... even after all this time. I know there are certain dates in history that will be forever embedded in memory. For older folks, of my parents' era, they will reminisce of where they were when they heard the news about the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. For the generation of my adult daughters, it will be where they were when they heard about the death of the Princess of Wales.
And for all of us, forever in our thoughts, will be where we were when we heard about the airliners full of innocents crashing into the World Trade Center on September 11. It happened in 2001. Hard to believe it's been fourteen years... but I am sure it seems like the pain is still sharp and raw to those who lost family members in the crashing and resulting destruction, aftermath as the Towers fell.
I read a book recently by a man who is a professional sports writer. Well known in the world of athletes, and a prolific writer, as well as media consultant and commentator. The following is by Rick Riley, and an excerpt from his most recent book. "Tiger, Meet My Sister... and other things I probably shouldn't have said". The book consists of a compilation of columns and articles, on a wide range of individuals, all of whom are somehow connected to the sports world - from long forgotten baseball players to individuals of Olympic competition levels.
Let's Keep Rolling
September 6, 2011
"The first battle in the renewed war against terrorism wasn't waged in Fallujah or Kandahar or Tikrit. It was held 32,000 feet above Pittsburgh, on September 11, 2001.
And it wasn't soldiers who led the battle.
It was four athletes, pushing a food cart.
United Flight 93 was supposed to go from Newark to San Francisco that Tuesday morning, but 31 year-old Jeremy Glick wasn't supposed to be on it.
He was supposed to go the day before, but a fire at Newark Airport forced him to re-book for the next day, one of the bloodiest in American history.
About forty-five minutes into the flight, four radical Islamic terrorists stormed the cockpit, sliced the throats of the pilots and took charge. They told the thirty-three passengers and seven crew members they were hijacking the plane and returning to Newark.
Glick, a muscular 1993 national collegiate judo champion, scampered back to the second-to-last row and called his wife, Lyz.
Lyz couldn't hold the line. What she was hearing was sending her body into convulsions. She handed the phone to her dad and walked into a different room."
[....the other three were as physically fit and joined with Glick to attempt to divert the plan of the radicals. Collegiate competitors and serious about the physical and mental training they would constantly subject themselves to to maintain top conditioning...]
"All of them jocks. All of them with the physical and mental training to rise up when all seems lost. This is the best guess of what they did.
'We're going to attack', Glick told Lyz. 'I'm going to put the phone down. I love you. I'll be right back'.
[Todd] Beamer revealed the same plan to the operator, Lisa Jefferson, who was sitting in a call center in Oakbrook Illinois. When it was time, he let the phone dangle so he cold keep the line open in case he made it back alive. She heard Beamer say to the others,' Let's roll'. It's a phrase that would later be stenciled on jet fighters, NASCAR rides and above locker room doors.
Using a food service cart as a battering ram, the attackers raced up the aisle and smashed through the cockpit door. It was almost 10 a.m.
'My dad said first he heard a series of screams', Lyz recalls. Then he heard another set of screams. Then it all sounded like a roller coaster, up an down. And then it just.... ended."
"United Flight 93 dove into a remote field in southwestern Pennsylvania, near Shanksville, killing all aboard. People ten miles away said they felt the ground shake. It's believed the plane was headed for the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C."
"And yet, ten years later, the memorial that was promised these forty people hasn't been delivered. The Flight 93 National Memorial is still $10 million short of completion. There is no visitor's center to teach, no Tower of Voices to listen to, and no forty groves of trees to honor.
'I'm 69 years old', says David Beamer (David's dad). 'I'd like to see the thing get done in my lifetime. If you and everybody you know can make one little sacrifice - one hour of your income - we could get this done tomorrow.'
I sent in an hour's pay not just to honor the passengers of Flight 93 but also to thank them. My niece was working in the Capitol that day. This spring, she had her second baby.
The passengers aboard Flight 93 saved hundreds of lives - if not thousands - in thirty five minutes. We've had ten years.
It's a hole we need to fill.
postscript: ...you'll be happy to know the goal was reached. The Flight 93 National Memorial in Shanksville is now open. It's free."
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