At 8:46 a.m., a hijacked American Airlines plane crashed into the World Trade Center. Seventeen minutes later, at 9:03 a.m., a second hijacked plane struck the South Tower. There was little doubt that the United States was under attack.
Rwabukumba, who now heads the Rwanda Stock Exchange and serves as President of the African Securities Exchanges Association (ASEA), was among the Rwandans in New York that day.
Speaking to IGIHE, he said that 25 years later, the images of that day remain vivid.
“It happened in the morning as I was going to work, before the market had opened. I was trading stocks in New York. The buildings had collapsed, there was dust everywhere and there was a strong smell.”
As people around him struggled to come to terms with what was happening, Rwabukumba said his colleagues were surprised that he appeared less shaken than they were.
“The white people I worked with in New York were immediately terrified. They asked me, ‘How come you don’t seem as shaken as we are?’”
His response was shaped by his own experience of Rwanda’s history.
“The image it brought back to me was Rwanda in 1994, during the Genocide against the Tutsi. One of the things it left us with was resilience.”
Rwabukumba said he saw a significant difference between the two tragedies. The Genocide against the Tutsi in Rwanda was aimed at exterminating Tutsi because of who they were, while those killed on September 11 were people going about their daily lives, whether at work, on planes or elsewhere, without being selected on the basis of ethnicity.
The September 11 attacks killed 2,977 people from 90 countries. Of these, 2,753 were killed in New York, 184 at the Pentagon and 40 aboard United Airlines Flight 93, which crashed in Pennsylvania.
The victims also included emergency responders, including 343 New York firefighters, 23 NYPD officers and 37 officers from the Port Authority Police Department.
102 minutes that changed America
The first plane struck the World Trade Center at 8:46 a.m., followed by the second at 9:03 a.m. At 9:37 a.m., American Airlines Flight 77 crashed into the Pentagon, the headquarters of the US Department of Defense.
At 9:59 a.m., the South Tower collapsed after burning for 56 minutes. At 10:03 a.m., United Airlines Flight 93 crashed near Shanksville, Pennsylvania, after passengers attempted to wrest control of the aircraft from the hijackers.
At 10:28 a.m., the North Tower also collapsed.
Within a short period, the area known as the heart of New York’s financial and commercial district was engulfed in dust, smoke and debris.
His family thought he was dead
One of his strongest memories is the disruption of communications. Damage to power and telecommunications infrastructure in Lower Manhattan made it difficult even for financial institutions outside the immediate attack sites to continue operating.
For Rwabukumba, the problem was not only about work. His family could no longer establish whether he was alive.
“The phones came back later, and that was when we called each other and I told them that I was alive. They were devastated; they thought I was dead.”
The Rwandan Embassy also sought information about Rwandans in the area.
“They called us to ask whether we were safe, and we told them we were fine. Rwandans also reassured one another.”
Although many Americans were deeply frightened, Rwabukumba said most of the Rwandans he knew did not immediately consider leaving the country.
The New York Stock Exchange had not opened when the first planes struck the World Trade Center. Power, communications and security problems contributed to the closure of US financial markets. The NYSE reopened on September 17, 2001, six days later.
Rwabukumba said the attacks also came at a time when the US economy was already facing difficulties.
Data from the National Bureau of Economic Research shows that the US recession had begun in March 2001, six months before the September 11 attacks.
According to Rwabukumba, investors were already concerned following the technology-sector downturn that had begun in 2000.
“The overall economic picture was not good. People were wondering where to invest their money. When the attacks happened, they pushed things much further backwards.”
More than 4,500 planes ordered to land
The attacks also immediately transformed air travel in the United States.
At 9:25 a.m., the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) halted all flights scheduled to depart. At 9:45 a.m., it ordered all aircraft in US airspace to land at the nearest airports.
More than 4,500 aircraft were in the air at the time. By 12:15 p.m., the skies over the 48 contiguous US states were clear of commercial and private aircraft. It was the first time the United States had taken such a sweeping measure.
Rwabukumba said the experience still comes to mind when he travels.
“Even today, when I go through an airport and I am asked to remove my shoes or belt, I immediately think about how the world changed after that attack.”
The requirement to remove shoes, however, was specifically tightened after another incident on December 22, 2001, when Richard Reid attempted to detonate explosives hidden in his shoes aboard American Airlines Flight 63.
Muslims faced suspicion
Rwabukumba also remembers how Muslims, Arabs and people perceived to resemble them increasingly faced suspicion following the attacks.
“Life became difficult for foreigners, starting with Muslims, Arabs and people who looked like them.”
Looking back, Rwabukumba said the attacks did not fundamentally change who he was. Instead, they reinforced lessons he had already learned from Rwanda’s history: resilience and the need to seek solutions rather than wait for others to provide them.
“It changed my mindset and taught me to become even stronger and to look for solutions within myself. It taught me that I should not wait for someone else to come and solve my problems.”
More than two decades after working in New York’s financial sector, Rwabukumba is the CEO of the Rwanda Stock Exchange and serves as President of ASEA, an association bringing together securities exchanges across Africa.
For him, there is a meaningful connection between the work he once did in the United States and what he does today in Rwanda.
“Today, I work with others to build my country without having to go or live in New York. I am doing what I know and love in my own country. There, I was working with other people’s assets; today, we are building our own. We have our own Wall Street and our own financial system.”
Leave a Reply