Hello everyone welcome back to the history hit warfare podcast I'm your host James Rogers and if it's your first time here we cover the history of warfare from the

polyonic battles and Cold War confrontations to the Normandy landings and 9-11. Today we have a special original commemorative episode to mark the 20th anniversary of 9-11.

But this is a history of that day that I can truly say I've never heard before. I've been studying this period for the last decade or so. I lecture in terrorism and counter-terrorism and I truly knew nothing about this.

As the World Trade Center was attacked and then rapidly fell to the ground, survivors were caught in an impossibly apocalyptic scene. They fled. They ran south as far as they could until the land ran out up to the water's edge.

And in less than nine hours at this point between land and sea,

approximately 800 mariners aboard 150 vessels delivered nearly half a million people from Manhattan to safety.

This was the largest maritime evacuation in history and the only way I can put this into perspective is to tell you that it was larger even than the boat lift at Dun Kirk.

This is you could say the maritime history of 9-11, a heroic story that is only now coming to light thanks to

Jessica de Long. Jessica served at Ground Zero on the NYC Fireboat John

J Harvey. She's interviewed hundreds of those who were involved. about her own own own own story at Ground Zero. So here is

is interviewed hundreds of those who are involved and we also hear about her own

story at Ground Zero. So here is Jessica Delong on

evacuating ground zero. Hi Jessica, welcome to the History Hit Warfare Podcast. How you doing today?

I'm doing well. Thank you so much for having me. No, not a problem at all. Thank you so much for coming on. It's going to be

amazing to hear the history that you have to tell us and to hear from your perspective as well we've got a range of episodes that will be

broadcasting through this week to mark the 20th anniversary of 9-11 and well as

someone who's been working on this topic for at least the last decade, I am shocked to find a part of this history which was just brand new to me.

And I'm sure it's going to be brand new to so many of our listeners as well. But before we get into that, how's your summer going, Jessica?

It's going well. It's been rather overcast this summer for the most part, which is perfect weather for me. My Irish roots run deep and so we're just at the very

last throws the last wisps of summer and then it's straight off into fall.

The last licks of summer but you must be quite a fan of fall then as well. If you like a bit of overcast, slightly colder, then fall must be your favorite time of the year.

Absolutely, how did you guess? And so do you live on the East Coast? I do, I do. I'm a New England native and so we are very much attuned to our

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