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CNN Saturday Morning News
America's New War: One Survivor's Story
Aired September 15, 2001 - 09:56 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.
PAULA ZAHN, CNN ANCHOR: We have heard an awful lot about how lives were forever changed at the time of the explosions here in New York City. And right now, we have a remarkable story that Bruce Burkhardt filed for us about an 81-year-old couple that was actually -- they were working in polling booths not far from the World Trade Center during the explosion. And his report takes us through what happened to them that morning.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
BRUCE BURKHARDT, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Another day in the Red Cross shelter in Gramercy Park of Rose Franklin, another day wondering what happened to her husband, Harry.
On Tuesday morning, election day in New York, Rose and Harry were working as volunteers at the polling station on Chambers Street just a few blocks away from the World Trade Center.
ROSE FRANKLIN: I go out and I see all that smoke.
BURKHARDT: While Harry stayed inside, Rose wandered outside to check out the big boom. She wandered too far. By the time she tried to return, chaos had taken over, and she was swept up in the stampede.
R. FRANKLIN: Kept pushing everybody up north, up north, up north.
BURKHARDT: Now, confused, wondering where her husband was, 81- year-old Rose stumbled along for two and a half miles before winding up at a shelter. It was there that she met a volunteer named Sergio, or, as Rose calls him, her angel.
SERGIO: At the beginning, she was one more person there. Slowly you get together, and you talk, which is really the only thing you can do.
BURKHARDT: At first, Rose said she had no family. But after warming up to Sergio, said she had a son in Boston, but she didn't know his phone number or where he worked. Sergio tracked him down. It paid off.
The son reported he had received two messages from his father. He said he was alive and well, but the message didn't say where he was. SERGIO: He's not sure how to talk to an answering machine, and he's really pretty confused.
R. FRANKLIN: He's always been on these heart pills, because he had a triple bypass. So I've never known him to be without those pills.
BURKHARDT: Sergio tried everything, searching shelters, hospitals.
SERGIO: Then I went to the Armory hoping that he would be there looking for her. He wasn't.
BURKHARDT: So that was to be our story, a couple in their golden anniversary years, separated by tragedy. The end.
Well, not quite.
SERGIO: We got him.
BURKHARDT (on camera): What?
SERGIO: He left a message on my phone.
BURKHARDT: The husband did?
SERGIO: Yes.
BURKHARDT (voice-over): Sergio, who just a few minutes before this had left the shelter, came running back to tell Rose the great news. Harry had left a message. Harry, it turns out, had been hunkered down in the couple's apartment in an evacuated zone near the Trade Center. Without electricity, without water, Harry didn't know whether Rose was alive or dead. No one thought to look for him there.
R. FRANKLIN: Harry, where have you been, Harry?
HARRY FRANKLIN: Where have I been? Where has she been?
BURKHARDT: Sergio and Red Cross officials then produced their version of When Harry Met Rosie.
H. FRANKLIN: I didn't really lose it.
Hey, Sergio, come in.
BURKHARDT: It was Sergio's notice in the Armory that did it, when it happened to show up in a local TV news report. A neighbor saw it and told Harry.
R. FRANKLIN: I didn't know where you were, but I would never have gone home. Before I met Sergio, forget home!
BURKHARDT: For Sergio, confirmation of his notion of what volunteering is all about. SERGIO: We have to concentrate on the small things. Go to a place, and when you find somebody sitting down, sit down by their side like I did and talk to them. And you might be surprised what information that you can get. And just one person, stick with that person, and with that information, you can make a miracle happen.
R. FRANKLIN: Where's Sergio? Sergio?
H. FRANKLIN: Sergio is with me.
BURKHARDT: Bruce Burkhardt, CNN, New York.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
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