United in Memory

Photo By Chief Petty Officer John Grandin | September 11, 2021 commemoration graphic  

UNITED STATES

09.11.2021

Story by BUMED PAO 

U.S. Navy Bureau of Medicine and Surgery

This Saturday we mark the twentieth anniversary of the attacks on September 11, an event that forever changed our world. Twenty years later, this is a day of remembrance – a day that we take pause and reflect on the lives lost at the World Trade Center, the Pentagon, and aboard Flight 93 that crashed in Shanksville, Pennsylvania.

Much like generations before us remembered where they were the moment they heard about the attack on Pearl Harbor or when President Kennedy was assassinated, we remember September 11th. If you were alive on that day there is no denying you still remember where you were when you heard the news.

Twenty years ago, I was in my last year of residency at the Naval Postgraduate Dental School, at what was then the National Naval Medical Center Bethesda, Md. I remember standing alongside my colleagues that Tuesday morning glued to the television watching the news of a plane crashing into the North Tower of the Trade Center. In that instance we did not know the cause or its long-term ramifications.

Within minutes all that changed as we watched in horror as the second plane tore through the South Tower live on television. This was followed by news that the Pentagon had been hit and that a fourth plane had been hijacked and was on its way to Washington, DC. Bethesda went into THREATCON Delta and they locked down the base. When they allowed us to leave that evening I recall driving home, looking at the other drivers and it seemed that everyone was in a fog of disbelief. Had this cataclysmic event truly taken place? Were there more attacks coming? How would the United States respond?

All of us in the residency program recognized there would be consequences impacting our careers. Over the ensuing years all of us would deploy in support of the Global War on Terror. With these deployments, that fateful day would grow in meaning.

Before completing my residency, one of my patients – who had worked as an aide to the Secretary of Defense on 9/11 – gave me a framed piece of the Pentagon with a coin containing the words, “United in Memory.” This artifact has remained with me my entire career. I have taken it on deployments to Djibouti and Afghanistan. It has – and remains – a constant reminder of the attacks on September 11th, as well as the brave men and women who answered their Nation’s call and went into harm’s way in Afghanistan, Iraq and in contingency operations around the globe.

As we continue to mourn the tremendous loss of life on that day – and the wars that followed – let us remain united in memory. Let us never forget their sacrifice and the families they left behind. As we honor the victims, let us never take for granted being alive today and the heavy cost of our freedom.

With Great Respect,

DSG

Gayle D. Shaffer, DMD
RADM DC USN
Deputy Surgeon General, U.S. Navy
Deputy Chief, U.S. Navy Bureau of Medicine and Surgery

• Date Taken: 09.11.2021
• Date Posted: 09.16.2021 14:11
• Story ID: 405178
• Location: US