Remembering Windows on the World

Windows on the World was a complex of venues at the top floors (106th and 107th) of the North Tower of the World Trade Center in Lower Manhattan that included a restaurant, Windows on the World, a smaller restaurant called Wild Blue, and a bar called The Greatest Bar on Earth, as well as rooms for private functions.

Windows on the World was destroyed when the North Tower collapsed during the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001. At the time of the attack on the World Trade Center, the restaurant was hosting regular breakfast patrons and the Risk Waters Financial Technology Congress. Everyone present in the restaurant when American Airlines Flight 11 penetrated the North Tower survived the plane's impact but perished because of smoke inhalation during the ensuing conflagration, jumping or falling to their deaths, or the eventual collapse of the tower 102 minutes later, as all passages to below the impact zone were blocked.

At the time of the attacks, present in the restaurant were 72 restaurant staff members (including acting manager Christine Olender, whose desperate calls to Port Authority police represented the restaurant's final communications), 16 Risk Waters employees, and 76 other guests/contractors. The last people to leave the restaurant before Flight 11 collided with the North Tower at 8:46 AM were Michael Nestor, Liz Thompson, and Geoffrey Wharton, who departed at 8:44 AM.