On 9/11, He Saw Tower Fall From 250 Miles Away

One haunting 9/11 image came from farther away than any other: orbit. NASA astronaut Frank Culbertson, the only American not on Earth that day, was commanding the International Space Station when he heard of the attacks and soon flew over New York City. From 250 miles up, he captured a vast smoke plume streaming from lower Manhattan, with what he later called an "odd bloom" near its base—likely around the time the second tower fell. That image, hinting at the scale of the attacks, became "iconic" and, 25 years later, remains "as haunting as ever," Live Science reports.

In letters written from orbit, Culbertson described the horror of seeing "smoke pouring from wounds in your own country" while aboard a mission meant to improve life on Earth. After learning that the pilot of the hijacked plane that crashed into the Pentagon was his former flight-school classmate, he wrote, "Tears don't flow the same in space." Years later, Culbertson described "one of the most startling" things he observed that day: contrails disappearing as aircraft were grounded across the US. Just one appeared as "Air Force One headed back to DC with President Bush," Culbertson told Space.com in 2017, describing the moment as "very sobering."