On September 11, we remember the fallen and the heroes

On September 11, we remember the fallen and the heroes.

Tuesday, September 11, 2001, the world changed.

Two airplanes – American Flight 11 and United Flight 175 – were hijacked by terrorists and rammed into the World Trade Center, bringing both structures down and creating a huge gash in American existence, while a third plane, American Flight 77, rammed into the Pentagon.

A fourth plane, United Flight 93, was hijacked and nearly retaken by passengers before crashing outside Shanksville, Pennsylvania, which is recounted in the book Let’s Roll, co-written by the widow of one of the men who spearheaded the recovery-takeover attempt.

Nearly three thousand people – 2,996 in total – were killed, with more than six thousand others injured.

Former Poet Laureate Billy Collins, who has written several poems either narrated by or about dogs, penned “The Names” as a remembrance.

Search and rescue dogs played a large part in rescuing those trapped in the rubble, while other dogs identified casualties for later burial.

Jake the black Labrador, one of the search and rescue dogs, was onsite at Ground Zero for 17 days afterward.

The last living search and rescue dog to take part in the aftermath was a Golden Retriever named Bretagne (pronounced Brittany), who passed over the Rainbow Bridge from kidney failure on June 7, 2016 at the age of 16 (nearly 90 in dog years). Like Jake, Bretagne has her own page on Wikipedia, and also helped following Hurricane Katrina in 2005.

One of the people in the World Trade Center that day, who was able to escape and survive, was a blind man named Michael Hingson, who wrote a book with Susy Flory titled Thunder Dog, about his experience with his guide dog Roselle helping him get through the chaos of getting down 78 stories to ground level.

On September 11, 2019, 18 years later, many of the dogs of Instagram and Twitter have joined in posting remembrance tributes, but like the 2husketeers here, they also reminded us that pleasanter times are to be savored as well.

CoyoteVest joined in the tributes as well.

Hug your dog for us today. All their love is especially necessary today.

Thank you to all the humans and dogs who played a role in the recovery efforts and aftermath.