# Excerpts of Tyree G. Bacon oral history interview conducted by Melodie Guerrera, August 6, 2010

Tyree Bacon was a Senior Court Officer and EMT working a few blocks from the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001. After the first attack, Bacon joined a group of fellow EMTs who were going to support emergency medical staff at the World Trade Center. Bacon was assisting a woman in the basement of the second tower, when the building collapsed. Bacon was trapped under the building’s debris, had no visibility, and had trouble breathing. He describes the experience as “the most terrifying thing I have experienced in my life.” Eventually, Bacon was able to exit the building with the woman. As opposed to the chaos outside the building when he entered, the street was a “deafening silence” upon his exit. Bacon took the woman to a nearby triage station, but she died in the hospital, from a heart attack, a few days later. Three of Bacon’s colleagues -- Harry Thompson, Mitch Wallace, and Tommy \[no last name shared\] -- did not survive the building’s collapse. Post-9/11, Bacon has suffered from survivor’s guilt and PTSD. He questions God about why he was spared, while the lives of his colleagues were not. Bacon knows that he made a difference on 9/11.

- Kind: Interview
- Year: 2010
- Runtime: 10 min
- By: Guerrera, Melodie
- Genres: History
- Archive: [Library of Congress](https://www.loc.gov/item/afc2015048_039_Vignette/)
- Licence or status: Rights statement at the Library of Congress (as the archive states it)
- Credit: Library of Congress
- Who can watch: Teens profiles and older (the archive gives no rating; placed by Invisible Network from its collection and subjects)

[Watch now](https://invisiblenetwork.ai/watch/archive/loc/afc2015048_039_Vignette?play=1)