AARP Hearing Center
Key takeaways
- Brian Clark stopped during his escape and rescued Stanley Praimnath from debris.
- A shared escape from the South Tower created a lifelong “blood brother” bond.
- Both men continue sharing their 9/11 survival story through public speaking.
Summary
The story of Brian Clark and Stanley Praimnath highlights survival, courage and friendship during the September 11 attacks. Working on different floors of the South Tower, both men faced life-threatening conditions after the building was struck. When Clark heard Praimnath calling for help, he stopped, found a way over a damaged wall, and pulled him to safety.
Their journey out of the World Trade Center forged a bond that has lasted for decades. The two men remain close, celebrating family milestones together and continuing to share lessons from their experience through schools, churches and public appearances.
The key takeaways and summary were created with the assistance of generative AI. An AARP editor reviewed and refined the content for accuracy and clarity.
Full transcript
[0:00:00] Stanley Praimnath: I don’t know how to thank this man who just saved my life.
[0:00:03] Brian Clark: How are you?
[0:00:03] Stanley Praimnath: I hug him tightly around the neck,
[0:00:05] give him a kiss on the cheek.
[0:00:06] I said, “What are you doing?” And he got up to fix his jacket and tie.
[0:00:09] Brian Clark: Dust off.
[0:00:10] Stanley Praimnath: Dust off himself, and he says, “Bryan Clark.” And I said,
“Stanley Praimnath.”
[0:00:28] Ed Baig: On 9/11, as a journalist for USA Today at the time, who was
[0:00:31] asked to go into my local town of Glen Rock, New Jersey ...
Brian Clark: Yep.
[0:00:35] Ed Baig: small town, get reaction from people,
[0:00:37] you happened to be there.
[0:00:38] Brian Clark: You were the first person I told my story to.
[0:00:41] I was an executive vice president at a company called Euro Brokers, working on
[0:00:46] the 84th floor of the South Tower on 9/11.
[0:00:51] Stanley Praimnath: I worked at the World Trade Center, the
[0:00:52] South Tower, on the 81st floor.
[0:00:55] I worked for a company they called Fuji Bank Limited as
[0:00:58] an assistant vice president.
[0:01:01] Brian Clark: On 9/11, it was a normal business day.
[0:01:06] At 8:46, there was this loud boom, boom!
[0:01:18] My peripheral vision suddenly caught glare on the glass behind
[0:01:23] me, and it was swirling flames.
[0:01:26] I had volunteered to be one of the fire safety wardens on our floor.
[0:01:30] Grabbed the flashlight that they had given me, put the whistle around my
[0:01:34] neck, told everybody, “Go out into the center hall. Await further instruction.”
[0:01:38] None of us knew specifically what had happened.
[0:01:41] Stanley Praimnath: I was on the 81st floor.
[0:01:43] A young lady from Chicago is calling me now from one of our rep offices.
[0:01:46] “Stan, get out.” “Get out for what?” Still holding the phone in my hand, I’m looking,
[0:01:52] and what I saw is a giant airplane, gray in color, bearing down on me.
[0:01:57] Hearing the revving sound, dropped the phone, screamed, dove under the desk.
[0:02:03] Brian Clark: Boom, boom, louder explosion.
[0:02:05] The ceiling rained down on us.
[0:02:14] Started down stairway A with my flashlight, and as we got to the
[0:02:18] 81st floor, I heard this banging on a wall or something, and this voice
[0:02:25] saying, “Help. Help. I can’t breathe.”
[0:02:28] Stanley Praimnath: I had crawled the entire length of the floor, and I’m
[0:02:31] confronted by that one Sheetrock wall.
[0:02:33] The person behind the wall is saying, “Bang on the wall
[0:02:38] and I’ll know where you are.”
[0:02:40] The man is saying, “You gotta climb over the wall.” I can’t climb over the wall.
[0:02:45] Brian Clark: I grabbed a desk, brought it over, tipped it up on its end,
[0:02:47] and crawled up on top of the desk.
[0:02:49] So I’m above this 9-foot wall, looking down into the pit.
[0:02:55] Stanley Praimnath: I jumped, grabbed on, and he gave me a headlock.
[0:02:58] One fluid headlock, and he pulled, and I squirm, and I flew off on the other side.
[0:03:04] Brian Clark: And he fell on top of me.
[0:03:05] Stanley Praimnath: And he took his left palm that had a gash and he did like this.
[0:03:09] He said, “From today, you’re my blood brother.” And he put
[0:03:12] his hand around my shoulder.
[0:03:15] He says, “Come on, buddy. Let’s go home.” And we started that long journey
home.
[0:03:20] Brian Clark: Back to the stairs with a flashlight.
[0:03:23] Stanley Praimnath: You can see the flames.
[0:03:24] You can hear them licking up the office space.
[0:03:26] Brian Clark: Yep, cracks
[0:03:27] in the walls.
[0:03:27] Stanley Praimnath: Yeah, down, down, down, down.
[0:03:28] Brian Clark: We ducked through a
[0:03:29] lot of debris.
[0:03:30] Ed Baig: Obviously, the two of you finally get out of the building.
[0:03:33] What happens next?
[0:03:40] Brian Clark: Didn’t know where Stanley had gone in the confusion.
[0:03:42] I had made it to a ferry on the East River.
[0:03:45] I took a train from Hoboken, got to Glen Rock, and as I got off the
[0:03:50] train, I guess dusty enough, you, you picked me out of that little crowd and
[0:03:55] said, “Were you at the Trade Center?”
[0:03:58] Ed Baig: As I recall, you said something like, “I’m the luckiest son of a …”
[0:04:01] You know, something to that....
[0:04:03] Brian Clark: He introduced himself as Ed Baig with USA Today.
[0:04:07] Could he interview me?
[0:04:08] I said, “Yes, but my car is at the other station.” So you agreed to
[0:04:11] walk with me, and the next day, there’s the story in USA Today.
[0:04:17] And what that story did for me, and then eventually Stanley,
[0:04:22] people started calling.
[0:04:31] Ed Baig: So how often do you talk these days and see each other?
[0:04:35] Stanley Praimnath: As often as Brian calls me.
[0:04:38] He assumes the role as an older brother towards me.
[0:04:41] Brian Clark: .
[0:04:41] We’ve each gone to a wedding of our respective daughters’ birthdays,
[0:04:45] anniversaries, you know, New Year’s, Christmas, those sorts of—[0:04:49] Ed
Baig: Right.
Brian Clark: … an- anniversaries of a sort.
[0:04:51] Also, if we haven’t talked for a couple of months, one of us will call the other one.
[0:04:54] Ed Baig: I think you told me that, uh, when he calls, and maybe your kids or
[0:04:59] somebody answers, they’ll say, “Oh, well, Uncle Brian’s on the line.”
[0:05:02] Stanley Praimnath: Absolutely.
[0:05:03] The kids refer to Brian as Uncle Brian.
[0:05:06] “Your brother is on the phone.”
[0:05:09] Ed Baig: What kind of obligation do you feel as survivors of this?
[0:05:13] Brian Clark: The story needs to be told, and I still carry
[0:05:17] on talking to schools today.
[0:05:20] Stanley Praimnath: I felt the need to tell about the goodness of God,
[0:05:24] so I started in our church, and then the news starts spreading to
[0:05:29] another church, and it never stopped.
[0:05:31] Ed Baig: So horrible as 9/11 was, a friendship was born out of
[0:05:35] it between the two of you guys.
[0:05:37] Stanley Praimnath: Had it not been for this man who risked his life, stopped
[0:05:41] to investigate, I would have died, and I owe everything towards him.
[0:05:48] Everything.
[0:05:49] Brian Clark: This is a, an odd friendship.
[0:05:51] I didn’t have a brother.
[0:05:52] Now I have a brother.
[0:05:53] It is a wonderful thing, and then piled on top of that, I’ve got a new friend in you.
[0:05:59] Little did I know, and now I’m ...
Ed Baig: Well, I, I’m not a blood brother.
[0:06:02] I’m a blood cousin.
Brian Clark: … pleased, pleased to introduce my brother to my new friend.