Retired counterterrorism investigator living in Huntersville describes being at Ground Zero

HUNTERSVILLE, N.C. — Retired counter terrorism officer Derek Partee has a difficult time explaining the events of Sept. 11, 2001, to his young granddaughter.

Partee and his partner were at the World Trade Center responding to a call when they saw the second plane before it flew into one of the twin towers.

He told Channel 9 reporter Ken Lemon that what he saw can only be described as “just madness.”

“Stuff is just coming down … paperwork, debris. And people.”

“When you look up, you see people jumping out of the damn building. I’m like what the hell,” he said.

Partee grabbed a disposable camera to document what was happening.

He focused the camera lens on the buildings, but he remembered looking into the eyes of the firefighters headed inside.

“I can see in their eyes, the same way I felt, that this is not real,” he said.

Partee was able to get to safety that day. He wrote a detailed report about it for his commanding officer but later wrote a more emotional description.

“On this day, all hell opened up with a furious double strike on the two towers,” he wrote.

In his writings, he referred to Ground Zero as “the worst place in the world.”

“The fire, the smoke, the heat, the fear,” he remembered.

He said as everything was happening, he simply bottled up his emotions and did his job.

Partee kept the gear he wore working security at Ground Zero in the days that followed the attacks. There’s still dust from the rubble in his goggles.

“It’s confirmation that it happened,” he said.

Partee said the firefighters and all of the first responders who set aside their fear to do their job that day, are heroes.

“I was in it. I was running out of it but they walked into it and they walked into it giving their lives,” he said.

He said as horrific as the events of 9/11 were, he remembers how the country came together.

“You know what, if I had to do it all over again, I’d be right there.”

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