Retired Osceola County medic recalls 9/11 terror attacks

George Dobson spent three days helping search for victims

Fifteen years later and the memories of the 9/11 terror attacks still haunt George Dobson.

"All you saw was the smoke in the air and it was coming up. It was horrific," he said. "We helped with search and rescue, we wasn't finding anyone."

Dobson worked as a medic in Allentown, Pennsylvania. He didn't find out what happened until he got to work that morning on Tuesday, September 11, 2001.

"I told my boss, I said, 'Listen, we need to get somebody in here because in 30 minutes I'm going to Ground Zero, I'm going up to New York,'" Dobson recalled.

He went right into the middle of the chaotic scene. Dobson says he helped set up a field hospital near the towers and ran a triage unit.

"That was from 9 o'clock that night until 7 o'clock the next morning when they shut it down because we weren't getting any survivors and they turned that into a morgue," he said.

Dobson worked non-stop for three days. He wore the same t-shirt. The blood and sweat are gone, but the emotions and memories remain.

"I can recall those sights and those smells so vividly," he said.

He remembers the dust was so thick he couldn't see anything. He also remembers finding victims' bodies in pieces and burned.

"You're just reacting to the situation," Dobson said. "You're not thinking about what you're doing really."

The situation left lifelong scars. Dobson says he suffers from several medical conditions, including PTSD, depression and anxiety.

He moved to Osceola County a month ago with his wife to help him take his mind off the memories.

"For those first couple of years, I mean it was really hard," he said.

It's now 15 years later and it is only getting a little easier. Dobson says he can't watch any coverage of the day or read anything about the attacks. He's only visited the site one time since the attacks on the second anniversary.

But despite it all, Dobson says if he had to he would run back into the chaos again.

"When you're in that kind of position, you just can't sit back and watch. You have to do something and that's what drove me there in the first place."


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