On the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 terrorist attacks, Rachel Uchitel relived the pain just as the rest of the world. But for Tiger Woods’ former mistress Rachel Uchitel, the tragedy hit closer to home than the millions who watched as two hijacked airplanes hit the Twin Towers in New York City on that fateful day in 2001. At the time, Uchitel was planning a wedding to her longtime love Andy O’Grady, who was working at the World Trade Center at the time. As she watched the unthinkable happen from her job at Bloomberg TV, she and her co-workers witnessed the building collapse with O’Grady and thousands of others in it.
In an emotional Instagram post, Uchitel recalled losing the love of her life. “I remember speaking to him and what he was saying on the phone” she captioned a series of photos of her and O’Grady in part. “I remember watching his building fall and not being able to catch my breath. I remember the whole newsroom floor got silent. They had all just watched me watch Andy die. And it was all too unreal…I remember it was hard to eat or sleep or sit and wait,” she continued. “I wanted to go to ground zero and pick up the rubble myself until I found him. The despair of not knowing was beyond words. The fear I had about what he went through in those 56 minutes has consumed me at times. This event changed who I was completely.”
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O’Grady was 32-years-old at the time. Uchitel learned that some survivors were being treated at a nearby hospital, Bellvue Hospital, so she rushed in hopes that she’d find him hurt but alive. As she waited for the news, a camera crew captured her with a photo of O’Grady pleading for help in locating him. Unfortunately, that would not be the case.
Per Swim Swam, O’Grady, a former UCLA swimmer, was a managing director at the investment banking firm Sandler O’Neill & Partners on the 104th floor of 2 World Trade Center. He and Uchitel had just returned from a vacation in Greece. It was just O’Grady’s second day back in the office and he’d arrived just 45 minutes before the plane hit that day.
Uchitel has been open about how 9/11 impacted her life. She attributes the depression she began experiencing from the day to her entering an affair with Woods.ย
