The U.S. flag raised by firefighters on the site of Ground Zero after the 9/11 terrorist attacks likely has been found and soon will go on display in a museum, 15 years after it disappeared, reports say. It was authenticated and the original owner donated the flag to the museum this week.
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It will be displayed near the entrance of the National September 11 Memorial and Museum, built on the site of ground zero. In 2014, a television show called “Lost History” aired on the History Channel about the mystery of the flag. How the flag ended up across the country is a piece of the puzzle that remains unsolved.
To America, the photograph of the flag flying over the dusty fires of the World Trade Center that first, bad day was a symbol for the whole country – wounded, yes, but still standing, still full of hope.
The flag matched in size, nylon material and stitching to the one in the September 11 photo.
Brian told the firefighters he had been watching a documentary on historical artifacts, and one segment detailed the missing ground zero flag.
“It’s truly incredible”, Dreifus said.
Forensic materials scientist Bill Schneck began taking samples of dust particles from the flag to compare with dust particles from Ground Zero in NY. But it turned out the flag – which was signed by Gov. George Pataki and Mayors Rudy Giuliani and Michael Bloomberg, among others – was not the right one.
Mystery solved – 2,585 miles away.
The original flag eventually resurfaced in Everett, Washington.
Brian said he was a former Marine who had been deployed in the Middle East.
“In the beginning it was just a flag that was returned”, said Kim Gilmore, a senior historian at the History Channel.
Detectives with the Everett Police Department investigated the flag after it was turned into the fire department for safekeeping.
Schneck said he analyzed his findings over and over again and is now certain that the flag was from ground zero. “But it became a two-year saga to make sure”.
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Regardless of how the man came to own the flag, firefighters told the local police, and investigators looked into the claim that this flag, which was 3 feet by 5 feet, was the original featured in the iconic photograph. Now the flag sits by itself on the top floor of the shiny museum, surrounded by the white marble floors and shiny glass towers of the new World Trade Center. “This is where the flag belongs”.
