Fox News’ Eric Shawn reacts to 9/11 air quality documents after cancer diagnosis

NEW YORK – Fox News Senior Correspondent Eric Shawn was commuting to work on Sept. 11, 2001, which was primary day in New York City, when he saw an airplane that caught his attention. It sounded much louder than a typical flight over Manhattan.

"I thought, 'Oh, he's [flying] low," Shawn, 69, tells USA TODAY.

That plane was American Airlines Flight 11, hijacked by five terrorists. The veteran journalist initially thought the jetliner might hit 2 Penn Plaza, the office building that overlooks Madison Square Garden.

It wasn't until Shawn ran into TV crews who were outside of the Women's National Republican Club in midtown that he realized that same plane hit the North Tower of the World Trade Center. Shawn remembers Dr. Vernon Gross, a former National Transportation Safety Board official, saying it was "probably a small plane that got lost in the sun."

Shawn ran into the Fox News assignment desk and told his colleagues that it was not a small plane. Almost immediately after, he was on the air with anchor Jon Scott when United Airlines Flight 175 crashed into the South Tower.

The lives of countless Americans were changed forever after the attacks of Sept. 11…

Original source: https://www.usatoday.com/entertainment/