DEVLIN BARRETT
NY Post Online
October 3, 2001 -- He carried her from the blazing towers, not sure if she would survive. He spent two weeks searching for her, just to make sure she's OK.
And she is.
Deputy U.S. Marshal Dominic Guadagnoli - photographed by the Associated Press making the dramatic rescue - had a touching reunion with the woman, who worked in the World Trade Center and did not want to be identified.
The young mom had been working in the south tower, very close to the area struck by the plane and was badly burned on her left side.
Guadagnoli, who raced to the building with fellow Marshals John Svinos and Bill Schuchat, carried the battered woman to an ambulance before the first tower fell.
The picture of her rescue has appeared in magazines and newspapers around the world - the kind of attention neither wanted.
But over dinner at her home Sunday night with their spouses, the rescuer and the rescued laughed about their luck.
"I always wanted to be famous, but definitely not like this," she told Guadagnoli.
"I was so nervous when I walked up to the door," said the lawman. "But then as soon as I saw her, I had such a feeling of relief, I can't even explain it."
She wrapped her arms around Guadagnoli, and said simply, "Thank you very much."
"After 10 minutes of talking, I felt like I'd known her for years," he said. "She's having a very hard time, but she has a wonderful sense of humor."
Guadagnoli said the office worker, who was just released from the hospital, is still recovering from the incredibly painful burns, and will spend weeks going to funerals because most of her co-workers were killed.
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