Nation reels in horror

By ROBERT TANNER
Associated Press Writer

The nation reeled in horror and security precautions spun into effect as the work day began with a series of plane crashes that left the World Trade Center in flames and smoke billowing from the Pentagon.

AP Photo

A woman reacts to a third explosion at the World Trade towers, while observing from the Brooklyn Promenade which provides a view of the Manhattan skyline.

"I'm very afraid. I don't feel safe," said Charlin Sims, taking a cigarette break outside her office in downtown Columbus, Ohio. "I want to hug my son."

Bells at Trinity Episcopal Church in Columbus rang for the victims. Nationwide, crowds gathered around television sets in airports, bars, hotel lounges. The space station commander could see the smoke rising above New York.

"I'm devastated beyond belief. I mean, in many respects this is significantly worse than Pearl Harbor," said Lewis Eisenberg, chairman of the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey. A passenger stranded in Orlando also recalled the attack that brought America into World War II.

"We're like everyone else, in shock," said Carol Windham, a spokeswoman at Birmingham International Airport in Alabama. Planes were grounded nationwide.

Heightened security went into effect at government and corporate offices _ at the Army's main germ warfare defense laboratory in Frederick, Md., city offices in Colorado, oil refineries in Louisiana.

"I don't think there's any place in America right now that's not at risk," said Andrew Hudson, a city spokesman in Denver, where emergency preparedness officials gathered in the basement of City Hall.

"It's just sick. It just shows how vulnerable we really are," said Keith Meyers, a computer technician watching police cordon off headquarters in downtown Columbus.

Others were angry, like Lynn Moore of Columbus. "I think they ought to start watching who we let into this country. We're just too generous," he said. "I think we've just become too comfortable."

In Philadelphia, dozens of people gathered in a hotel lounge to watch television coverage.

A visitor from Texas wept.

"I can't believe what I'm seeing. I never thought I would see anything like this in my lifetime," said 20-year-old Beverly Evans of Dallas. "How can we stop something like this from happening?"