By: Don Driggers
Support is still available for victims of the 9/11 terrorist attacks and their families, even if it takes a fight to get it. Spencer Cullum was a frightened 9-year-old child when he survived the events of 9/11. Cullum was on vacation with his family from California and had just visited the World Trade Center when the two planes hit. As the debris rained down, he ran for safety with his brother and parents.
The toxic dust caused Cullum to have leukemia that he has battled for many years. Applying for financial aid to cover his hundreds of thousands of dollars in medical bills has proven to be difficult.
The Victims’ Compensation Fund mandates that multiple non-relatives vouch that the victim was in Lower Manhattan on that day. All these years later, Cullum had no way to prove that he was there as a nine year old.
Luckily, the family was featured in their hometown paper which covered their saga of survival and the mission it took them to get back home to the west coast. The father was interviewed and described watching the planes hit. The family had no way to get back to California with all airports closed so they stayed for a bit with friends in Canada and managed to get home the next week from there.
Cullum was cut from his football team because the delay in getting home meant he missed games. Cullum went on to college and graduate school and that is when his cancer journey began. It was during graduate school that he was diagnosed with leukemia that is linked to his 9/11 exposure.
Cullum used the newspaper clipping to verify his story and get the money to pay for his life-saving medical treatments. He also received funds to cover his earnings he would have made had he been able to work during his cancer fight.
In an exclusive statement to The New York Post Cullum said, “he thinks being at the World Trade Center that day, he feels like he’s a better person because of it. “When I look at who I am, as a son and a brother and a husband, and a person, I’m very thankful. I think that the suffering that I endured has really sharpened and changed my view of my life and my purpose. I don’t know that I have the strength to say that I would choose to go through it again. But having gone through it, I’m thankful for many of the ways that it’s affected me.”.
