9/11

See also: 911, 9・11, and 9-1-1

English

The north face of Two World Trade Center (south tower) immediately after being struck by United Airlines Flight 175

Alternative forms

• 911
• 9-11
• nine-eleven

Etymology

From the date September 11 written in numbers according the format used in the United States, which puts the month before the day.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /naɪn.əˈlɛ.vən/

• Audio (US):

  (file)

• Rhymes: -ɛvən

Usage notes

• /naɪn.wʌnˈwʌn/ (nine-one-one) is usually used for the telephone number 911 instead of the date.

Proper noun

9/11

1. The date of the attack on the Twin Towers and the Pentagon in the USA (September 11th, 2001).
2. (metonymically) The attack itself.
   • 2014 November 17, Roger Cohen, “The horror! The horror! The trauma of ISIS [print version: International New York Times, 18 November 2014, p. 9]”, in The New York Times‎^[1]:

     What is unbearable, in fact, is the feeling, 13 years after 9/11, that America has been chasing its tail; that, in some whack-a-mole horror show, the quashing of a jihadi enclave here only spurs the sprouting of another there; that the ideology of Al Qaeda is still reverberating through a blocked Arab world whose Sunni-Shia balance (insofar as that went) was upended by the American invasion of Iraq.

Translations

the attack on World Trade Center and the Pentagon on September 11, 2001

• Chinese:

  Mandarin: 9·11事件 (jiǔ-yāo-yāo shìjiàn)

• Danish: 11. september
• Finnish: WTC-isku
• French: 11 septembre (fr) m
• German: 11. September (de) m
• Japanese: 9・11 (kyū ichi ichi)
• Portuguese: Onze de Setembro m, 11 de Setembro m
• Spanish: 11S, 11-S
• Swedish: 11 september-attackerna
• Turkish: onbir eylül, 11 eylül

Noun

9/11 (plural 9/11s)

1. An event comparable to 9/11.
   • 2005, Peter H. Merkl, The Rift Between America And Old Europe: The Distracted Eagle, Routledge, page 73:

     Eleven million Spaniards responded to "their 9/11" by demonstrating in the rain against terrorism and their government's policies.

   • 2006 April 14, “Moussaoui says he wants more 9/11s”, in The Age‎^[2]:

     Moussaoui says he wants more 9/11s [title]

   • 2006, Michael Weissenstein, “Nations respond to their '9/11s'”, in International Institute for Strategic Studies‎^[3], archived from the original on 2008-04-08:

     But experts who have studied these other "9/11s" say some offer important revelations, by comparison, about how America responded to its own.

   • 2007, David E. Long, Bernard Reich, Mark Gasiorowski, The Government and Politics of the Middle East and North Africa:

     Jordanians referred to this horrific event as "their 9-11".

   • 2023 October 9, Ben Doherty, “Israel military says situation ‘dire’ in south as 260 bodies retrieved from festival”, in The Guardian‎^[4], →ISSN:

     IDF says fighting is ongoing in south, saying it ‘could be a 9/11 and a Pearl Harbour wrapped into one’ as Supernova festival-goers describe attack[.]

2. (humorous) A negative event a person or group of people experienced whose impact is not actually comparable to that of 9/11's.

   This was my 9/11.

   This is 11 year olds' 9/11

   9/11 for unfunny people

   This is 9/11 for band kids

Translations

an event comparable to 9/11

• Portuguese: Onze de Setembro m, 11 de Setembro m

See also

• Appendix:American Dialect Society words of the year

Further reading

• September 11 attacks on Wikipedia.Wikipedia

Anagrams

• 119