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- Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – >Here is an item I got from the Palm Beach Post. I hope you can read this >because many of you have expressed an interest in this. I have to read the >Florida papers to find out things in my own state. > By Staci Sturrock, Palm Beach Post Staff >Writer > Sunday, September 16, 2001 > NEW YORK — It is a fact of pet ownership >that a Chihuahua is more portable than a calico. This is especially true >when skyscrapers rain from the sky, when a sunny day turns instantly dark. > So, it was Quinn, their pocket-sized dog, >that Chris and Lynette Morrow, grabbed Tuesday morning. From the living room >of their sixth-floor apartment in Battery Park City, the picturesque >neighborhood across West Side Highway form the World Trade Center, the >Morrows saw the panicking of the south tower. > "That’s when we knew it was time to get >out," Chris said. "The courtyard filled up, black as night." > Puffy and Toonces, and Chris’ mother’s cat >named Cat, stayed in Gateway Plaza, Building 400, as the Morrows were loaded >onto a New York City Waterway taxi and ferried to Jersey City, N.J., across >the Hudson River. > They stayed in a hotel and didn’t return to >lower Manhattan until Saturday, when their search for their pets lured them >back. Authorities have barred Battery Park City’s 30,000 residents from >their own homes since the attack. > "It’s not so much that our building is >damaged," said Lynette, 33. "It’s that we have zero access." > "If we had our cats, I don’t know if we >would have come back," said 35-year-old Chris. > The couple had even considered driving to >South Florida. Lynette’s father, Martin Lerner, offered to put them up in >his Palm Beach Gardens home. > "It’s been a nightmare," Chris said. Not >only because of the disaster itself and the displacement from their home, >"but we haven’t been able to sleep all week knowing that our cats are in >there. They’re part of the family." > To retrieve Puffy, Toonces and Cat, the >Morrow’s went to Hudson Pier 40, where the ASPCA is operating a pet-rescue >center. Hundreds of New Yorkers have registered their trapped pets there. > Saturday morning was spent waiting and >waiting and waiting for instructions. Finally, an announcement from a park >ranger: Line up in an orderly fashion. You will be allowed 15 minutes inside >your building to crate your animal and bring it out. > It would be the Morrow’s first look at their >home since the deadly cloud of dust and debris swept over it. > Along the waterfront, where the couple once >walked Quinn, police helicopters rested in the grass. A rescue dog chased a >tennis ball tossed by his handler. Supplies such as buckets, shovels and >bottled water were piled in heaping mounds, and dusty-booted emergency >workers ambled about. > Except for them, lovely Battery Park City >was a ghost town. On the basketball court, the playground, the park >benches — no one. > And above the rooftops, there were glimpses >of the hellish scene just beyond. Blasted-out windows several stories up, >twisted beams poking through the skin of the nearby skyscraper. The Winter >Garden, an airy structure so photogenic that brides had their wedding >portraits shot there, reduced to a shattered house of glass. > Battery Park City is without power, so the >Morrow’s apartment building was illuminated only from utility lights strung >in the stairwells. Residents used flashlights to navigate the hallways. > In the Morrow’s hall, someone had abandoned >a baby stroller. > Lynette unlocked her door. "Toonces is OK, >Toonces is OK," she called. "They’re both OK." > The dust-covered window in the living room >revealed that the courtyard is not OK. Memos and resumes and faxes that had >fluttered down some 100 stories were being raked by cleanup crews. Soot >still covered some patches of ground. A flag flew at half mast. > "Boy, are we lucky," Chris said. "It looks >like everything is alright." > Toonces and Puffy had lapped up all their >water but remained frisky enough to make several escape attempts from the >cardboard carriers they were loaded into. > Chris and Lynette also managed to nab their >laptop, documents and medications before leaving. > One flight below in his mother’s apartment, >Chris found Cat hiding under some covers, which seemed an appropriate >response this week, for man or beast. > Back to Top > Sunday, September 16 > Accent | Business | Local News | >Martin/St.Lucie | News | Opinion | South PB County | Sports > Our Partner >
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