Today is the Seventeenth Anniversary of that sunny Tuesday morning when the Towers fell. Driving through lower Manhattan this past weekend we saw the Freedom Tower rising into the sky. It was a long time coming.
I can still remember the paper and debris flying through the air over a half mile away, the burnt pulverized concrete dust falling from the sky. The smell, which lingered for weeks afterwards. And the long walk home that the summer morning with the smoke plume rising in the sky.
From last year:
Late in the morning of the Tuesday that changed everything, Lt. Heather “Lucky†Penney was on a runway at Andrews Air Force Base and ready to fly. She had her hand on the throttle of an F-16 and she had her orders: Bring down United Airlines Flight 93. The day’s fourth hijacked airliner seemed to be hurtling toward Washington. Penney, one of the first two combat pilots in the air that morning, was told to stop it.
The one thing she didn’t have as she roared into the crystalline sky was live ammunition. Or missiles. Or anything at all to throw at a hostile aircraft.
Read the rest or hear it here.
And as an author to an Author I have to admire the plotting touch, where the three burly and brave guys who spearheaded the fight back in flight 93 were a born again man, a Jewish man, and a gay man. Can you imagine any group designed to give more heart burn to the enemies that brought down the towers and who tried to use flight 93 as a weapon?
…
Their lives were forfeit, but they died free men. They died heroes. More importantly, they died Americans.
Read the rest.
Never Forget.
Hat Tip to to Cap’n Bob (http://capnbob.us)
