I don't like to think about it much, but I remember where I was for a number of disasters and tragic events. In some cases I remember who called to check on me when events happened closer to home. When the Oklahoma City bombing happened, my phone rang with family members calling to ask if I worked near a federal building. (I worked in downtown D.C., a few blocks from the White House.) I even got a call when the Heaven's Gate cult suicides were discovered.
The events of September 11, 2001, however, stand out in my mind as indicating how technology changed the way people cope with these events. Today's tragic shootings at Virginia Tech, the way students and faculty used social networks and text messaging to communicate during the shootings, provide another example.
Virginia Tech students and staff reported on what appeared to be the deadliest shooting on a U.S. college campus as it unfolded, using blogs, social networking sites, podcasts, and cell phones to do it.
With their Web server down, contributors to the campus newspaper the Collegiate Times filed blog entries on their parent company's Web site beginning at 9:47 a.m. as they attempted to confirm information about two Monday morning university shootings, which left at least 22 people dead and many more injured. ABC reported 29 dead by Monday afternoon.
…Students and faculty communicated with each other during the crisis through instant messaging and e-mail. A student captured the sound of several gunshots on campus.
By the afternoon, the university had posted a podcast of statements from its president, Charles Steger.
In addition, Nicco — our company president — started a Facebook group to show support for the students and faculty of VA Tech, and also created a sign that anyone who wants to show their support can print and display.
When the article above landed in my inbox, via the LGBTPOC listserv I'm on, it took me back to 9/11. I was at work, listening to NPR at my desk when I heard about the planes hitting the towers, and by the time the towers fell I was watching it on television in the conference room with the rest of the staff.
But when I got back to my desk, and for the rest of the day at home, I and countless others turned to email, online communities, and instant messaging to check on friends and family, as getting a phone connection was impossible for a while. I emailed friends in New York to get news on their condition, and watched my buddy list in AIM for my friends in New York to login. Everyone I knew was OK, though one friend revealed that he would have been in one of the towers that day, if a schduled office move hadn't been postponed.
In the meantime, I joined other members of a online forum I frequented on our virtual front stoop, where we exchanged updates while waiting for others to check in. Later we comforted those who'd lost people in the attacks, or who had friends and family missing in the aftermath.
I don't know how much comfort the students and faculty of Virginia Tech, or their families, received from being able to get updates so quickly, and to remain in touch with each other as events unfolded. But I can imagine, being a parent, that any information would be better than no information.
And as I human being I know that being able to connect with another human being — to be less alone in moments of fear and uncertainty — would make all the difference. However trivial our various emails, IMs, blog posts, and text messages may seem, when tragedy strikes, those connections — like anything else that lets us reach out to one another for comfort, strength, or just to share our grief and fear — may matter more than anything else.
