25 years later, I still hear that call come in, live, on our air

Those of us old enough to remember have never forgotten. Everyone has their own story, their own specific memory attached to that morning. Mine came over the radio, on my commute in, listening to this very station.

Eric Scott delivered the first breaking news. You could hear the shock in his voice as he laid out the facts. Then Jim Gearhart came on and said it plainly: "My God, I've got nothing but goosebumps." Jim opened the phone lines almost immediately, to anyone who might have actually seen the plane hit the World Trade Center. By the 9 a.m. newscast, Eric Scott said something that's stayed with me for 25 years: that this was going to be one of those days we'd all still remember decades later.

Then the second plane hit, live, on our air

Eric put a caller on, a man working on the Jersey side of the Hudson, who screamed that he'd just watched, in that exact moment, a plane hit the second tower. Eric was in disbelief. Then a second caller confirmed it. All of us, everyone listening, shared that same disbelief that it had actually happened again, a second time. This was all unfolding in real time. Tragic, but remarkable reporting, from Eric Scott and Joe Cutter in our newsroom, and remarkable reporting too from callers who were living through it and telling us what they saw as it happened.

As the day went on, the Pentagon was hit. Flight 93 went down in western Pennsylvania. All of it felt unbelievable, scary, sad, and we genuinely did not know what would happen next, or when, or where it would end.

SEE ALSO: Remembering 9/11: The Audio We Heard at New Jersey 101.5

Photo by Spencer Platt/Getty Images

One caller's whole day, told to us block by block

One thread ran through our air all day long: a Mercer County man who worked in a building next to the towers, checking in by cell phone again and again as he tried to find his way home. The trains weren't running, so he was walking, block by block, covered in dust from the debris in the air. Each time he called back in, he'd tell us where he was now, what he was seeing, how far he'd gotten. Eventually he found out the ferry was still running. He made it across the Hudson, caught a bus, and made it home to New Jersey that night. He made it home. Nearly 750 New Jerseyans did not.

What I actually feel, looking back

When I think about how our team handled that day, all I have is pride. We needed to inform people, stay calm ourselves, and offer whatever information and reassurance we possibly could. Everyone I worked with that day did exactly what they needed to do, out of pure instinct, even with adrenaline running through every one of them. We took hundreds of calls from listeners who'd witnessed events firsthand, and hundreds more from people who just needed information, or a little comfort to help them stay calm. Our team delivered on both, over and over, all day long, and for the weeks and months that followed.

What I remember most, after the fear passed

In the days after, I remember the unity this country felt. I remember one caller saying, simply, on the air, "put up an American flag." It felt like all of us did. That sense of unity feels long gone now. I hope we get it back someday. I just hope it doesn't take another day like that one to bring it back.

We've put together the actual audio from that morning, our own coverage, as it happened. I'd encourage you to listen. Twenty-five years later, it still says more than I can.