The Rare 9/11 Story With a Happy Ending

When Nick Marson left London on Continental Airlines Flight 5 bound for Houston on September 11, 2001, he expected an ordinary work trip. Instead, within hours, the journey would place him in the middle of an extraordinary chapter of 9/11 history — and change his personal life forever.

His aircraft was among 38 flights unexpectedly rerouted to Gander, Newfoundland, after the terrorist attacks in New York and Washington, DC forced the closure of U.S. airspace. Almost overnight, about 6,700 stranded passengers arrived in the small Canadian community, nearly doubling the town’s population.

At first, those onboard were only told there were unspecified “problems” affecting American skies. It was not until shortly before landing that the pilot explained the devastating reality: planes had struck the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. For Nick, stepping off the aircraft brought one overwhelming feeling — relief that he was still alive. He was then transported to Gambo, roughly 30 minutes north of Gander, where he was given shelter inside the town’s largest building, The Society of United Fishermen.

Standing in line for an old military blanket to use on his cot, romance could not have felt further away. But then he found himself beside Diane, a warm, witty woman from Texas, and the two quickly started laughing together about the musty mothball smell clinging to the bedding.

Their easy connection was immediate, and they decided to set up their cots next to one another. The following day, desperate for a break from the nonstop television coverage of the attacks, they stepped outside for a walk.

As the conversation unfolded, they discovered they had been passengers on the same plane. Diane had been returning to Houston after a trip to England, where she had visited her son, an Air Force member stationed there.

Despite coming from different countries and backgrounds, Nick and Diane were struck by the similarities between them. Both had been through divorce, both had adult children, and both placed family at the center of their lives.

Neither could have imagined during that quiet walk in Newfoundland that they would be married within a year. Their unexpected 9/11 love story, which began amid fear and uncertainty, would later help inspire the acclaimed Broadway musical Come From Away.

‘We spent a lot of time talking about our lives, because we came from two different backgrounds, so we had a lot of things to discuss,’ Nick, now 77, told Our News Outlet.

‘We both had similar values,’ Diane, 85, added. ‘Our families mean so much to us and we both try to be helpful and respectful to other people, whether they agree with you or not.’

Diane was intrigued by her British companion. When it was lunchtime and they stopped at a convenience store, she paid for their snacks in a bid to spend more time with him.

Later that evening they went to a screech-in event, a Newfoundland tradition where visitors take shots of alcohol and kiss fish to become honorary Newfoundlanders. Their easy chemistry was so clear to others that Nick and Diane were mistaken for a married couple.

When they laughingly explained that they weren’t, the master of ceremonies, who was also a justice of the peace, offered to marry them – to which Diane responded, ‘Why not?’

‘Neither one of us got on that plane looking for a romantic character our age,’ Diane said, explaining that in that moment, she was just looking to be ‘silly’ and ‘lighten the mood.’ But she couldn’t deny that she was starting to feel very fond of Nick.

She got a clear indicator of how Nick felt about her the next day when they took a trip to the Dover Fault, the geological rift in the Earth’s crust that marks where North America and Europe were once welded together. Nick wanted to take a picture to remember their day and when Diane tried to get out of the shot to allow him an unimpeded image of the scenery, he stopped her.

Nick said: ‘I wanted a picture of this day and what turned out to be five wonderful days [together]. I needed to ensure that it really happened and it wasn’t something I dreamt up or embellished in my mind.

‘I wanted to make sure that I remembered what she looked like… I didn’t want to forget. And at that point, I didn’t think I’d ever see her again.’

For Diane, that was all the confirmation she needed.

‘That’s when I knew he was interested in me and not the scenery,’ she said.

Five days after Nick and Diane arrived on the island, air travel was cleared for the diverted planes. They boarded a school bus together to travel to the plane that would take them to Texas.

On the bus, Diane began to cry, overcome with the emotions of the past week and the thought of never again seeing the people in Newfoundland to whom she had become so close. Though it had just been five days, the stranded passengers had spent hours getting to know the residents of Gambo, who had treated them like family.

To soothe her, Nick put his arm around her and kissed her forehead gently.

In response, Diane recalled: ‘I just grabbed him and kissed him because I thought if I don’t, I’ll never have another chance.

‘He lived 5,000 miles away – the chances of us ever meeting were about zero.’

‘That changed the airplane ride home,’ Nick said, noting that the couple ‘canoodled’ the entire flight, so much so that a flight attendant jokingly offered them cold towels, instead of hot ones.

Once Nick returned to London, they began corresponding over email – communications which they supplemented with long telephone calls on the weekends.

Within a month, Nick, who worked in the oil industry, had found a way to finagle another business trip to Houston.

It was a month after that trip, that Nick proposed. He did so over the phone in his car, unable to wait until his next trip to Houston. Diane happily accepted.

‘It was less than two months after we’d met, but we knew we wanted to be together,’ Diane said.

‘It just felt right,’ Nick added.

For the next year, the couple dealt with the red tape and logistics of Nick immigrating to the U.S, and strengthened their bond by meeting each other’s families. They made the decision for Nick to move to America because Diane had just purchased a house in Spring, Texas.

And while there can be no doubt that their romance was a whirlwind, given the circumstances under which they met, Nick and Diane knew that time was too precious to worry about whether or not they were moving too fast. They married on September 7, 2002.

For their honeymoon, the Marsons knew that they wanted to return to where their romance had sprung: Newfoundland.

‘Where would we spend our honeymoon other than where we met?’ Diane said.

They had intended to throw a thank-you dinner for the islanders who had welcomed them so warmly almost exactly a year earlier. Instead, their friends on the island surprised them with a wedding reception complete with wedding cake and a song about their love story performed and written by the mayor of Gambo.

‘We made so many memories with all of the people up there,’ Diane said. ‘We spent the week of our honeymoon with the people that had looked after us.’

Today, Newfoundland has become a home from home for the Marsons, who have returned to the Canadian island nine times and keep in close touch with their Newfoundland friends.

But while their love story, a bright spot in the midst of a devastating tragedy, may have been the talk of Gambo, it was largely unknown outside of Newfoundland. That changed in 2010, when they were featured in Tom Brokaw’s documentary about Gander’s role in aiding America’s Operation Yellow Ribbon – the nation’s response to the terror attacks.

‘Until that point, we hadn’t been comfortable with sharing the story with people other than close friends and family,’ Nick said. ‘I think it’s survivor’s guilt. We don’t feel comfortable with what we had when 3,000 families had been devastated.’

Three years later, Nick and Diane’s story was immortalized when their love story became one of those featured in the Tony and Olivier award-winning musical, Come From Away, which is set in Gander the week of 9/11.

The Marsons had been approached by the musical’s creators Irene Sankoff and David Hein in 2011, on the 10th anniversary of 9/11, and had given them their blessing to use their story but were largely uninvolved with the development of their on-stage counterparts.

When they did see the musical for the first time in 2013, they were thrilled with how Sankoff and Hein had brought to life that time in Newfoundland and paid homage to the kind people who had hosted them.

Since the musical debuted, the Marsons have seen the production in various forms, including on Broadway and in regional productions, at least 160 times. They have even toured with some theatre group productions.

‘Diane says every time we see it, it’s like we’re renewing our vows,’ Nick said. ‘It takes us back to those wonderful five days… sometimes, you think, “Was it real?”‘

Now, 25 years later, it’s clear that the Marsons’ love for one another is just as real as it was when they first met in the shelter on Newfoundland. Nick says that though they always hold space for the tragedy of 9/11, they have finally moved on from the guilt that plagued them in the early years of their romance.

‘Enough time has gone by for the survivor’s guilt to dilute,’ he said. ‘You realize that there are good and bad things that happen in life and you have to navigate all of it. We didn’t cause it, so we probably shouldn’t feel guilty that we found each other.’

For Diane, the tragedy surrounding their love story only highlights how important it is to cherish the time that they have together.

‘We just enjoy spending time together because we know how precious it is,’ she said.