It’s twenty five years on from the September 11th attacks. Most of us will remember where we were – I was almost five.
Yet I vividly remember being outside with a child-minder playing on our climbing frame when the news broke. If you were old enough to be cognizant, you’ll remember.
We still have a newspaper stashed away from the next morning, carrying the haunting image of the moment the twin towers fell. Those attacks, which took the lives of nearly 3,000 people, reshaped global politics and intelligence.
Many stories of unspeakable human suffering run parallel alongside extraordinary courage. One that stays with me is that of Ron Clifford, the Cork man who comforted and prayed with a woman who had suffered severe burns from jet fuel outside the World Trade Centre until emergency personnel took her away.
The Irish businessman at the World Trade Centre could not possibly have known that his sister Ruth and her four-year-old daughter Juliana, his niece, were aboard the doomed United Flight 175, which struck the South Tower moments later.
Ron died suddenly in December 2023, at his home in Connecticut. He had spent years campaigning for the perpetrators of the attack to be brought to justice, telling RTE in 2021: “I hope in our lifetime we will get our day in court.”
In the National Geographic docuseries ‘One Day in America,’ filmed in 2021, just a couple of years before he died, Clifford spoke about what happened that day and his relationship with his sister and niece. The sorrow of that day is still acutely visible in his eyes.
Every year, the anniversary of 9/11 carries a heaviness, but it’s also important to remember the heroism which existed in the midst of such evil. It’s important to remember the human stories.
“Ruth was always there as a friend, a confidant. A younger sister and sometimes older sister. Just a very good friend. We were a year and a few months apart in age and we were just always very good friends throughout childhood and adulthood,” Ron said.
“Juliana was just full of joy. Very happy,” he told National Geographic. “She had just started to ride horses, and Monica, my daughter, regarded her as her little sister.”
‘Not a cloud in the sky’
It was his daughter Monica’s eleventh birthday. The morning was beautiful – a “gorgeous autumnal morning”, Ron remembered. His sister Ruth had picked out a bright yellow tie for him to wear to a meeting at the Marriott World Trade Centre.
Everything seemed to be going right.
Recounting the morning of the attacks, Ron told producers of the documentary in 2021:
“That morning, I woke up at six o’clock to the ringing of a phone. The meeting that I was supposed to attend at eight o’clock that morning was moved from the Marriott Midtown to the Marriott World Trade Centre. It was an exciting morning in our house – Monica’s eleventh birthday – a gorgeous autumnal morning. Not a cloud in the sky.”
Ron remembered taking the train in Glenridge, where he lived, to head towards Hoboken in New Jersey, just across from the World Trade Centre.
“Taking the ferry across in the morning is generally a treat. It’s like getting a boat trip – you can stand on top of the deck and just watch humanity. With the weather being so beautiful, it was just a lovely trip across to Manhattan.”
“My sister, you know, a few days before, we were discussing this meeting that I was going to have in Manhattan, and Ruth said, ‘Ron, you know, stand out.’ And I said, look I have a new suit and a nice bright yellow tie. Ruth thought that was perfect for this meeting. This meeting was supposed to change our financial dynamic where I was working for one company, and we were talking about merging with another company. So I was very excited to have this meeting in Manhattan.
“When I arrived that morning, everything was pristine. I think it had rained the night before, and everything was glittering and clean. And walking through where the boats are was just magnificent. People were working on their boats – and there was a man who passed a comment that I had a good suit on. You know, he said, that’s a good suit. So I felt very confident walking up the steps to the meeting. This was [going to be] a good day. I’ve had a ride over on the gerry, things look good, not a cloud in the sky. Let’s get this meeting over with, you know?”
Ron recounted the moment everything changed, having walked up the steps to the ground floor lobby of the hotel inside the World Trade Centre.
Then the building shook. “There seemed to be an explosion. The whole building seemed to rock.” Ron initially wondered if there had been an accident in the basement. Then he noticed the smell.
“I could smell what I thought was paraffin or kerosene. I had no idea that it was – aviation fuel.”
Moments later, a badly burned woman approached him.
Her name was Julieann Maffeo, a 40-year-old UBS PaineWebber employee who had been caught in the first plane’s impact. Ron stayed with her.
“I didn’t understand what was going on. I had no idea. I had no idea she was burned at first but she said she couldn’t see. She said that there was a ball of flame. I remember bringing her into the lobby of the hotel and sitting her down against a wall and I could understand then that she was burnt. She was still pretty much smouldering. Her hair was very badly burned and you could see that she had a slide in her hair that was burnt into her hair.
He ran for water and filled a plastic bag and carefully tried to douse her burns. Her clothes and hair were badly burned. She was still smouldering.
“The whole front of her – I guess she was wearing a sweater with a zipper – that was kind of burnt into her body, and her shoes were burned. Everything was burnt. So I sat her down and I thought to myself, ‘My God, I need to get some water to douse her.’ So I ran to the bathroom and filled a clean plastic bag with water. I hurried out and doused it on the woman.
“Afer a minute or two, after I could get her to calm down a little bit, I asked her her name. She said her name was Jennieann Maffeo, and she was from Staten Island.
“She said she was on her way to work, and then she said, ‘Holy Jesus, Mother of God, don’t let me die. ‘ I said to her, look, you’re not gonna die. You’re gonna be fine.
Then Ron discovered she was Catholic.
“She said, ‘Holy Jesus, Mother of God, don’t let me die.’ I said to her, look, you’re not gonna die. You’re gonna be fine.”
“I said, ‘Well, let’s say the Our Father together.’” They began to pray.
Halfway through the prayer came an almighty boom. “Everything shook. The building shook, the floor shook.”
At 9.03am, United Airlines Flight 175 struck the South Tower.
Ron stayed with Julieann, getting her onto her feet and draping her in a tablecloth as most of her clothes were burnt off. He asked her if she could walk and she said she could.
“As we walked through the lobby, there was a big, burly waiter standing by a table, and I asked him to throw me a tablecloth. He threw me a white tablecloth that I could wrap around Jennieann. She just looked so terrible and I didn’t want to enter the street with her the way she was. Jennieann was by my side.”
Outside, the streets were grey. Trucks were vaporised and the building was dripping.
Ron remembered: “I could hear noises all around me, crashes on the ground, the world trade centre on fire. As I started to walk towards the West Side Highway, a fireman approached me with a white helmet. I will always remember him – he said for f**k’s sake – get out of here as fast as you can – run! So I asked Jenieann if she could run and she said she could.”
People screamed and ran. Pieces of the ceiling began falling. The air filled with a grey haze.
Ron helped Julieann to her feet and wrapped her in a tablecloth after much of her clothing had been burned away. A fireman shouted at them: “For f**k’s sake – get out of here as fast as you can – run!”
Ron helped Julieann across the West Side Highway, where an ambulance was waiting.
Ron later went to visit her in the hospital in the weeks following the attacks. She fought her injuries for 41 days before passing away on October 22nd 2001.
It was only when he returned home from Ground Zero that afternoon that he learned that his beloved sister and niece had been among victims.
Ron eventually made his way home but the tragedy of that day was unrelenting.
“I had survived 9/11,” he recalled. “All I wanted to do was to go home and give my daughter a hug on her birthday.”
He had been home less than twenty minutes when the phone rang. It was Ruth’s husband, David. Did Ron know where Ruth was? He didn’t.
Ruth and Juliana had been travelling to California for a trip to Disneyland along with Ruth’s friend and Juliana’s Godmother, Paige. They were passengers on the hijacked United Flight 175 which was flown into the South Tower of the World Trade Centre.
Ron soon confirmed that his sister and his young niece had been aboard the plane. The horror of the day suddenly became personal.
“I was literally saying the Lord’s prayer with this woman on the ground of the World Trade Centre when my sister’s plane hit, on my daughter’s eleventh birthday, 9/11.”
The coincidence was almost impossible to comprehend.
“Why me, why my sister? Why her daughter?” It just brings back all those terrible memories and it’s hard to go there. It’s hard to understand that circumstance – why me, why my sister? Why her daughter? Why Paige, why Julianne?
The bright yellow tie Ruth had chosen for him that morning had bits of Julieann’s skin on it. His suit smelled of jet fuel.
And yet, despite everything, Ron believed Julieann had played a part in saving his life.
“But in some way, I think Julieann Maffeo was put there to guide me out of the building,” he said. “I’ve always thought that.”
Twenty-five years on, it is easy to remember 9/11 through photographs: the planes, the billowing smoke, the collapsing towers.
But those images can obscure the human beings at the centre of them. Ruth. Juliana. Paige. Julieann. Ron.
A sister. A four-year-old girl. A stranger in terrible pain. And a Cork man who, on the morning of his daughter’s eleventh birthday, found himself praying with a dying woman as his own sister’s plane crashed into the building around them. A man, who like many others, carried the scars of that day for years but continued on with life quietly and bravely.
His death notice reads: “Many came to know Ron’s selfless nature through the courage he demonstrated on 9/11. He was in the lobby of the North Tower when the first plane hit and, without hesitation, risked his life to help rescue a badly burned woman and lead her to the safety of an ambulance. “
To honour their memory, Ron would serve as a government witness and give testimony in the criminal trials of the terrorists responsible for the attacks. He campaigned tirelessly to bring the perpetrators to justice, and his family
That is why we remember. Not simply the towers that fell, or the history that changed.
But the people. The courage and humanity in the midst of hell on earth.
Seven Irish-born people and around 18 who had direct ties to Ireland died in the attacks – with 1,000 of the 2,977 victims identified as having Irish-American heritage.