Juan Lopez woke up on Wednesday as an unknown window washer working in New York City. By the end of the day, Lopez and his partner, Juan Lizama, were famous, but not because they wanted to be.

Lopez and Lizama were washing windows outside the 69th floor of the One World Trade Center when their normally horizontal scaffold went nearly vertical.

Fortunately, safety harnesses and excellent training saved the window washers and the FDNY was able to rescue the two men after cutting through the tower’s windows so the stranded workers could be safely evacuated from their scaffold.

“We made sure the scaffold was intact before we jumped in, as we do every day,” Lopez told CBS2. “At the moment when it happened, it was just reaction.”

Although they briefly panicked, the window washers soon realized that their training would bring them home to their families that night.

“It calms you down. After a while, after you realize you’re steady, you take a breath and put everything together,” he said in the interview. “The safety you learned, you realize everything is good.”

He may be used to being high up in the air, but Lopez was overjoyed to step back onto terra firma.

“I’m feeling a lot better now on the ground,” Lopez said.