9-11 Firefighter To Speak At NTCC

Where were you on September 11, 2001? Jay Jonas was at Ground Zero.


RELEASE, Jan. 28, 2009 -- Jay Jonas, a Battalion Chief for the New York City Fire Department, was leading one of the first responding units at the World Trade Center after the terrorist attacks. On Wednesday, February 11 Jonas will share his inspirational story about what happened that infamous day at the Whatley Center for the Performing Arts at Northeast Texas Community College.

This lecture is presented by the NTCC Foundation and Communities In Schools and will be presented twice - at 10 a.m. and 1 p.m. General admission is $5 and all students get in free.

“Each year we bring a speaker to NTCC as part of the Distinguished Lecture Series. Many of our younger children barely remember September 11 and some don’t remember it at all. We felt that it would be a great time to bring Chief Jonas to our area to share his story,” Dr. Jonathan McCullough, NTCC Vice President for Institutional Advancement, said.

Jonas is currently Chief of Battalion two in Lower Manhattan. During his 24-year career with FDNY he has worked in the South Bronx, Harlem, the Lower East Side of Manhattan and Chinatown. On September 11, 2001, Jonas and his unit were rescuing a woman from the north tower of the World Trade Center when it collapsed on them. The unit survived the collapse and its entrapment in the rubble. Chief Jonas was later selected as the official representative from FDNY at President Bush’s address to the nation at the U.S. Capitol Building following September 11.

Chief Jonas has been published several times in professional publications, and was the author of procedures for the New York City Fire Department to rescue trapped firefighters. Jonas appeared on NBC Dateline and The Miracle of Ladder Co. 6., and was featured in an ABC television documentary based on Dennis Smith's book Report from Ground Zero.

He is the recipient of the Bishop’s Cross, given by the Bishop of the New York Diocese of the Episcopal Church. Jonas received a “Men of the Year Award” from The Men’s World Day Organization in Vienna, Austria, presented by Mikhail Gorbachev and Paul McCartney.

Jonas has an AAS Degree in Fire Protection Technology from Orange County Community College (SUNY) and a BS Degree in Fire Administration from Empire State College (SUNY). He and his wife live in Goshen, NY and have three children.

For more information about this event, please call 903-434-8181 or visit www.ntcc.edu.