On September 11, 2001, four commercial airliners were hijacked in a planned attack against the United States. Two airliners were flown into the World Trade Center Twin Towers and a third aircraft into the Pentagon. A fourth aircraft, United Airlines Flight 93, crashed into an open field near the small town of Shanksville, Pennsylvania after the passengers and crew stormed the cockpit to derail the plane from its intended target, Washington, D.C.
The Flight 93 National Memorial was envisioned and designed by Paul and Melina Murdoch. Every element was created with deep meaning and intent. As expected, it is emotional, however, I was not aware of how many features would make up this memorial. They are all impressive on their own, when combined they magnificently honor those killed. It is an honor to be able to experience it.
“A common field one day. A field of honor forever.”
The Tower of Voices is the first thing that you see after entering the memorial. The impressive structure stands at 93-feet tall and contains 40 chimes to represent the eternal voices of the 40 passengers and crew members of Flight 93. The chimes are activated solely by the wind. They vary in sizes of 5 to 10 feet, each has a unique pitch that contributes to the collective sound, representing the combined actions of the unimaginably brave individual souls on the plane that day. The second photo above was taken standing inside the tower, the camera pointed up.
After leaving the Tower of Voices we drove to the parking lot for the Visitor Center. The black granite Flight Path Walkway follows the path of United Airlines Flight 93, the two 4-foot concrete walls narrow your focus to what lies ahead, the Overlook. The concrete walls’ imprints mimic the texture of a hemlock tree because of the hemlock grove surrounding the crash site. Time stamps of the other three planes on September 11, 2001 are engraved in the walkway. Once you reach its end, you can stand at the Overlook and view the Memorial Plaza, Wall of Names and Crash Site in the distance, the latter is marked with a 17-ton sandstone boulder.
The Visitor Center offers a self-guided tour that includes a chronological display of the day’s events with artifacts from the crash, flight paths, TV coverage from that day played on multiple screens, as well as information about the passengers and crew. You can listen to the final calls made to loved ones. It is chilling. It is knee-buckling. You want to stop the audio after seconds but it feels necessary to continue hearing their words, their voices. For days after, I asked myself what I would say, would I be as calm as they?
We next drove one mile to the Memorial Plaza At The Crash Site. On our way to the Wall of Names, we walked along the boundary of the approximate location of impact. Cement benches along the path are subtlety designed to look like seats on a plane, while the walkway turns at a 45 degree angle, the effect: two wings of a plane.
The Wall of Names, shown in the photo at the top of this post, is a white marble wall positioned on the flight path with 40 panels engraved with each hero’s name. Pregnant at the time of her murder, Lauren Grandcolas’s panel includes, “AND UNBORN CHILD.” It stopped me cold. Before leaving I visited their panel again.
At the Ceremonial Gate, made out of hemlock, visitors can look down the flight path to the Crash Site. Only the victims’ loved ones are permitted to walk through that gate to the boulder; the gate is unlocked for them every September 11th at 10:06 am, the time of impact. This information was provided to us by an extremely knowledgeable ranger, it was the most touching takeaway for Mister Rain from this extremely moving place. As I used my binoculars to see the boulder, I said a prayer, paying my respects to the courage of the crew and passengers on board Flight 93.
As you can see in the photos, the sky was perfection the day we visited the Flight 93 Memorial, identical to that of September 11, 2001. Many times when I see that bright blue blanketing me above, I think of that day. That same color calmly covering this “common field” was almost Disneyesque; how do they replicate that sky for this memorial every day? But it was not the work of an imagineer, for I had been here once before on a gray winter’s day. Both versions of the weather offer an appropriate backdrop, a skydrop, to this spot. In December the sadness reflected above, on this September day a beautiful skydrop for this sacred ground, a duplicate of a gorgeous morning that changed all who lived it forever.
The ranger, one of many beleaguered by my questions across the East Coast, told us a very upsetting fact which I share with you now, not for the purpose of shock value but because you should know, too. As the plane flew over the area where the Visitor Center now sits, it was upside down. I leave you with that, what more could I possibly say?
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