This year marks the 21st anniversary of the deadly 9/11 terror attacks in the United States which claimed the lives of nearly 3,000 people.
The day was marked by a speech from President Joe Biden at the Pentagon, which happened to be one of the sites hit in the attacks. First Lady Jill Biden also spoke from a site in Pennsylvania where one of the planes flown by hijackers crashed.
“Twenty-one years later, we keep alive the memory of all the precious lives stolen from us at Ground Zero, in Shanksville, Pennsylvania, and at the Pentagon,” Biden said via the president’s official Twitter account. “To the families and loved ones who still feel the ache, Jill and I hold you close in our hearts. We will never forget.”
Other former Presidents who shared their views online, included George W. Bush, Bill Clinton and Barack Obama. Meanwhile, NASA has shared a poignant image of the aftermath of the attacks, captured by an astronaut on the International Space Station (ISS).
Expedition 3 Commander Frank Culbertson took photos of New York as the ISS flew overhead. NASA explained Culbertson was the only American aboard the ISS: “As soon as he learned of the attacks, he began documenting the event in photographs because the station was flying over the New York City area.
“He captured incredible images in the minutes and hours following the event. From his unique vantage point in space, he recorded his thoughts of the world changing beneath him.”
One image shows the smoke plume above Manhattan “visible from space,” believed to have been taken after the twin towers of the World Trade Center collapsed.
Speaking about his vantage point of the horror unfolding below, in a letter dated September 11, 2001, Culbertson said: “The smoke seemed to have an odd bloom to it at the base of the column that was streaming south of the city.
“After reading one of the news articles we just received, I believe we were looking at NY around the time of, or shortly after, the collapse of the second tower. How horrible…”
The next day he added: “It’s horrible to see smoke pouring from wounds in your own country from such a fantastic vantage point.
Source: Newsweek
