Roselle was three years old and had one job: to be Michael Hingson’s eyes.
On September 11, 2001, they were together on the 78th floor of the World Trade Center’s North Tower when American Airlines Flight 11 struck sixteen floors above them. There was no barking or trembling. Roselle waited for her owner’s command and then began going down, step by step, for nearly an hour.
By the time they reached the street, the South Tower was already burning and a cloud of debris completely enveloped them. It was Roselle who found the way to the subway, the only refuge possible. As they descended—1,463 steps in total—other people began following her steady pace, as if her calm were contagious. When she died in 2011, at the age of 14, she was already a National Hero Dog in the United States and had the Dickin Medal in her name. Hingson never saw her face, but he never stopped telling people what he felt while holding her leash that day.
