Before It Was Real (9/11)

As many readers know, last year Discover Magazine was bought by Bob Guccione Jr., the man behind the music magazine SPIN and the lad mag GEAR. Recently I was flipping through old copies of GEAR, which features many pieces by Discover contributing editor Bruno Maddox, writer of our humor column Blinded By Science (which I happily edit). In one issue -- I don't have the date on hand, but I suspect it was a year after September 2001 -- he wrote a short essay about trying a flight simulator much like, or possibly identical to, the one used by the terrorists who flew into the Twin Towers five years ago today. I am moved to reprint the article on this sad anniversary. I couldn't find an electronic version of it, so I retyped it as I flew on an airplane. Forgive typos.