The guard told me that there was an active shooter nearby. These were 3 words he said further, who really scared me.

It was a white helicopter blades cut through the air, noise – no continuous emergency vehicle sirens – I was interrupted that something was wrong.

In New York, the chaos – ambulance, an uninterrupted honor of horns – is so common that it becomes unnoticed, repeating the choir. That’s why when I heard the sounds of fire engines and police car cars, sitting on the 14th floor of my common work space in the center of Manhattan, I didn’t think much of them. Last week there was a festival with live singing on the street, which lasted an hour. I thought it was a city soundtrack.

Already at 6:30 pm, but I needed another hour attention to wrap the project for the client. I was in a dedicated “quiet” space where people are not allowed to talk aloud. About five of us sat there plowing through our work. But every 10 minutes, people from other rooms on the floor gathered behind me so that through the window and gently murmur each other. About half an hour later I decided to load and come home because the distraction was too great.

Then the helicopters flew away. Something was wrong.

Until 7 p.m. I immersed myself in my laptop in my backpack, took some of the last sips of my mango tea and went to the main area of the common work space to throw away my trash. That’s when I started catching fragments with full votes.

Something about an active shooter.

Something about the building across the street.

Something about being stuck here.

It cannot be rightI thought. I even asked one guy to see if there was a replacement exit, but he just shrugged and went.

I quickly dropped the laptop bag over the shoulder and turned towards the lobby to find out about myself. When I was on the ground floor, I could see the confusion behind the glass wall to the wall and the wave of blue police officers going back and forth in the street. I realized that every word I heard is real.

What we learned later was that around 6:30 p.m. A 27 -year -old man named Shane Devon Tamura had went to 345 park ave. with m4 and opened the fire Before you go to the elevator, to continue the rampage at the top in the lobby, tragically killing four people and yourself. As a result, the building where I was straight across the street was closed.

But at that time, the details were few. Yes, the satellites in the lobby confirmed that the Sagittarius was active in directly across the street. And no, we couldn’t leave the building. Instead, I and about 10 other lobby people were told by the guard to do what, I thought I would never do: “The shelter is on the spot.”

If the Sagittarius confirmation in me caused fear, those three little words – the order to build shelter – set it. I knew that a refuge on the spot was an important goal of emergency respondents to reduce threat. But was there no shelter instead of what they told the people of the South Tower to do after the North Tower was struck on September 11th? Was there a shelter on the spot, what people who had no other means to escape did when a hurricane “Katrina” struck? Was there a shelter on the spot, what people in paradise, California, were forced to do when the roads were blocked and there was no way to escape the fires?

Living in this city – always take care of your guard and be prepared for a red warning. You know exactly how many seconds of eye contacts you need to report to a person dangerous to see them, but you don’t look at them. You know what ways you need to look against Jaywalking across the street. You know where to sit on the train and how to get to be the least likely to be a victim of crime.

When I was reading about other tragedies, I told myself that the shelter on the spot was not always the safest choice and that I would take a break if I was ever in such a situation. But through the growing anxiety and shock, as far as I was dangerous, I ran and did not fight as I expected and planned from the comfort of my home. I turned on the heels and returned to the shores of the elevator to get back to 14Th Floors with everyone else.

“Keep away from the windows,” the lobby satellites reminded us when we waited for the lift door to open.

There were many reactions at the top. Some people glanced through the windows, trying to find out what was happening in the office building in front of us. Others seemed to work hard with their laptops. Even more were probably hidden in other rooms. But it was endlessly silent. As I was looking for the safest place to settle down the floor, I attracted a pleasant stranger who had to notice confusion on my face.

“Should I be more worried?” I told him looking for a consolation.

“Maybe,” he replied. – Maybe not. He kindly invited me to sit with him and his friend, but I wanted another wall between the outer windows and me. Instead, until 7:30 p.m. I was deported to the inland office and oscillating between my Twitter channel, CNN and text chain with worried friends – one of which actually worked in the building all over the street, but (fortunately) that day worked from home that day.

At the time, no one knew exactly what was going on. They did not know if the shooter was a single gunman or had his accomplices with him in the building. I watched the footage on the internet about how people are handcuffed and escorted from the stage right in front of my building. The authorities did not know whether this was an individual event or was more expected in the area. On my floor, one person casually mentioned that they care about the shooter might have a bomb.

I knew that people across the street from me were exponentially more danger than me. I knew that the terror they had been most serious. And at the same time, I had to remind myself that I was still in a very real danger zone and I needed to take it seriously. The fact that I could not reduce and ignore the emotional and physical pulsation effects that the event had, even though I was not those around them in the center. Proximity to the danger also causes panic and leaves the effect even after you are clear.

I was sitting in that interior office, listening to updates nervously, which were in 20 minutes, when it reminds us of staying and staying away from the windows. Until 8:30 p.m. Finally, we received a different message: we could leave the building through the side exit.

I am ashamed to say that I barely glanced at other people on the floor or said goodbye before I rushed to the elevator so I could go down and drove off the exit that I had never seen. When I was in a hurry to drive half a mile from the crime scene before entering the subway, I had nothing but thinking about what had just happened.

They say everyone has a plan until you put your mouth in. Sometimes we distance ourselves from the way we think we will behave and what we actually do in unpredictable and troubled moments. Are we kind of pleasant? Are we brave? Are we unselfish? Do we find out? Are we improving? Will we make mistakes?

No matter how you act in frightening situations, you should not appreciate yourself too strictly. What I had to remind myself as New York is that this city is completely unpredictable. Even the best -set plans fly every day. I am grateful that I have benefits when I can plan the next day.

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