9/11 survivor faces emotional challenge running NYC Marathon for the first time

A 9/11 survivor is facing the emotional challenge of running the New York City Marathon for the first time.

Running a marathon is a gruelling enough experience anyway, no matter how much training you put in, it's going to be pretty tough.

But for Alice Yu the NYC Marathon will take her on a journey to her past and one of the darkest days in the entire history of the US.

For Alice, it will be her first ever marathon, but there will certainly be other things on her mind as makes her way to the start line today (5 November).

Speaking to ABC7, she said: "I was there that morning, early, so I was up there, and I had just logged in when I heard the noise, it was a very loud boom and we looked behind us and saw a lot of flying papers."

On 11 September 2001, Alice - who was 24 at the time - was logging in for work when a loud bang shocked her and all of her coworkers so much they started to walk down 71 flights of stairs.

ABC7

"So we saw flying papers and we did know it was a plane, but we didn't know what size and I think at the time everybody just decided to leave and we just thought we should leave, so we started taking the stairs," she explained.

"So I was about on the 30th floor when there was a shaking and it felt like an earthquake and that's when the second plane hit our building. And that's when we started to feel fear and really know something was wrong. And that's when after I came down to the concourse area and it was all dark and a bit of flooding and I did see pieces of the plane, like I saw the tail for American Airlines."

Alice, who was working for Morgan Stanley at the time, made it to the ground and escaped the clutches of the Twin Towers before they fell.

She was one of the lucky ones to survive 9/11, but the experience impacted Alice that much it took her more than a decade to return to the World Trade Centre.

"It took me a very long time to go back there down to the Ground Zero area," she said.

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"And it was still very, very emotional, just being there that day and having survived it, I think there's some sort of survivor's guilt."

Now, Alice is looking forward to her first even marathon, as she explained: "I started running during the pandemic for exercise and to be outdoors and I just really started to enjoy it.

"I said I have to do something while my daughter is at gymnastics so I put my shoes on, found a little trail, and started running."

"I'm looking forward to finishing strong and healthy and fine," Alice added.