Melissa Doi


Melissa Cándida "Missy" Doi was an American businesswoman in the financial industry who was a victim of the September 11 attacks on the World Trade Center.
Doi is known for the recording of the 9-1-1 call she made during her final moments from inside the South Tower as it was engulfed in flames. The recording was used during the prosecution of Zacarias Moussaoui, the only criminal trial to result from the attacks. Her emotional conversation with emergency operator Barnes made several international headlines.

Early life and education

Doi graduated from the Spence School, before attending Northwestern University, where she graduated in 1991 with a sociology degree and was a member of Delta Gamma sorority. She had ambitions to become a ballet dancer. After graduation, she took a job in public relations, then moved to banking. In 1997, she joined IQ Financials and soon became a Financial Manager. Doi was the only child of a single mother, Evelyn Alderete.

Death and 9-1-1 call recording

According to the 9-1-1 recording played during the trial of Zacarias Moussaoui, Melissa Doi made her call at from the 83rd floor of the South Tower at 9:17 a.m., on September 11, 2001. When the South Tower of the World Trade Center was hit by United Airlines Flight 175 at 9:03 a.m., she and another five people were trapped in the impact zone on the 83rd floor where IQ Financial Systems was located when she called 911. During the call, the operator tries to keep Doi calm and extract information from her. She answered, "Well, there's no one here yet, and the floor's completely engulfed. We're on the floor and we can't breathe, And it's very, very, very hot".
Due to privacy reasons, only the first 4 minutes of the dispatch call, which lasted 24 minutes, was released by the courts along with the rest of the recordings, numbering more than 1,600.
As the South Tower burned, she asked the operator, "Can you stay on the line with me, please? I feel like I'm dying."
Near the end of the call, Doi spells out the last name of her mother and asks the dispatcher to set up a three-way call so that she can speak to her mother one last time.
"We couldn't put her on," the dispatcher says. "We don't have a three-way system for that."
As smoke and heat began to overcome her, Doi gave the 911 operator her mother's name and phone number in hopes of passing on a last message. That evening, Alderete received a call from the 911 operator who had spoken with Doi while she was trapped in the stairwell, who said she had a message for Alderete from her daughter: "Tell my mother that I love her and that she's the best mom in the whole world."
After 24 1/2 minutes, the call cuts off. It took three years for her remains to be found in the rubble. At the National 9/11 Memorial, Doi is memorialized at the South Pool, on Panel S-46.

Transcript of the 9-1-1 call

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