Victims’ relatives and dignitarie.
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In the meantime, though, Americans can remember the feelings that pulled us together 15 years ago. Victims’ relatives and dignitar.
But they are keeping traditions that have made the ceremony a constant in how America remembers September 11, even as ground zero and the nation changes.
(AP Photo/Gene J. Puskar, File).
At the Flight 93 National Memorial in southwestern Pennsylvania, the ceremony will include music, the reading of the names of the 40 victims who died there and the ringing of bells.
The United States marks the 15th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks on Sunday with solemn services to commemorate the victims of the deadliest terror strikes on U.S. soil, which changed the world forever.
United States presidential candidates Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump temporarily paused their bitter election campaign to attend the service with police and relatives of the victims at the September 11 memorial. Our commitment to that freedom and to one another, in some ways, was strengthened that day.
The statement offered no additional details. But many dignitaries attended, including Trump and Clinton.
Clinton and Trump also followed a custom of halting television ads for the day. The 15th anniversary arrives in a country caught up in a combustible political campaign and keenly focused on political, economic and social fissures.
For most of us, though, the effects of 9/11 and the war on terrorism are felt at the airport and in doing business where our citizenship and identity are more thoroughly checked.
“It doesn’t get easier. But this is something that just doesn’t go away”, she said. “You don’t move forward – it always stays with you”, said Tom Acquaviva, of Wayne, New Jersey, who lost his son Paul Acquaviva.
On the morning of September 11,
2001, I was scheduled to speak to a luncheon gathering of the Ancient Order of
Hibernians in Washington, D.C., and then meet with Cardinal Edward Egan in New York City.
“My wife and I lost everything”, Acquaviva said. “I think everyone needs closure, and this is my time to have closure”. It was a while longer before it became clear what had happened to the plane that crashed in a field near Shanksville, Somerset County.
Defense Secretary Ash Carter vowed to hunt down all who attack Americans.
Among the visitors that day was Greg Brierley, 49, of Milan, Mich., a retired firefighter who said he came to the site to remember the first responders killed on September 11.
Obama said he is inspired by the resilience of the victims’ families.
“Our diversity, our patchwork heritage, is not a weakness”. For quite some time after the attacks, the nation was united in grief and determination.
He added: “In the end, the most enduring memorial to those we lost is ensuring the America that we continue to be”. The wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, in which US troops are still involved 15 years later, were responses to those attacks. I have three kids who have no memory of it at all – they weren’t born yet.
Emily Ortiz, 16, of Queens, said she found comfort in attending the anniversary ceremony because it allowed her to remember her father, Pete Ortiz, who died on 9/11.
Neither Clinton nor Trump made public remarks at the ceremony, where politicians haven’t been invited to speak since 2011.
A United Airlines Boeing 757 traveling from Newark to San Francisco with 44 people on board – including four hijackers – crashes into a field near Shanksville, Pennsylvania, after passengers and crew apparently fought with the hijackers.
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In New York, crowds for the ceremony have diminished over the years.
