This week marks the twenty third anniversary of the September 11, 2001, terrorist attack on the United States. I was 27 on Tuesday, September 11, 2001; a few months earlier I had just begun my first term as mayor of North Carrollton and President George W. Bush was in his first term. On that morning, I was leaving for city hall and on the television both towers of the World Trade Center were on fire, smoke billowing from the gashes left by the two airplanes which had crashed into them minutes before. I realized we were under attack. I remember President Bush was reading to students in Florida when his chief of staff informed him of the attack. When I got to city hall that day, the fax machine was bombarded with information for cities and towns on the attack and it came with an uncertainty of what would happen next that day and throughout the day’s ahead. The September 11 terrorist attacks were a major turning point in Bush's presidency.
There were four coordinated Islamist suicide terrorist attacks carried out by al-Qaeda against the United States on that September day. That morning, 19 terrorists hijacked four commercial airliners scheduled to travel from the New England and Mid-Atlantic regions of the East Coast to California. The hijackers crashed the first two planes into the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center and the next two flights toward targets in or near Washington D.C., in an attack on the nation's capital. The third succeeded in crashing into the Pentagon, the headquarters of the United States Department of Defense in Arlington County, Virginia, while the fourth plane crashed in rural Pennsylvania following a passenger revolt. The attacks killed nearly 3,000 people and instigated the multi-decade global war on terror.
We will always think about that day and how in a moment things can change. This past Wednesday was the twenty third anniversary of 9/11 here in 2024. As we remember and honor those we lost, we have emerged stronger and will never forget the service and sacrifice.
Ken Strachan serves as the mayor of North Carrollton and is a member of the Mississippi Municipal League board of directors
