Every September 11, we remember the people we lost.
But there are also stories from that day that remind us of the people—and animals who made it out.
One notable example is Roselle the guide dog.
Roselle the guide dog worked with Michael Hingson, who was blind. They were on the 78th floor of the North Tower when the first plane hit on September 11, 2001.
She was in the office, as she normally was, when the building suddenly shook violently.
There was smoke, confusion and fear.
And yet, Michael couldn’t see what was happening around him.
He didn’t need to.
He had Roselle the guide dog.
Together, they entered the stairwell. And then they began to descend.
78 floors.
1,463 steps.
One after another.
People were rushing down around them, terrified and desperate to get out. Firefighters were climbing upwards, heading towards the very place everyone else was trying to escape. And somewhere in the middle of all that chaos was a man who couldn’t see, holding onto a railing, trusting his guide dog.
Michael kept talking to Roselle, reassuring her that she was doing a good job. He knew she could sense the fear around them and wanted her to know that he was calm.
She kept going. Floor after floor. Smoke. Heat. Noise. Panic.
She didn’t know what had happened. She didn’t know why people were running. She didn’t know that the building they were inside would soon be gone. She simply knew her job.
Get Michael out. And she did.
After more than an hour, they finally reached the ground. They made it outside, only to hear the warning that the South Tower was coming down. The crowd turned and ran.
Michael couldn’t see the tower collapse. He could hear it. And once again, he ran with Roselle.
At one point, she stopped and led him towards the subway, getting them away from the chaos above. Eventually, they reached safety. They had escaped the building approximately 30 minutes before the North Tower collapsed.
That night, when they finally got home, Roselle picked up her favourite toy and wanted to play. For her, the danger was over. Michael was safe. Her job was done.
And perhaps that is what moves me most about Roselle’s story.
She didn’t need to understand the enormity of what had happened.
She didn’t need to know about terrorists, planes or skyscrapers.
She only needed to know that her human was relying on her.
And she never left him.
Which brings me to something I think about every time I hear someone complain about dogs being where they apparently shouldn’t be.
Dogs are dirty.
Dogs don’t belong on planes.
Dogs shouldn’t be in restaurants.
Dogs shouldn’t be at the beach.
Dogs are not humans.
There always seems to be something.
But I do wonder where those objections go when the building is collapsing.
When you’re trapped beneath rubble, suddenly the dog isn’t so dirty.
When someone is missing, suddenly nobody minds a dog searching through the wreckage.
When you’re blind and trying to find your way out of a burning skyscraper, nobody is asking whether dogs belong in public spaces.
They just want the dog to find them.
And that’s the contradiction I can’t ignore.
We ask dogs to be there when we need them most, while sometimes treating their presence as an inconvenience when we don’t.
Roselle didn’t save Michael because she was human. She saved him because she was a dog who had been trained, trusted and given the opportunity to do what she knew how to do.
Twenty-five years later, that descent still stays with me.
I picture the stairwell.
The smoke.
The hundreds of frightened people.
The firefighters going up while everyone else was trying to get down.
And somewhere among them, a yellow Labrador walking beside a man who couldn’t see.
One step. Then another. Then another.
Until they reached the street.
Roselle could never have known that people would remember her name.
She only knew that Michael was with her.
And she was with Michael.
For her, that was enough.
Illustration of Roselle, hand-drawn by me, with Copic markers.
A little more about Roselle
Roselle’s courage was recognised far beyond that day.
On March 5, 2002, she and fellow guide dog Salty were jointly awarded the Dickin Medal by the People’s Dispensary for Sick Animals — often described as the animal equivalent of the Victoria Cross — for loyally leading their blind owners to safety from the World Trade Center after the September 11 attacks.
Roselle was also recognised by Guide Dogs for the Blind and received a Partners in Courage Award from Guiding Eyes for the Blind.
In 2011, the year she died, Roselle was posthumously named American Hero Dog of the Year, winning a public vote of more than 400,000 people.
Salty deserves a story of his own — and perhaps that’s one for another day.