In the Busy World and Times….
One should NEVER Forget….
NY Times….
Twenty-five years ago this morning, out of a very clear, very blue sky, a 135-ton airliner going over 400 miles an hour slammed into the 96th floor of a Manhattan office building, setting in motion one of the darkest, deadliest days New York and the nation have ever known.
And on this morning,as on every Sept. 11 since 2002, survivors, mourners and politicians gathered in Manhattan for the city’s most somber ritual: reading the names of the nearly 3,000 people killed that day in the terror attacks in New York, at the Pentagon and in Shanksville, Pa. Similar observances are being held at the other two sites.
President Trump spoke at the Pentagon. “Sept. 11 reminded us of the terrible power of hate,” he said. “The 25 years since have shown us the even greater power of the American spirit to endure and prevail and to win, and today our country is stronger than it has ever been before.”
The ceremony in New York got underway, as always, at 8:46 a.m., with a beat of silence honoring the moment when the first plane, American Airlines Flight 11, struck the North Tower of the World Trade Center. Relatives of those who died — including some children who had never met their grandparents who were killed — began reciting their names. Five more silences mark the times when other flights crashed and buildings fell.
But this year, a new, seventh moment of silence will be observed at the end of the ceremony, to mourn those who have perished over the last quarter-century from cancer and other illnesses because of the toxic dust they inhaled in the days and months after the attacks.
The new rite underscores the unending reverberations from that September day: Even as 2001 recedes into the past, deaths from 9/11-related disease are only accelerating and are believed to have outstripped the toll on 9/11 itself.
This week brought a revelation that for many in the city felt like a fresh wound. New York’s mayor, Zohran Mamdani, released over 170,000 pages of reports, records and correspondence that, taken together, leave the impression that the city’s leaders, in their desperation to get Lower Manhattan and Wall Street up and running again, misled New Yorkers about the lingering dangers.
Though the New York memorial service is typically apolitical, a widow of one victim made an impassioned address about American officials continuing to work with Saudi Arabia, years after the attacks and as family members have sought to hold the Saudis responsible in federal court. “It has been one betrayal after another,” said the widow, Terry Strada, whose husband, Thomas Strada, was a broker at Cantor Fitzgerald.
All four living ex-presidents — Clinton, Bush, Obama and Biden — are at the New York ceremony. So is Mr. Mamdani, the city’s first Muslim mayor, despite a petition signed by thousands of people, including victims’ family members, urging him to stay away. Rudolph W. Giuliani — the city’s mayor on 9/11 — and other right-wing activists have also objected to Mr. Mamdani’s presence. But Mr. Mamdani and Mr. Giuliani shook hands at the site before the ceremony began….
images….top…..Flowers laid at the Sept. 11 memorial on Wednesday in Lower Manhattan.Credit…Todd Heisler/The New York Times
bottom…Watching NYC downtown from Jersey City….NY Times
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