Long Islanders born Sept. 11, 2001, inspired to live meaningful lives

Nick DiPaola was born at 4 a.m. on Sept. 11, 2001, a few hours before the sun rose over the New York skyline.

His mother, Layne, cradled her baby in her arms, surrounded by her husband, Michael, and their two other children at North Shore University Hospital in Manhasset. 

At 8:46 a.m., not five hours into Nick's life, American Airlines Flight 11 struck the north tower of the World Trade Center in lower Manhattan. Another plane soon crashed into the south tower.

The terrorist attacks perpetrated by al-Qaida, which resulted in the deaths of almost 3,000 people, live on as among the most infamous days in U.S. history — and is a point of fascination for DiPaola and others born on that day.

"I’ve always felt a strange obligation to learn more about it," he said.

This week, DiPaola and other Long Islanders born on Sept. 11, 2001, will turn 25. The group includes a Coram woman whose father helped train the next generation of air marshals. A pair of Huntington twins who work in helping professions. And a Great Neck woman who doesn't mind ceding the spotlight on her birthday to the victims.

They have complicated feelings about the day, from guilt to grief to hope.

As the anniversary approaches, they hope to honor the people whose lives were lost while also celebrating a milestone birthday in their own ways.

Newsday spoke to five Long Islanders born on 9/11. Here are their stories.

Nick DiPaola, Lindenhurst

Two days after Nick was born, as his mother carried him out of the hospital, she tucked his face against her chest to protect him from the fumes and smoke, at the recommendation of a nurse.

Layne had been in "denial" about what had happened, recalled her husband

"She didn’t really want to talk about it because, understandably, she just had a baby," Michael said. "She said, ‘What do you mean, smoke?’ We’re miles away from the city.’ "

Then, on the drive home to Lindenhurst, they found themselves behind a convoy of military trucks on the Long Island Expressway. From then on, Layne said, she felt "responsible" for conveying the magnitude of what had happened to her children, including Nick — while also celebrating his special day.

"In that dark day," she said, "it brought our family a little light."

Michael and Layne opted against making a fuss out of Nick’s birthday as the anniversaries passed. But as he got older, they balanced moments of celebration with reflection.

Every year, as Nick ate his cereal the morning of his birthday, the family would watch the annual 9/11 memorial ceremony.

When Nick was younger, he was "scared" of being called out for a lack of knowledge about 9/11. He has long felt compelled to familiarize himself with the attacks. He can rattle off the number of people killed that day — 2,977 — in conversation without missing a beat.

He doesn’t feel like he’s spent enough time thinking about the tragedy, though. Last year, he visited the National September 11 Memorial & Museum in lower Manhattan for the first time. 

Walking around the memorial, he said, he felt like a "tourist" that "hadn’t earned the right to be there."

In other ways, he feels a connection with the victims. Michael works as a floor sander, and in the months after 9/11, a client informed him that his own son, an EMT, had died in the attack. He was found holding another person in his arms.

"I told him my son was born that day," Michael said. "His first reaction was, ‘Thank God.’ "

Nick said he feels a cosmic connection to the man’s son.

"My soul said hello," he said, "and [his] said goodbye."

Emily Anderson, Coram

On Tuesday, Sept. 11, 2001, Don Anderson had called out of work. His wife, Jennifer, was in labor.

At the time, he said, the Federal Aviation Administration employed 33 air marshals — individuals tasked with going undercover on flights to monitor suspicious activity. Anderson was among them.

"We felt that it was very regrettable that we weren't on those planes," he said of himself and his co-workers. "We probably would have, if we had the opportunity, traded seats with anybody on that plane."

Instead, he was beside his wife at the former Newcomb Medical Center in Vineland, New Jersey. They arrived early in the morning, and Jennifer gave birth to Emily at 8:33 a.m. Shortly after, a nurse remarked that a plane had hit one of the Twin Towers.

"We were concerned, but we were a little bit busy at the time," Don said. "We kind of pressed on. And then we heard another plane hit the towers. That’s when you knew immediately it was something else."

Don kissed his newborn daughter on her forehead and said goodbye to his wife. He needed to go to work. He wasn’t sure what he could do, but he drove to the FAA William J. Hughes Technical Center for Advanced Aerospace at the Atlantic City International Airport.

"We were monitoring what was going on," he said. "Waiting for our marching orders."

Don laments he wasn’t able to spend more time at the hospital — holding his wife’s hand, embracing his newborn. But he’s proud of the work he did then, as well as the years he spent training the next generation of air marshals.

More than anything, he wants Emily to enjoy her birthday.

Emily, who moved to Stony Brook with her family in 2012, initially thought 9/11 was a holiday because of all the "commotion." Then came the looks of pity and apologies in school when her birthday was announced over the loudspeaker, followed by a moment of silence.

"I know something bad happened that day, but I just viewed it as, it’s a day. It’s my birthday," she said. "I had no control over it."

Emily learned how to answer the usual line of questioning. "Yep," she would say, "I'm born on 9/11."

Back at home, Emily said, her family would celebrate as if it were any other day.

The gravity of the day hit her during a family visit to the 9/11 museum a few years back. She saw remnants from the Twin Towers — beams, stairs, office items. 

She knew how many people died that day. "But seeing their photos and their names, it changed the number, almost," she said. "It made it seem like a whole lot bigger."

They also stopped by One World Trade Center, which Don had toured years earlier when it was being built. He had taken a construction elevator to the top floor, and on one of the beams, he wrote "The Andersons" in black permanent marker.

"As long as that building is standing," he said, "the Andersons will be there."

Anne and Nina Rodriguez, Huntington

Clarice Rodriguez begged the doctors to wait until 12:01 a.m.

It was Sept. 11, 2001, and her twin daughters were ready to enter the world. But she didn't want them to share a birthday with the tragedy she had just watched unfold from the television in her room at Huntington Hospital.

Clarice, who had grown up in Brooklyn with a view of the Twin Towers on her walk to school, had spent the day in her hospital bed, peeking at television coverage of the attacks with one eye from underneath her sheet. The doctors told her she couldn't wait any longer. Her twins were coming. At around 6:20 p.m., Nina and Anne were born.

She told her daughters from a young age their birthday carried extra significance.

"You were kissed by angels," she recalled telling them. "You have to do something great with your lives."

Their birthday has always stirred complicated emotions. One year, Clarice brought ice cream to school, but the principal said the class couldn't celebrate, given that some of their classmates' parents had died in the attack.

"We did try, when we were very young kids, to celebrate on our day, just to instill some normalcy," Anne said.

But, Nina pointed out, "you never knew who you were sitting next to, and what they had gone through."

She added, "It was a little weird going to school, feeling kind of excited it's your birthday, and then you go to class, sit down and watch [videos] of one of the worst days in American history."

One thing she looked forward to that day: Her father, John, was always home after school. An air traffic controller, John never works on 9/11. 

The twins said it's helpful to have each other to help navigate the tricky emotions around their birthday.

"I feel very guilty," Nina said, "for wanting to celebrate with my family on a day that a lot of families did not get reunited."

This year, Clarice said, celebrations will be a bit delayed: She's planning a family trip in October to the Grand Canyon — a "miracle of nature, and of our country," she said.

The twins took their mother's message to heart and work in helping professions: Nina is an inpatient psychiatric social worker, and Anne is a medical surgical nurse.

"I always was interested in medicine, and doing some sort of emergency, high-pressure situation," Anne said, "to help." 

Isabella Nicolaides, Great Neck

From the balcony of their 27th floor TriBeCa apartment, Inna and Alexander Nicolaides watched the fiery scene unfold in shock. They saw people jumping from the Twin Towers, and what looked like confetti flitting through the air. 

"We didn't really know what was happening," Inna said. "We thought it could have been the world ending. We thought it could have been nukes."

Then Inna, who was more than eight months pregnant, started to get bad cramps. They hopped in a cab uptown. Doctors initially told the Nicolaideses they would need to come back later, as space was needed to triage victims. But eventually Inna was given a bed, and at around 6 p.m., Isabella was born. 

The couple stayed with their newborn at Inna's parents' home in Brooklyn for eight months; their neighborhood in lower Manhattan was filled with a "chemical" odor, she said, and trucks loaded debris out of the area around the clock. The family eventually moved to Long Beach, and then Great Neck.

Isabella's parents "sheltered" her from what had happened, she said. She remembers her parents abruptly turning off the news when she would walk into the room on her birthday. In second grade, her teacher refused to let Isabella go to the main office to help with the morning announcements, as was customary on birthdays.

"I realized, once the announcements came on," she said, "that this was not a happy day."

These days, Isabella doesn't like to make a big deal about her birthday. 

The tragedy has shaped how she sees her role in the world. She donates blood several times a year. At her local blood center, some of the volunteers said they started giving blood themselves on Sept. 12, 2001.

"They love to see me. They're like, 'Oh my god, you're like the glimmer of hope for such a bad day,' " she said.

On Sept. 24, 2023, Isabella lined up with thousands of others for the Tunnel to Towers 5k, which replicates the route FDNY firefighter Stephen Siller took from Brooklyn to Manhattan through the Hugh L. Carey Tunnel. Siller died helping others during the attack.

When Isabella emerged from the tunnel, as Siller had 22 years earlier, darkness gave way to something else. The street was filled with firefighters, police officers, and Scouts. They cheered and waved American flags.

Isabella got goose bumps as the light of lower Manhattan came into view.