Incredible story of the man who defied authority's order to rescue 2,700 of his colleagues on 9/11

September 11, 2001, marks one of the darkest days in U.S. history, with terrorists hijacking four airplanes and crashing two into the World Trade Center's Twin Towers. Officially, nearly 3,000 people died in these attacks, though actual fatalities were higher. Amidst the carnage, many unsung heroes put their lives in danger to save others from the collapsed towers. Among them was Rick Rescorla, who was working as a security officer in the South Tower of the World Trade Center at that time. 

Rescorla was a British-American with a diverse background as a soldier, police officer, educator, writer, and private security specialist. His military career included service as a British Army paratrooper during the Cyprus Emergency and a U.S. Army officer in the Vietnam War, according to The Washington Post.

Rescorla was a daring man, inspired by the discipline and prowess he acquired during his life as a soldier. In his later years, he became Vice President of Security at Morgan Stanley Dean Witter & Co. In the last days of his life, Rescorla was studying Zen Buddhism and Stoicism, contemplating the nature of life. He was diagnosed with prostate cancer that had spread into his bones a couple of years ago. It was in remission but even after that, he would often muse about the philosophy of “kairos,” a Greek word that implies “the right time.”

"I have accepted the fact that there will never be a kairos moment for me, just an uneventful Miltonian plow-the-fields discipline…a few more cups of mocha grande at Starbucks, each one losing a little bit more of its flavor," he wrote in an e-mail to his friend Bill Shucart, who is a doctor. They met in Vietnam.

On September 11, one of the hijacked jets crashed into the North Tower of the World Trade Center. Loudspeakers were trilling with the orders that told the employees not to leave the building. The building was secure, they said. But Rescorla didn’t believe them. He had always been skeptical about the vulnerability of the Towers’ security, especially the basement.

After the 1993 terrorist attack on the World Trade Center, Rescorla regularly implemented evacuation drills, using his megaphone to guide thousands of employees down the stairwells to safety. During the drills, he would sing songs and tell his colleagues, "In an emergency, no matter the chaos, leave your offices, descend the stairwells, and evacuate the building.” On 9/11, he called his best friend Dan Hill and told him furiously about the authorities ordering him not to evacuate. "They said it's just building one. I told them I'm getting my people out of here." Finally, Rescorla trusted his instincts, defied the orders, and asked his employees to evacuate the building.

He commanded his colleagues to keep moving over his megaphone while Hill was still on the call. "Typical Rescorla," Hill recalled in a conversation with the publication. As he led the evacuation, Rescorla called his wife Susan for the last time. He told her not to cry. “I have to get these people out safely. If something should happen to me, I want you to know that I’ve never been happier. You made my life.”

After ensuring their safety, Rescorla returned to the South Tower—struck by United Flight 175—to help more colleagues. He was last seen on the building's stairs, and his body was never recovered. Rescorla's heroic actions saved 2,700 employees of Morgan Stanley that day.