Anyone old enough to remember the first iPods and the last “Friends” episode damn sure remembers the Tuesday that changed the world in 2001 — where they were, what they were doing and who told them to turn on the TV because our country had been attacked.
The terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001 killed nearly 3,000 people at the World Trade Center’s Twin Towers in New York City, the Pentagon in Washington, D.C. and a field in Stonycreek Township, Pennsylvania, where airplane passengers thwarted hijackers’ plans to crash into the White House, instead ambushing the cockpit and crashing the plane, killing all 44 people on board — including the terrorists.
Thousands more — mostly firefighters, police officers and EMTs — have since succumbed to cancer and other illnesses caused by the toxic dust and chemicals they inhaled while working to rescue survivors and recover bodies from the devastation at Ground Zero.
Each year on Sept. 11, the Alex Vega Key West Firehouse Museum, 1024 Grinnell St., and the city of Key West honor the first responders and all victims of 9/11 at a memorial ceremony.
The museum houses two memorial pieces of the World Trade Center that collapsed when two hijacked planes slammed into the skyscrapers that Tuesday morning.
Key West’s historic fire bell, which once rang in the cemetery to alert island residents of a fire, is struck twice on 9/11 at the precise times the hijacked planes hit the Twin Towers — 8:46 a.m for the North Tower and 9:03 a.m. for the South Tower.
Local firefighters, law enforcement officers and city leaders spoke at the remembrance, including Sheriff’s Capt. David Smith and city commissioners Donie Lee, Aaron Castillo and Lissette Carey.
