Those people trapped in the tunnel scrambled for their lives. They threw off their jackets, they ran out of their shoes, but they ran. They squeezed between cars, the most fit among them running on top of the cars, chased by the incessant chattering of automatic rifles, the echoes inside the tunnel magnifying reality. They ran as fast as they were able, which in many cases was not fast enough. They clogged the narrow spaces between cars, then began pushing others out of their way; if someone fell, he or she had little chance of getting up. Taxi and limousine drivers abandoned their passengers, but a Pakistani Lyft driver carried a grandmother from Linden a full half mile to safety on his back. The crush was so great drivers were unable to push open their doors against the human tide. Many of them escaped through their sunroof.

The fleeing mob made it impossible for the soldiers and police officers who had been positioned on the Manhattan side for just such an attack to get into the tunnel. There was nothing they could do but help people get to safety. But from the Weehawken end responders began moving cautiously into the hell, moving slowly, wary of booby traps. The firing coming from deep inside the tunnel seemed relentless, the echoes reverberating through the entire tube.

Then the explosions started.

As the terrorists moved past deserted cars, they casually tossed time-delayed grenades through broken windows or now-open sunroofs. They moved slowly and deliberately, stepping over bodies, being in no hurry to meet their own certain death at the mouth of the tunnel. The cars well behind them began exploding. Large segments of concrete fell from the roof, blocking access for those responders.

The attack continued for almost an hour. It ended when the terrorists finally reached the perimeter formed just inside the mouth of the tunnel by the U.S. Army-NYPD joint antiterrorism squad. After a brief firefight, the attackers blew themselves up. The explosion blew a massive hole in the tiled ceiling and bedrock, arousing fears of a complete collapse.

The tunnel held.

At the press conference at the site hours later, Police Commissioner Rogers said his people believed all of the attackers were dead but admitted that conflicting descriptions from survivors made it impossible to even determine with certainly how many of them there had been. Mayor Rose was forced to admit that it was possible, although not probable, he insisted, that one or more of them had escaped by joining the fleeing survivors.

Four hundred and fifty-six bodies were eventually recovered; many of the victims had been trampled to death. Optimistic Port Authority officials predicted, with luck and good weather, the tube could be reopened within four months, while damage to the tristate economy was guesstimated at “more than $28 billion.”

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This is my all-time favorite Far Side: Two turkeys are sitting at a small round table. There are cups of coffee in front of both of them. One of them, wearing black-rimmed glasses, is reading a newspaper dated Tuesday, November 23. In the distance a coveralled farmer carrying a hatchet is walking toward them. The caption reads, “I always feel sorry for those chickens.”