister died in Tower One. I'm a risky worker. I was sewing people back together that morning on a hard conference room table. So, my plate is very full. And what I noticed in the years immediately after the bombing, many colleges, many universities, they invite me to be the keynote speaker at their commencement exercises. And what I notice is that I decompress from that really full plate a little bit each time when I speak. And since I've come down with cancer from 9/11, I'm not allowed to work anymore. I chose to voluntarily retire because I can't stand to do surgery. Cannot physically stand, is what I should say. I love surgery. I just can't do it anymore. So, I've devoted my life to speaking around the world, and I travel around the world and this great country. I go out…California, Iowa, Nebraska, these really popular places, and I speak and I notice I decompress the same amount from that really, really full plate as I did when I speak in front of 10,000 people at a graduation. So, I do this because it helps me decompress from the horrors of that day, being a triple.
So, sharing your own grief and retelling it is a release for you.
It definitely is. I have PTSD besides my cancers and yeah.
So, this morning, as we're speaking right now, not too long ago, you met with students over at the University at Albany, and many of these students who are now maybe in their late teens or their early 20s, most of them were likely not alive.
That is correct.
When the 911 attacks occurred. What kinds of questions do students ask you when you visit their campuses?
They actually asked me, mostly my own personal feelings, my emotions that I was going through that day, because it's so it sounds so incredible what I went through. And when I speak in front of these students, they obviously journalism students, and the first thing I said to them is, ‘Everything that anyone ever tells you, you make sure they back it up with pictures, videos or make sure you're backed up with facts.’ And what I did is, I showed them what it was like down there, and they actually felt it. And these young students, they go through something called American history. You remember taking American history in high school?
Sure.
That big textbook. Now these students, they can open up the book. Look under September 11, 2001 have one paragraph to describe all three areas of this country that was attacked on that day. And they may, if they're lucky, get two pictures in that same textbook. Usually, it's just one picture. It's usually the picture of the towers on fire. That's usually in the high school's American history books. So, what I got to tell them today, it pretty much enlightened them on what really happened and the magnitude of it when I am able to quote and show them the numbers, when I'm able to show them the demographics of the four-block kill radius. Not just two towers. What prompted me to, especially speaking to journalists and journalist students, is that everyone in the world, not maliciously, but everyone the world, got fooled in the thinking when people died, the 2,749 who died, died in the towers. They didn't. Because I had a mother come up to me in 2018 said, ‘My daughter doesn't work anywhere near the World Trade Center, but she died on September 11, 2001 in New York City. How is it that she died in the world trade?’ That's when I started checking this out, and I realized, ‘Oh my gosh, this is sub story, sub topic here that the whole world needs to know about.’ It's that four block kill radius. And I have the pictures and, well, I have the pictures of the kill radius area. Mind if I show it to you real quick?
Sure.
OK. See if you look at this color photo, look at the area where Ground Zero is. You see all that stuff in white?
Sure.
This is what Steve Casquarelli captured. He had to put a dot where they found bodies the first month, October, 2001. Look at where the bodies are.
Yeah, I’m looking at a map where there are dots, they are all over the place.
They're not in the footprint of the towers. They're out here. And if Steve went beyond October, and let's say he did it for like, two years, three years, or even two months, this area would be a black ring. This is what the whole world never got to see. And it's not the fault of the journalists, because it's the nature of their work. It's not done out of malice. When, if you look at the news tonight, just look at any news station, look at any of the reporters. How much time are they standing in front of the camera in the field? 15, 20 seconds tops. So, are they going to talk about the say, the Deutsche Bank building that's on fire, that's 39 stories tall? Or are they are going to talk about the World Trade Center building that's 110? Every single reporter in the world and domestically in the United States, reported only on the World Trade Center. So, the whole world got deceived in thinking all 2,749 died in the World Trade. They didn't. They actually died outside. And then, of course, I have to show them everything, like the destruction of different buildings. The Deutsche Bank, American Express, the Trade building, residential buildings. As I told the students this morning, you got to back up everything with pictures and videos. And that's what I did.
And on that point of backing things up, obviously, we are in an age of information and social media that didn't exist 24 years ago. Do students encounter misinformation without them realizing it? Or, do you see that in the students that you speak with, that they maybe not have an understanding of the events of the day, but they also might have the wrong impression because of misinformation about the day?
And it's not done with malice. It's the nature of the job. It's the nature of journalism. This the students, they I guess you could say they missed a lot of information, but they wouldn't even know that it's missing. That's what I'm trying to say. I had them….everyone raise their hands. ‘How many in this room think that everyone who died, the 2,749 who died, died in the World Trade Center?’ Pretty much everyone raised their hand. Everyone believed, until they heard my talk, until they saw the buildings, all the other buildings, until they see Steve Casquarellli’s thing, until they see that picture of the killed, the three, the four-block radius kill zone when the building came down. See, the World Trade Center is 110 stories off the ground. It came down between 10 to 12 seconds. And if you have an engineering background, you realize, that much buildings coming down at that great speed, it generates a huge amount of pressure. So, the building appeared to be exploding as it came down. And the further it got closer to the ground, the bigger the explosions. So, it got to the bottom where it exploded out horizontally like a grenade. That's how you got all these buildings destroyed, all in that area. That's what you see in the actual picture. And if you go on the internet, because it's readily available, you'll see 13 to 16 buildings went up in flames or came down that morning. Not two. Thirteen to 16 buildings. And this is something that I was trying to impress upon the students. I tried to tell them, it's a very noble profession being in journalism, but you have to attack this profession with a lot of respect. You have to realize you have a very great burden on you. A lot of lives can be changed depending on how you report it. And it wasn't done with malice on September 11th. It's just the nature of the job that the whole world got fooled into thinking people died dying in the World Trade Center.
So, the students you said, were very curious about your own experiences and the emotional part of it. What about your story grabs the students you think the most? Is there anything when you're talking about your day and the impacts on your life and your family's life and your fact of being the only triple survivor, are there any particular details of your story that the students are most curious about?
Well, I can tell you the last student that spoke with me. She came up to me because…my sister, who died, we attended a church in Chinatown. There were only four people within the community of churches that died in the World Trade Center from Chinatown churches. Two of them came from the same church, my sister and one other girl, Jennifer. Jennifer was only 26, she was very young. So, when I got to speak about Susan, this student from this morning is a Sunday school teacher, also, when she's not in school at UAlbany. She's a Sunday school teacher back at her home and she felt that connection, and she saw the human side of it, or how, when I told about Jennifer. Jennifer's a 26-year-old, this was her first job, you know, where she has to pay taxes and W-2s and all that good stuff? And she was off that week, but she wanted to go into the World Trade Center to see where her new desk is and to meet her new coworkers. She didn't have to do that, but she was just so excited starting her new job, she never came out. And then, I got to mention, how Susan's name at the reflecting pools at Ground Zero, Jennifer's name is placed right next to Susan. The names are supposed to be a place where your company is…you have to be with your coworkers. Jennifer didn't work with Susan's company. Susan worked for compact computers, a very old computer company that went out of business in 2013 but Ben and Joyce wanted Jennifer's name next to Susan, because Jennifer never knew her coworkers, but she did know Susan. Susan was there changing her diapers in church and things like that, so many years ago. So had that human connection, and I think that's what touched the students. When you bring it down to that level, you have that human connection.
As we're speaking right now, there's a lot of cuts to federal government spending going on, including to the World Trade Center Health Program. The administrator of the program was fired, and then, under pressure from Congress, was reinstated. How are you wrapping your head around these cuts to programs that support so many people?
Just for my own personal, on Monday, I had my exam for my 9/11. I've got multiple cancers because of 9/11. In that dust was 69 different types of cancers. So, I went in this Monday for my checkup. And of course, it got canceled even before I got to be seen. I guess lack of personnel, they were not able to get my, from the databank of 9/11 to the doctor's office, so they couldn't communicate. So, since they couldn't communicate, they couldn't see me. So, now that's my own personal thing. I'm not angry about them, I just understand that. You know, I'm not getting my treatment, but by the grace of God. I also, I'm a military veteran, and so I have something to fall back on. Most of my friends who do have their cancers from 9/11, this is the only, the only means of medical support. But like I said, I'm fortunate. I have my military behind me that provides my medical care.
But there's certainly thousands…
Thousands upon thousands…
Thousands upon thousands who may have no recourse after this.
That is correct. That is correct. And it's not easy either. Even when everything was running smoothly, it wasn't that easy getting our treatment. The loopholes who have to jump through the paperwork. We just snowed under so much paper. I wish I can say it was a very sympathetic ear, because we're 9/11 survivors, and we're casualties of the attacks of 9/11 and I think if this occurred 25 years ago, we had the discussion of health insurance, I don't think it would have been that much of an issue. The country would have been very supportive and very sympathetic. But right now, it’s “It's not my department. Yeah, you go call this department, and you contact this department, you fill out that form, and maybe that'll go somewhere. We don't know.” So that's what it's come down to.
So where will your tour take you next, and even beyond this year? Is this something that you envision continuing to do for as long as you can?
Well, I'm not supposed to live past 2021. I'm living on borrowed time right now. So, I made it my point, my only thing, there is nothing I have left to show the world. But I think my narrative is something that I can leave the world. My narrative is maybe something that will help others from the humanitarian standpoint, but in the not-too-distant future…I'm supposed to be in Hamburg next month, in Dublin and Galway in June, and Manchester and Stevenage, which is just above London, in July. So that's the not-too-distant future.
Well, Gordon, thank you for telling me about your story. I appreciate it.
Well, thank you.
Update 6:35 a.m., April 11th, 2025:
A CDC spokesperson emailed WAMC in response to a request for comment on the status of the World Trade Center Health Program.
“The WTC Health Program’s Clinical Centers of Excellence and Nationwide Provider Network are continuing to provide services to Program members at this time. Direct patient care is functioning, and Program members are being seen by doctors and nurses at clinics.
“All statutorily required programs will remain intact, and as a result of the reorganization, will be better positioned to execute on Congress’s statutory intent.
“Program members having problems accessing care are encouraged to contact the Program at wtc@cdc.gov or by calling the Program call center at 1-888-982-4748.”
