INDIANAPOLIS — Saturday marks two decades since the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks which forever changed our country.
"I had initially thought it was an accident, that the plane had flown into the building and it was an accident. I was able to turn on TV in time to see the second plane hit and realized this was a much much bigger deal than originally thought," said Shane Hardwick with Indianapolis Emergency Medical Services.
Like so many others, Hardwick remembers that day like it was yesterday.
"There are certain smells that take me right back, [such as] concrete dust. Twenty plus years I've been in the business. [It's] the smell of hot metal. It's like, it just takes you right back," Hardwick said.
Hardwick was just a year and half into his career when he answered the call to go help at Ground Zero in New York where the twin towers of the World Trade Center stood.
He said he remembers watching a news conference where New York officials were pleading with first responders across the nation to come help.
"We got into lower Manhattan late on the 13th, and we didn't know why we were going or what we were going to do when we got there, but we knew that we wanted to go help," Hardwick said about traveling with a few other Indiana first responders. "It very much felt like you were in a movie scene."
Hardwick captured those scenes in polaroid pictures, which he keeps in a box, along with a copy of the New York Times and other magazines from that time.
He also keeps his dust-covered gloves, goggles and mask he wore at Ground Zero as a reminder to never forget the tragedy.
Hardwick said he never saw any casualties while helping out in New York City.
"I found an empty attaché case, completely void of any contents, but that was the only thing that was recognizable of it being an office," Hardwick said.
Through so much devastation, there was a bright spot.
"There was a girl drawing an American flag on the sidewalk outside her family's business," said Hardwick, who believed it was a sign that the city was beginning to come back to life.
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Hardwick said he was thankful he answered the call to help.
"You've got all of this hurt, and you've got all of this confusion and chaos going on, and you know that that's what you trained yourself to do," Hardwick said.
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