The 1993 Bombing of the World Trade Center

The 1993 Bombing of the World Trade Center

By: Garrett Moores

           When this project was first announced I wanted to research the September 11^th attacks on the World Trade Center. However I was not able to perform my project on this subject because of restrictions given by my instructor. This made be sad because I have always had so much interest in this particular devastating domestic attack on the United States. But I was not going to give up on the subject of terrorist attacks against the United States. As I was searching the Internet I stumbled across the 1993 bombing of the World Trade Center and I was immediately excited because it would allow me to learn about the lead up to the 9/11 attacks and also learn about another devastating day in American history that is often over looked.

Time Magazine

           Before I began learning about the attack I wanted to learn about the World Trade Center itself.  I found that the World Trade Center is not just the twin tower. It actually consisted of seven building all on one big piece of land. The twin towers are 1,368 and 1,362 feet tall and were the tallest building in the world for about a year until Sears Tower was built. The towers were designed by Minoru Yamasaki and Emery Roth and sons. Construction began on August 5th, 1966 and was completed in 1973. This website help me find out more about the twin towers and the rest of the World Trade Center. It was extremely helpful; it provided me with generic information about the Trade Center. 

Twin Towers

          As I was looking for the main information about who, what, when, where, why for the attack I found this site that had all of the basic information of the attack on it. I found The attack took place at 12:06 pm Eastern time on February 26, 1993. The bomb came from a van parked in the parking garage of the World Trade Center. It was a 1,200 pound bomb meant to bring down both twin towers to the ground. Luckily the tower remained standing, but a 60 foot wide crater was left underneath the World Trade Center. Even though the towers did not fall the blast killed six people and injured more than a thousand more. The attack must have been incredibly scary for the people inside the building who were evacuated all afternoon.

After math of the blast.

          After finding finding out about the attack itself I wanted to find out who was responsible for the bombing. The site used above helped me uncover some information but I wanted to find out more about the investigation that proceeded. So I turned to the FBI's official website where I found good information on the investigation and how they brought down these terrorist. After the blast the FBI sent in a team of investigators to inspect the crime scene. They found an identification number to a van that had been reported stolen days before. The FBI brought one suspect into custody when he attempted to retrieve his four hundred dollar deposit on the rented van. Mastermind of the attack, Ramzi Yousef, was not caught until February 1995 in Pakistan. Yousef admitted to being the leader of the attack and even confessed to lighting the fuse, but his real intent was not to just leave a hole in the ground. He wanted to bring down one of the towers and let the debris from that tower destroy the second tower. Six out of the seven suspected terrorist were caught, tried, and sentenced to life in prison. The only suspect that was not caught was Abdul Yasin, he remains on the run to this day.  

Ramzi Yousef

          I wanted to know what the people's immediate reaction to the bombing was so I looked for newspapers to tell of the first thoughts of America were. The New York Times seemed like a great place to start and sure enough I found this article. In the after math of the bombing the police had many people call in admitting to the crime. I think they must have been crazy or were just trying to be funny because the real culprits did not call in. The rest of the city was put on bomb threat because of the bombing. The Empire State building and other buildings were evacuated a few hours after the bomb was detonated. It was very difficult to evacuate the twin towers because the communications for the police department had been disconnected because of the blast.

First responders try to rescue as many as they can.

        The attack on the World Trade Center is one of the most devastating attacks in our history. The fact that it was on domestic soil and in such a public and metropolitan area makes it even more scary to think that someone would want to kill innocent souls. Even though the attack was not "successful" the bomb still killed six people which is six too many. This tragic day was shocking and destructive and will live on in American heart's forever. But it will always be over shadowed by Al- Queda finishing the job on September 11th, 2001. When two commercial airplanes hit the building and killed more than 3,000 people.

After math of 9/11