Remembering 9/11

Jason Perrone

"Chaotic and frantic," are the words Jason Perrone (Long Island City, NY) uses to describe the moments and days after the tragic fall of the World Trade Center Twin Towers ten years ago. As a New York City firefighter Perrone was on the scene hours after the collapse.

"It was horrible, but guys were willing to give up there lives to save one or two people," he says on the anniversary of 9/11, the worst terrorist attack on American soil.

"Lots of dirt, steel and paper," says the 41-year old who's using Borgata poker to help break up the intensity of all the reminders during this milestone day. Small in stature, Perrone says he was used primarily to dig through small holes and voids to find, "anything I could," while debris continued to fall from where the towers once stood.

Police, firefighters, rescue workers and volunteers worked around the clock and Perrone says people were sleeping at Ground Zero as "every firefighter in New York" was there. But his prolonged exposure in the rubble came at a price as Perrone was forced to retire in 2004 after developing bronchitis and sever asthma.

"I was getting sick every year," he says after inhaling the toxic cloud filled with asbestos and other toxins. Perrone collects a pension through the World Trade Center (WTC) Disability Law after he failed mandatory lung tests.

"When you lose your career you lose yourself because that's what you do," he says after a ten year career. "You become depressed and you don't even know that's what you're feeling," Perrone says, adding that he mostly misses the camaraderie of working at Engine 307 in the Jackson Heights section of Queens, NY.

"It's like going to work with your best friends everyday," he says while building his chip stack early in the day with premium cards. "I've had aces twice, hit a set with jacks and my good hands have held up."

Since retiring Perrone has gotten a degree in Italian, has been traveling to Rome and is now thinking of going back for his MBA.

More than 3,000 people died that fateful day, and Perrone was fortunate that other than some trainees he met while going through the academy, he didn't lose anybody close to him.

While he didn't make through this no limit tournament, Perrone will always remember 9/11 and how it's impacted all of our lives.