Name: FDNY Firefighter Talks About What He Saw on 9/11
Uploaded: 2026-02-04T22:30:31.000Z
Description: Watch the stand-up comedy video 'FDNY Firefighter Talks About What He Saw on 9/11' from Theo Von Clips on Comedy Buff. Published 2026-02-04. Transcript available.

Watch the stand-up comedy video 'FDNY Firefighter Talks About What He Saw on 9/11' from Theo Von Clips on Comedy Buff. Published 2026-02-04. Transcript available.

FDNY Firefighter Talks About What He Saw on 9/11

Yeah, if it's okay to talk about what were things like during 9-11?
I mean, I know kind of like what some things were like,
but when you look back on it.
Well, I got off work that morning.
I did a 24-hour tour on the 10th, and I just got home,
and I had a power washing painting business on the side.
Oh, yeah.
And I had my Dominican helper waiting for me at home, you know.
So I got home.
We came in.
I'm making coffee, and my wife calls me.
She's at work, and she says,
you see what happened?
They flew a plane into the towers.
I'm like, you're kidding me.
I put a little TV on that I had in the kitchen,
and I'm like, holy shit.
I'm like, what happened?
Did the guy have a heart attack?
You know, I thought it was like a single plane
that the guy just flew in by accident.
Yeah, some guy fucking just couldn't get it ready.
You didn't know the first one.
You didn't know it was terrorists.
So then I take you.
We get to the paint store,
and the guys are all around the counter with a TV,
and I come in, and the guy, Tony, turns around.
He says, what the fuck is they fucking terrorists
flew planes into the fucking towers,
and I'm like, holy shit.
Now I see both towers going.
Now I know, you know, it was an attack.
So I says, all right, we got to get out of here.
I got to paint a rabbi's house in Woodmere.
So I got this painting truck with ladders,
Tony's power washing and paint.
I raced him.
On the way there, I hear the first tower collapses.
So I'm like, oh, I'm cursing.
I'm like, motherfuckers.
My Dominican guy don't speak English.
He doesn't really hear, but he knows something bad.
He knows the towers.
So now I get another 20 minutes, 10 minutes later or whatever,
and I hear the second tower come down,
and I was out of light.
I put my foot on the brake, and I just started crying.
I was on the steering wheel,
because I knew how many guys just got killed, you know,
from this whole deal.
Oh.
Oh, I was crushed.
So you, like, yeah, at that point,
did you know because you were privy to the information of,
or you just knew how it worked?
You just knew the way it works, you know.
They called in everything once those planes hit, you know.
Could you have gone back in,
or you weren't even allowed to go in?
When?
Like at that moment,
since you had just gotten off of a shift?
No, well, now I raced to the rabbi's house.
I throw the ladders, the paint.
I knock on the rabbi's door.
I says, listen, rabbi, I'm a fireman from New York City.
I got to go to the trade center.
I knew he knew it,
because I could hear the TV on inside.
So he's like, okay.
I said, Roberto's going to take care of everything.
I told Roberto, listen,
I don't know when I'm going to see you again.
But he's like, no worry, no problem.
My boss, I take care.
He was such a great guy.
So now I'm racing with my van,
and I'm going in and out of the L,
out on the elevated train,
and I've got my hand on the horn,
and I'm pedal to the metal,
and everybody's probably looking like,
what the fuck is with that painter?
I'm in on the wrong side of traffic.
I'm just like the French Connection.
I'm in and out of fucking cars.
I get to the firehouse,
and it's chaotic.
Everybody's running in.
What are we going to do?
Who's going?
How are we going to get there?
One guy said he was taking a boat,
because my firehouse in Howard Beach was on a canal.
Yeah, so my friend Whipper comes in.
He's got a Suburban,
and my friend Bobby comes,
and he was like,
I'm going in with my Suburban.
Whoever wants to go,
I'm leaving now.
And were there some guys that did not want to go,
did not want to be involved?
No, everybody went.
Wow.
Yeah, so we grabbed our gear.
A lot of guys went to a staging area.
They made that mistake,
because they got stuck at the staging area.
We took my friend Suburban right to the pile,
right there.
I mean, we were heading down Woodhaven Boulevard,
and I'm like-
And there was no traffic?
It was traffic.
I mean, the shit hit the fan already.
So the Whipper's driving crazy,
my friend the Whipper.
And I'm like,
Whip, don't get anybody killed.
There were enough people already.
Slow down a little.
So we get to the LIE,
and the cops have it shut off,
the entrance to the Long Island Expressway.
So I stick my turnout code out the window,
and they move the cop cars,
and they wave us in, you know?
That had to feel crazy.
It was, man.
Was there some-
I mean, obviously, there's excitement,
probably a ton of adrenaline.
Fear?
Fucking adrenaline.
What are we going to do when we get there?
Right.
We said, we're going to be in ambulance.
We're going to take bodies,
and we're going to rush them to the hospital.
That's what we figured.
So now we're racing down there,
and we get to the Midtown Tunnel,
and my friend Whip is the driver, man.
He's the best.
We're doing 100,
and we're going through the Midtown Tunnel,
and it's like a time warp
with the lights and the yellow bricks,
and we're doing 100 miles an hour.
We come out.
We head downtown,
you know, by the Midtown Tunnel.
We head down,
and he takes us right to the rubble,
and we get out of the car,
and it's dark like an eclipse,
and all the stuff is coming down on us,
all the paper and the ash.
It was dark.
The walls were standing still.
Did it look something like this,
or it looked different?
Just like that.
You know, that's a few days,
a week later or whatever, maybe.
But it was dark,
and when we got out of the car,
we couldn't breathe.
So we had to rip up T-shirts,
and we put them around our faces to breathe,
and then I noticed there was an old hardware store
right across the street
with like a glass door.
So I grabbed the tire iron.
I went over.
I smashed the door open,
and we all went in.
We grabbed ropes and masks
and sledgehammers,
whatever.
The cops came in behind us.
Everybody was grabbing shit.
So now we start to climb, you know,
and it was like the top of the trade center
was only about six stories high now, you know,
and we were climbing,
and there was nobody around.
It was quiet, dark, eerie,
and we heard all the pass alarms going off
that when firemen aren't moving,
it makes a screechy noise,
and you could hear that all around, you know,
and there was maybe one or two other firemen.
We were the only ones there,
and we were going in and out of voids,
in and out of voids,
calling anybody to hear us,
banging on shit,
and waiting to see if that happens,
and nobody, nobody.
Finally, we worked all the way up to the roof
of the trade center,
which was AstroTurf,
and now you could see,
and it looked like it went on for a mile,
you know, it was like a movie set.
It was so crazy,
and on one side was the EAB bank,
and it was on fire,
and they had, excuse me,
they had mesh,
like the black mesh covering it,
and all you saw was the black mesh
and the flames coming out.
It was like satanic.
Oh, it was so creepy,
and so we were climbing all around,
inside and out of voids,
and we did this for like,
maybe about one o'clock.
We got there at 11.30,
and my friend Bobby says,
Tony, I'm, my throat's closing up.
We got to get water.
So I said, Whip, we got to get water.
We got to head to the street.
Now it's like one o'clock.
People are coming in from everywhere.
Firemen from,
cops, firemen,
the National Guard was coming in.
So we worked our way to the street,
and then we needed water,
and there was a guy,
a Wall Street guy,
with expensive suit on,
covered in cement dust,
and he had a bottle of water,
you know, like.
Those big bottles?
The big bottle,
and he was going around,
giving everybody water,
and you know,
trying to wash their eyes out,
and shit,
and we were just waiting our turn
to get some of that water,
and as we were doing that,
these four women,
they come out of nowhere.
They set up two barrels,
a piece of plywood.
They had wonder bread,
and peanut butter,
and jelly,
and they started making sandwiches
out of nowhere.
It humbled,
and I got a little emotional,
because it was like,
you know,
to see all these people
coming together,
right,
at this time,
no matter what your race,
creed, color,
working together.
So we passed the peanut butter,
and jelly sandwiches,
we had the water,
and we went back,
but before we got up,
a deputy gets up on a car,
and he yells to whoever can hear,
you know,
and it was like,
six truck,
we just got a call,
they're trapped,
they're in a shaft,
and we're going to find them.
We were like,
this is the first time
we're hearing anybody's alive.
We're like,
yeah,
yeah,
so everybody starts running
for get gear,
and there's a rescue truck
that was crushed,
and we ran over
to the rescue truck,
and we started opening up
compartments,
I grabbed a jackhammer,
we grabbed some bit,
big ass jackhammer,
bits,
bottles for air,
and now we start heading out
to look for them.
So you at least had a mission.
Oh,
we were on a mission now,
you know,
now we're looking for it.
So now,
another two hours,
was climbing up and down
these kinds,
but meanwhile,
Building 7,
which is the big building
everybody talks about,
was on fire
from the moment
we got there,
every floor.
Really?
Burned every floor.
And what caused that fire?
Just the collapse,
you know,
they had the two trade centers
just collapsed
right in front of them,
yeah.
There was a lot
of buildings on fire.
So now,
we're working up and down,
and I take a fall,
I fall into a void,
and I fall on my right shoulder,
and my Bobby comes running over,
he's like,
kiddo,
you all right?
I said,
yeah,
I fucking hurt my shoulder.
He helps me up,
I take the jackhammer,
I throw it into a void,
I'm like,
fuck this shit.
We had no radios,
we didn't know if they found
anybody or anything,
excuse me,
my pin.
It was almost impossible.
It was impossible.
Finally,
we threw all this shit down
because it was a couple hours already,
climbing again,
and when you're climbing up
these big jagged pieces of concrete,
I'm sure it's scary.
In and out,
in and out,
and we made our way
into a store,
like a high-end store
that was maybe
three stories up,
and we went in
through the window
because that's how-
Three stories up what?
High,
because the rubble
was that high,
so we crawled
into their window,
and it was a high-end
women's store,
and it's dusty and dark,
and we're crawling around.
I'm looking under all the clothes
to see if there's anything.
We're yelling,
anybody here?
Anybody here?
Nobody there,
so we worked our way back out,
and now we went to the Marriott,
which was a hotel right there,
and we came in
one of these big broken windows.
It was right there
at Ground Zero,
huh?
Yeah,
and we climbed down the debris
into the lobby of the hotel.
We're the only ones there,
you know?
So we're like,
holy shit,
look at this place,
you know?
We're looking around.
And it was kind of kept okay?
It was a big lobby.
There was ash
and broken glass and shit,
but it wasn't collapsed.
So I said,
look over there.
I see a fireman
sitting at one of those
little desks in the lobby.
We're like,
holy shit.
So we go running over.
First fireman we're seeing,
you know?
And he's covered in shit,
you know?
No helmet.
He's like pale white.
He's in shock,
and he's sitting there,
and we're like,
holy shit,
buddy,
you okay,
okay?
And he turns,
and he looks at me,
and it's one of the young guys
that got on rotation.
He just left our house,
and they sent him to Manhattan.
We called him Monkey Man.
Wow.
I'm like,
holy shit,
Monkey,
what the fuck?
And he just,
he looked up at me,
and he said,
all my guys are dead.
They're all dead.
And we were like,
oh shit.
And I'm like kind of rubbing his shoulder.
My other guys are like,
Monkey, Monkey,
you all right?
You all right?
And he was in shock,
you know?
So we're like,
look, Monkey,
we got to go, man.
You know,
you're okay.
We're going to leave you here.
And it was funny,
because the phone was on the table
with the little messenger light blinking.
It was the weirdest sight,
you know?
And we left him.
We climbed back out,
out the window,
back onto the debris.
It's a long day.
Yeah,
we were there until like 9.30 at night
from 11.30 in the morning.
So we were going