Zev Mydlarz Tribute
Died כד אדר תשע״ח March 11, 2018
Zev was a long time member of Yavneh Minyan. He was the creator and original editor of the shul newsletter. With his guidance we were one of the first shuls to send their newsletter via email. Zev loved meeting people and collecting emails. He was a large person with a huge heart and huge bal chessed. He was very well read, a huge interest in nature and history. He loved to gather with people, for lunch, dinner, movie, first night at Brooklyn Museum, or Costco to name a few. He also liked to help people find jobs, especially with NYC civil service. He will be missed greatly.
Send a condolence card to Zev's mom. (via USPS) She calls him Stephen.
Mrs. Sylvia Mydlarz
5256 24 Mile Rd.
Shelby Twp. , MI 48316
Embedded Facebook live of funeral service. Starts a few minutes into the service.
Index to Audio: 0:00 Tehillim by Tom Bauer 1:40 Rabbi Moshe Sokol 13:24 Lisa Reiner 17:45 Paul Mydlarz 19:32 Howie Mandelbaum 22:10 Kel Malei Saul Guberman
9/11/01 World Trade Center first hand account
WTC-Frist Hand Account
-submitted by Zev Mydlarz
Thanks to all who called. Rivki and I are b"H well. As you know, we both work in lower Manhattan; Rivki at Water and Wall Street, and myself at 90 Church Street. This morning, we both took the express bus into work, and soon after emerging from the Brooklyn-Battery Tunnel into Manhattan we spotted smoke billowing from the World Trade Center. We didn't know the whys and wherefores so we went about our business - she exited the bus first, near her office, and I remained on the bus as it drove up Trinity Street, eventually alongside the WTC.
Due to all the traffic and people pointing up to the fire, I and many others left the bus a few blocks early to walk the remaining few blocks (remember we had not heard the news reports of a plane crash). I found it interesting that I could see so much smoke but no flame - and lots of PAPER. Paper, paper, emerging from the side of the WTC towers like an ivory plume.
Picking my way amongst the stalled cars and rush hour pedestrian traffic, I was focused on the ground in front of me when I heard a great roar. Looking up, a huge billowing ball of flame burst from the WTC tower one block to my left. Again, not suspecting foul play, I stopped to ponder just how such a plume could form. Natural gas leaks are small due to the size of the pipes used; only later did I learn that it was aviation fuel from a fully loaded transcontinental airliner that plowed into the far side of the building.
Time really does seem to move slower in a disaster. The screams of running people started to sink in and interrupt my reverie. The sight of larger chunks of building flying my way caused a gradual realization that maybe this was a good time to watch from a GREATER distance.
Down one subway station, I saw what I later learned was the last N train leave for Brooklyn, but I was too engrossed in finding a phone. They were all in use, so I went back upstairs and circled around the carnage and slipped through the police cordon as it was being erected. At my office, the security people would not let me call up to the 8th floor, let alone go up there, so I left.
Outside on Church Street, was a long line of parked Hatzoloh and other ambulances, engaged in wheeling people on stretchers and into the waiting vehicles. I started thinking slightly more intelligently, and walked towards the East River in search of a train. The first station I found was closed, but lots of people were milling about trying to find out what to do. I was told by one exasperated MTA worker that the 4 and 5 lines were still running, so I went there, took a train - and was promptly stranded at Bowling Green station. The intercom announced that all passengers should disembark there, and in proper lemming fashion we did so. And waited. And waited. And noticed that the subway tunnel was filling with smoke. Finally a man in full protective gear came down shouting to evacuate the station. I paused at several pay phones, but the lines were just too long. In the street, I picked up several sheets of charred paper. One was full of chemical formulas with accompanying prose - a textbook perhaps. Another, a screen print of waiting emails. My original intention of a quick souvenir soon seemed macabre and I abandoned it.
As I left the station the dust/smoke combination was getting pretty severe, and passing police and EMS all had respirators or at least dust masks, and it was getting hard to see. I heard a load deep roar (the collapse of the WTC towers)but I had no idea what it was at the time. So I ducked into a nearby office building. Number One Broadway was a mass of confused anxious people, all dressed in their business best. Fortunately the HVAC system was working and the clean air was a blessing. A group of us huddled around the guard's radio trying make sense of what was happening. Lines formed around the office phones in the mailroom where some of us waited. A janitor upended a five gallon spring water jug offering dixie cups to all. I opened the door to take a look and was quickly chastised by the janitor in words of broken English but unmistakable reprimand. I asked to borrow a cell phone and instead was shown how no signal was there. Incoming calls did come sporadically. The air grew dark as night, but within maybe 40 minutes looked "normal". A man in a flak jacket marked "US Coast Guard" went door to door letting us know the Staten Island ferry was back in operation.
I left for Rivki's office a few blocks away. It was an oasis of calm, people waiting for news and surfing the web. The request to evacuate the building came soon thereafter and my wife and I left for Brooklyn. There was NO public conveyance - not a single bus or train to be had. So we joined a grand migration of people on foot north, through Chinatown (what a great smell), past the Brooklyn Bridge (closed due to a "suspicious vehicle" on it) to the Manhattan Bridge. The Manhattan Bridge was a sea of pedestrians - no cars or trucks - and we passed several news crews recording the WTC view.
Behind us, a rising plume of smoke where lower Manhattan used to be. Once on the other side, Brooklyn posed it's own set of challenges. There were plenty of MTA workers and NYC cops, but a dearth of information. The vacuum was filled with plenty of misinformation - a bus stop here, a train station there. We continued walking past the phantom stations and vehicles, only to encounter the real ones closed and cordoned off. Many businesses along the voortrekker's route were providing free water and juice to us refugees. A Jewish place, the Soved Institute, amongst them.
Eventually we found a running bus and made our way home. ...Zev