The account of a survivor of September 11th.

Rodolfo Borges_247 – I was in New York in May to explore the city and, obviously, the area where the September 11, 2001 attacks occurred. The monuments that will be inaugurated this weekend were being finalized, and the World Trade Center area remained surrounded by construction barriers. The construction work diverted pedestrians to the World Financial Center building, from where it was possible to see the reconstruction work in more detail, but it didn't really interfere with the visit. New York seemed like a normal city, despite everything. Until I met George Mironis.

At 71 years old, Mironis carries a business card with the inscription "survivor" everywhere he goes. That's how he's introduced himself since the North Tower of the World Trade Center was hit by the plane that would bring it down. At the time of the impact, the American was working on the 48th floor – the tower was hit on the 92nd. Deeply marked by the event, Mironis carries a backpack with mementos of that day. These include photos taken inside the building, right after feeling the strong impact, and outside, where he documented the fall of several people. "I lost part of my hearing, my memory isn't good, and my life changed completely after that. But the worst thing was losing 33 friends," the survivor of the attack told Brasil 247, keeping a notebook with the names of all the acquaintances who died that day.

Mironis is the 9/11 that still breathes. Proof that, despite Americans saying everything is fine, the trauma hasn't passed – and probably never will. He managed three floors of the Japanese bank Dai-Chi Kangyo, whose office moved to New Jersey after the attacks. Days later, he lost his job and started working in security, but he couldn't overcome the trauma. "I still have nightmares with flashes of that day. I'm not the same anymore," said Minoris, who considers the final report on the attack presented by the government, the result of the work of a commission composed of parliamentarians, "inconsistent and political." This dissatisfaction has generated groups like 11/11 Truth, which continues to seek information that clarifies what happened.

Like most Americans directly affected by the September 11 attacks, Minoris began to live in retrospect. He seeks someone to tell what happened in the final minutes at the World Trade Center and attends events related to the attack, such as the lecture on conspiracy theories where I met him. In fact, the event on May 25th was supposed to be just a lecture, but the presentation by experts Kathryn Olmsted and Michael Barkun at the 9/11 Memorial ended up becoming a forum for expressing American dissatisfaction with how their government conducted the investigations into the case. At the end of the lecture, more than half of the audience of about 30 people raised their hands, eager for answers that would acknowledge some legitimacy in their investigations and personal theories to explain something the government was unable to do.

Conspiracy theories

One of the most vocal figures that early evening was Manny Badillo, who lost his uncle Thomas Joseph Sgroi, then 45 years old, in the attack on the Twin Towers. "It's disrespectful to discuss conspiracy theories in the context of 9/11. Seventy percent of the families' questions have gone unanswered by the government. We want a feasible investigation. What you call conspiracy theory, I call a search for the truth," said Badillo, who has been campaigning for ten years for explanations about what really happened on September 11, 2001.

One of the great mysteries, and one of the biggest sources of discomfort for those affected, is the fact that Building Seven of the World Trade Center complex collapsed minutes after the towers fell. The Salomon Brothers building had 47 floors and, apparently, fell in the same way as the main towers, without leaning to either side, and without being hit by any plane. For the relatives of the victims, the conditions of the collapse reinforce the theory that the American government knew about the attacks and allowed them to happen, or that the White House itself was responsible for bringing down the buildings using explosives.

The conspiracy within the American government aimed to justify a war (even though the invasion of Iraq would only occur two years later), as is believed to have happened when the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor, leading the United States into World War II. This type of theory gained traction when information about Operation Northwoods was revealed, a government plan in the 1960s to simulate a series of attacks and thus justify an invasion of Fidel Castro's Cuba. It is also through these theories that Americans tend to explain the assassination of former President John F. Kennedy by an unremarkable 24-year-old.

According to Michael Barkun, professor emeritus of Political Science at the Maxwell School of Syracuse University and author of *A Culture of Conspiracy*, Americans seem to prefer to believe that "the Japanese couldn't have surprised American troops at Pearl Harbor or that a 'loser' like Lee Harvey Oswald couldn't have assassinated a president like Kennedy." Interestingly, it is from this confidence in the infallibility of the government that distrust arises when the structure apparently fails. According to experts, it was the American government itself that originated this "culture of conspiracy" in the country.

"The first investigative agencies were created by the government during World War I, and with them came secrets," explains Kathryn Olmsted, a history professor at the University of California, Davis, and author of the book *Real Enemies: Conspiracy Theories and American Democracy*. According to the professor, the Watergate revelations, which ultimately brought down President Richard Nixon, reinforced the idea that conspiracies do indeed exist.

The assassination of Osama Bin Laden may have brought some relief to a large portion of Americans, but it wasn't enough for those directly affected by the September 11 attacks. As long as the American government fails to explain how the United States' air defense system could have failed, or why there's a three-minute difference between the time of the Flight 93 crash in Shanksville, as indicated in the 9/11 Commission's final report, and the moment the seismic event was recorded, theories will continue to circulate. And, thanks to the internet, with ever-increasing speed and reach.