Flight 93 National Memorial

         The following post was written after returning home from attending the Flight 93 National Memorial the day that it was dedicated and first opened to the public on September 11th, 2011.


         Former Presidents George Bush and Bill Clinton were gone by the time my wife and I arrived at the Flight 93 National Memorial in Shanksville, Pennsylvania. The ceremonies were concluding and the families of the heroes from Flight 93 walked from the memorial wall down to the path where Flight 93 made impact. As they were departing the memorial they walked through the midst of the crowd of roughly 4,000 people to gentle, sustained, respectful and heartfelt applause. Part of the crowd then spontaneously and softly started singing  America The Beautiful.  
         Flight 93 National Memorial Park is roughly 15-20 minutes off of the Somerset exit of the Pennsylvania Turnpike. I didn't need to hear the words from the speakers on the dais, moving as I'm sure they were, for I just wanted to be in the spot, or as close to it, to where this remarkable group of people struck back at terrorism before the terrorist's day of infamy was even over, something very similar to those pilots who got off of the ground at Pearl Harbor before Tojo's planes could leave the islands. What happened on that flight, and the aftermath of it, could never have been envisioned by the terrorist minds involved.
          As the crowds were waiting in long lines for buses to take them back to the parking areas, I had the bright idea of walking up and over the field then meeting back up to the road, and then back to Route 30 where our car was parked along the berm with many others. A couple miles into the forced march back I had regretted subjecting my wife to this trek and we still had a couple of miles to go! The line-up of departing automobiles moved at a snail's pace and at times we walked faster than they inched along,  As one vehicle with two men inside came up beside us the driver asked if we wanted a ride. I'm the type that if I was stranded on a deserted island and a cruise ship spotted me and tried to rescue me I would say, "Only if I can work for my fare," but I looked over at my wife and then said "thank-you very much."
         The driver offered us a fruit drink which was a great relief to us and we asked these two men a few questions on where they were from and why they had come. Well, they were two of the four children of Flight 93 passenger Joseph Driscoll who perished on that site and whose widow and many other family members were in other vehicles. I realized that they were probably emotionally spent and tired themselves but I did ask some questions about that fateful day and they very politely answered. One of these two sons of Joseph Driscoll had been working in the World Trade Center only the day before the attacks and he vividly described the scene on the New York City streets as his father was still aboard Flight 93. How typical of all that I had heard of these families of the Flight 93 heroes, that they reached out to help others after they themselves were hurt, and here they were doing it again on this special day.