Moving memorial to 9/11

As the rubble fell from the North Tower it crushed the truck used by Ladder Company 3. PHOTO / KRISTIN EDGE

On a sunny morning on September 11, 2001, terrorists hijacked four commercial planes. Two were flown into the Twin Towers in New York City. The 9/11 attacks killed 2977 people from more than 90 countries. The oldest victim was 85, the youngest was only 2. More than 400 were first responders who died performing their sworn duties. Northern Advocate reporter Kristin Edge visited the memorial site and the 9/11 memorial museum and finds it a very moving, sombre but positive experience of triumph of human dignity.

THE mangled wreck of a fire truck stands in the middle of the dimly-lit room, 20m below the surface of bustling New York City.

The red locker doors are smashed, tyres shredded and the ladder spills out like twisted entrails at the front of the appliance.

The team on Ladder Company 3 responded bravely, to help with the evacuation of the North Tower and arrived on the 35th floor by 9.21am on the tragic day.

Captain Patrick "Paddy" John Brown used a telephone to contact the Manhattan dispatcher after his fire personal communication gear failed.

He reported burns victims and numerous others making their way down the stairs and he understood there was a fire above the 75th floor. All 11 responding members of Ladder Company 3 were inside the building and were killed when it collapsed at 10.28am.

New York's new skyline. PHOTO / KRISTIN EDGE

On Friday it will be 14 years since the atrocities of 9/11, when nearly 3000 people were killed in a horrific episode of televised terrorism. Nearly 400 emergency service workers, including the crew on Ladder Company 3, were killed.

In May last year the 9/11 Memorial Museum opened to the public, located at the former site of the World Trade Center and completed the US$700 million undertaking of the 9/11 memorial project that includes two cascading pools set in the footprints of the original Twin Towers.

The museum houses more than 10,000 artifacts salvaged from the destroyed buildings - from personal mementos such as a teddy bear, an unposted letter, a shoe, to large artifacts like mangled pieces of steel from the collapsed towers, an elevator motor and pieces of plane.

With the use of audio, video and first-person accounts visitors are taken back to the horrifying moments when the two planes slammed into the towers.

Since the museum's opening, victims' families, survivors, rescue workers and others have come forward to add about 135 new gifts to its collection.

Relatives have brought new photos or recorded new remembrances to profiles of the nearly 3000 victims. Others have added to the wallets, helmets, and other personal effects in a collection that looks at the terrorist attacks through the lens of individual lives.

Another physical exhibit taken from the rubble of the towers is The Last Column - a 58-ton, 11m-tall piece of welded plate steel. It was one of 47 columns the supported the inner core of the South Tower. When it collapsed, it remained anchored in the bedrock, buried beneath the wreckage.

Touching tributes to the dead put on The Last Column while it was still at Ground Zero. PHOTO / KRISTIN EDGE

As the recovery of the World Trade Center site neared completion the column was removed in a solemn ceremony.

In the weeks before it was removed, recovery workers, first responders, volunteers and victims' relatives signed the column and wrote memorial messages, photographs and other tributes.

"Mychal thank you for being part of our lives. We miss you," is one of the tributes written for Father Mychal Judge, who was the New York Fire Department chaplain who was fatally injured while giving the last rites to a fallen firefighter.

In the heart of the museum there is a room where every terrible detail of that day is represented. There are handsets visitors can listen to of answering-machine messages passengers of Flight 93 left for loved ones.

There is video surveillance footage of the hijackers going through security.

And the most traumatic of all there are pictures and videos of people jumping from the buildings as they burned.

It's hard to watch. It makes you stop. Pause for a moment, and wipe away the tears.
Another artifact is the historic "Survivors' Stairs", a 7m-tall flight of granite-clad stairs that connected Vesey St to the World Trade Center.

During the September 11 attacks, the stairs served as an escape route for hundreds of evacuees from the World Trade Center, a nine-floor building adjacent to the 110-storey towers.

For many, it was the only route of escape, hence the term "Survivors' Stairs".

It's hard to image how the bustling streets of downtown New York could have been in such turmoil and devastation.

Waterfalls cascade into the pools with the names of the victims inscribed around the perimeter. PHOTO / KRISTIN EDGE

Outside at ground level two pools set in the footprints of the original Twin Towers are a vivid reminder of all workers who died in each of the towers.

Waterfalls cascade into the pools with the names of the victims inscribed in bronze lettering around perimeter of the two pools. You can't see the bottom.

The reflection pools are surrounded by 400 trees and mass of towering glass and steel buildings stretch skyward from the concrete jungle.

The whole memorial is a fitting tribute to all who lost their lives on that tragic day.