The Cycle of Information
Photo of World Trade Center towers burning At 8:46 a.m. on the morning of September 11, 2001, American Airlines Flight 11 from Boston crashed into the North Tower at the World Trade Center. This tragic event started an information cycle that continues to this day.

Within minutes, early news broke on television, radio, and the internet:

NYT screen shot
A.P. Report via New York Times Web Site, 8:55am

We want to tell you what we know as we know it. But we just got a report in that there's been some sort of explosion at the World Trade Center in New York City. One report said--and we can't confirm any of this--that a plane may have hit one of the two towers of the World Trade Center. ...We have no further details than that.

-Diane Sawyer, Good Morning America
8:53am, E.T., September 11, 2001

Two aircraft crashed into the World Trade Center in Lower Manhattan about 18 minutes apart. These incidents occurred about an hour ago Eastern time. The FBI's investigating whether the planes were hijacked. ...And not to raise alarm, but there have been reports that this could be a wider thing; reports of a plane crash at the Pentagon.

-Bob Edwards, "Morning Edition,"
National Public Radio
10:00am, E.T., September 11, 2001
CNN screen shot
CNN Web Site, 10:21am, E.T.

Screen Shots courtesy of September 11 Web Archive, Library of Congress
Radio and Television transcript excerpts courtesy of LexisNexis Academic database

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