I was working two jobs at the time and one of them started at 5 am in the morning. I turned on the TV as I got ready for work and saw the footage and thought, "Damn thats one heck of an accident, someone can't fly a plane" and went to work. I worked by myself at a petrol station and the whole time people kept coming in and saying "something whacky is happening in America! and me being in customer service mode was just "yeah, right hey?" but I had no idea as I had no access to any up to date news source.
When I finished work at 12, I went home and the TV was still broadcasting the same footage and the better half gave me an update as to what was going on.
Dang thought I. Went off to second job that started at 4pm and people were talking about it all there too.

It was a confusing day for me, but I remember it quite vividly.

When I caught up on everything that was going on, I thought, this will change the world. I also wondered what America would do about it.
Thinking back on it, GW Bush was in a bad spot. With that many deaths, people wouldn't have accepted him just going "Bummer." The US govt would have had to find an enemy and do something about it. I'm glad I wasn't in his shoes at that time, I don't know what I would do if faced with the same circumstances (although I'm sure I'd have better informational resources if I were the US president).