On 9-10-01, I returned to Orlando after a weekend of fishing at the Canal. Once home, I realized that I had left a Rapala fillet knife in my carry-on bag, which went through screening at Logan with no issues.
On 9-11-01, I was back at work at the Kennedy Space Center on a Tiger Team, trouble shooting mechanical problems on a new payload canister transporter.
All of the best were in a meeting, when we were interrupted that a plane had hit one of the WTC towers. Initially we all thought that it had been a small plane inflicting minimal damage, so we kept working.
Our meeting was broken up when the second plane hit, and we were ordered back to our stations, at the same time the KSC was in a complete lock-down.
The mere fact that the "box-cutters" have been targeted as the weapon of choice shows the pure audacity of the perpetrators of the greatest crime in our nation's history, especially due to the fact that on the day preceding the event, I inadvertently passed through Logan airport screening with a razor sharp fillet knife.
Today, I can not carry a barroom pizza, let alone a drink of water, through the TSA screeners.
P.S. I feel so much safer after removing my worn shoes / sneakers.