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CNN Live Today
Family Bears Added Burden Following September 11 Loss
Aired March 11, 2002 - 14:36 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
BILL HEMMER, CNN ANCHOR: Many families are coping with the loss of 9/11. One family in the state of Massachusetts has an added burden now. As Elizabeth Cohen tells us, the Quigleys must explain the events to a child at some point, who wasn't even born yet.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
ELIZABETH COHEN, CNN MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: This baby will never know her father. This 5-year-old will strive every day to remember him.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I want you to hold on to the toe.
COHEN: They're the daughters of Patrick Quigley, who died on United flight 175. On that morning on September 11th, their mother, Patti, was seven months pregnant with Leah, at home watching the news, desperately trying to remember which flight her husband had taken from their home in Boston to Los Angeles.
PATTI QUIGLEY, SEPTEMBER 11 WIDOW: It turns out to be that it was the second plane that I saw going into the tower. Rachel and I went upstairs to her bedroom, and I told her that Daddy's plane had crashed into a building. And then she said to me, "what happened?"
And then I said, "Well, it blew up in flames."
And she said, "Is he alive?"
And I said, "No, he's dead." And we cried for a little while together.
COHEN: Since then, the Quigley family has set out to remember Patrick every way they can.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: This is my mom and this is my dad.
COHEN: There are the Christmas pictures, the first ballet recital. And Rachel remembers how her father danced on vacation in Hawaii.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I think we have pictures of Daddy doing the hula.
COHEN: They still cry sometimes when Rachel wants to know why. To help Rachel, Patty got her together with other children in the Boston area who'd also lost a parent on September 11th. And for herself, she befriended other women in her situation.
Susan Retik (ph) lost her husband, David, on September 11th. She had a baby in November. Haven Fyfe (ph), whose husband, Carlton, died that day, is expecting her baby in May.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It just makes it easier to know that someone can totally understand, without even saying very much.
COHEN: Understand that a mother's mission is to make sure that the father who left forever is never forgotten. And Rachel helps her mother remember, too.
QUIGLEY: Patrick just comes out of Rachel, her personality, and the way that she looks, with his dark eyes and olive skin. That's one way that I see him all the time, through her.
Say hello to Leah!
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Hi!
COHEN: And in a few years, Rachel will hopefully help her little sister.
QUIGLEY: I'm trying to just keep that -- put that in her mind, so maybe we can tell Leah about that.
COHEN: Tell Leah that even though this is the only picture her father ever saw of her, he loved her very much. Elizabeth Cohen, CNN, Wellesley, Massachusetts.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
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