20 Years Later: 9/11 Remembered | Nevada Week

Nevada Week | 20 Years Later:  9/11 Remembered      

SEASON 4: EPISODE 9 | Airdate: 9/10/2021

Twenty years ago, the unthinkable happened. Hijackers took over four commercial airplanes, flying two into the twin towers of the World Trade Center in New York City, one into the Pentagon in Washington, D.C., and the other crashed in a field in Pennsylvania when passengers fought the hijackers, bringing it down rather than having it used as another weapon. 

The attacks of September 11, 2001, profoundly changed America. For those who were in New York City at the time, the attacks are never far from their minds.

Members of the Ten-13 Club in Las Vegas, a club for retired New York City police officers, talked to Nevada Week about their experiences on 9/11. Charlie Licata and his lifelong friend Gene Vitale retired from the force in 1988. They were together that morning. They were supposed to be going to the cemetery to pay respects to Licata’s father, whose birthday is Sept. 11. 

“I walked to my bedroom window because from where I lived I could look across Jamaica Bay and see the twin towers and all of the sudden I said the south tower just exploded,” Licata recalled, “The second plane hit and then we realized we were under attack.”

Vitale remembers seeing the explosion as he drove to Licata’s house. At first, he was reminded of an accident years before where two planes collided mid-air, but when he got to Licata’s house and spoke to him about what he had seen, he knew something more serious had happened.

“We called One PP, which is One Police Plaza, and we wanted to come down to help and they told us, ‘No, you stay where you are. We have a lot of help here.’ We were crying. How could this happen? In the greatest city in the world?” Vitale remembers, “Me and Charlie said, ‘We gotta do something,’ but unfortunately we couldn’t. So we went to church and we prayed. We went to church.

Bill Swierupski was still on the force at the 105th Precinct. He remembers hearing about the attacks on the radio as he was ordering breakfast from a deli. He raced to the precinct to help but was told by his supervisor that he needed to stay there to help coordinate the response there.

“We had TV’s going in the precinct and I saw the towers come down, and I just said to the one police administrative aid, ‘We just lost 20,000 people.’ We didn’t know they had evacuated that many. They were lucky,” Swierupski said.

Ed Johnson had already retired to Southern Nevada when the attacks happened. He first heard from one of his sisters, who worked across the street from the World Trade Center. 

“She said, ‘A plane just hit the trade center,’” Johnson said, “She said that they’re locking them in. I said, ‘Just relax,’ follow the instructions, police security, she said, ‘Okay.’ She hung up. About 15 minutes later, she called again and she said, ‘A second plane hit the building,’ and at that time, I saw it on the news. And I told her, ‘Get the hell out of the building, just get out!’”

Johnson remembers feeling helpless in Las Vegas as loved ones rushed to safety and former colleagues raced to Ground Zero. He had previously worked on the investigation into the first bombing of the World Trade Center in 1993.

“After the investigation, we kind of brainstormed and said how do we protect and guard against this again because we knew they were coming back,” he said.

Dave Casano was working for the Surface Transportation Enforcement District of the NYPD. He recalls visiting what was known as ‘the pile,’ the debris from the buildings where rescue efforts quickly turned to recovery.

“The awful smells. Which the smell of death and a lot of other things in the air that you just never forget,” Casano said, “The visions of beams that held up the buildings still smoldering being pulled out and they had to hose them down.”

Casano would escort the trucks moving the large beams that once held up the 110 story buildings to the barges that would take them to Staten Island. 

The work in Ground Zero has had a lasting impact on the health of the people who worked there, Casano said.

“Every one of us knows of several who have gotten ill and passed away from the effects afterward,” he said, “Sometimes years later and a lot of the times it was from these malignancies that you seldom hear of.”

Now, 20 years after the tragedy, Licata said the men and women of the Ten-13 Club of Las Vegas have not forgotten.

“We lost over 3,000 people that day,” he said, “Those people have to stay in your mind forever. You can’t say, it happened that’s it cased closed. No, as far as we’re concerned at Ten-13 it happened yesterday. We’re not going to forget and we’re going to remind everybody of that day.”

Las Vegas suffered its own tragedy in 2017 when a gunman open fired on the Route 91 Harvest Festival on the Las Vegas Strip. Fifty-eight people died that night and two more people who were wounded have died from their injuries since then. It was the worst mass shooting in modern American history.

Because of that, Las Vegas received two saplings from what is known as the Survivor Tree. It is a pear tree that was found under the rubble of the twin towers about a month after 9/11. The New York City Parks Department nursed the tree back to health, and now, it stands at the memorial at Ground Zero.

Maggie Allred was instrumental in getting the tree to Las Vegas. Her brother-in-law takes care of the seedlings from the original tree through his tree business in Connecticut.

“We’ve visited it over the years, and sadly, we’ve heard of all the places where they’ve sent it to Paris, San Bernardino, Florida, all around the country, and I was saddened when I had to call him to say, ‘we need a seedling in Las Vegas,’” she said.

The trees arrived two years ago and were cared for by the urban foresters at the City of Las Vegas.

“We’ve planted a lot of trees but this one has special significance to us in the community and so yeah, it’s a little bit more nerve-wracking caring for the tree,” said Brad Daseler, an urban forester with the city.

The first tree was planted at Las Vegas Fire and Rescue Station 5. The second was planted at the Police Memorial Park, where the Ten-13 Club has created a memorial for those lost on 9/11. It is also home to the memorials for Nevada law enforcement officers who have been killed in the line of duty.

“I think it is a symbol of hope. It is something that survived a terrible tragedy and now it’s here, standing proud and beautiful,” Daseler said.

Dates and anniversaries of tragic events can trigger anxiety and even fear and panic in people who have experienced trauma, said Dan Ficarola, a counselor with Bridge Counseling.

Bridge Counseling has been part of the Vegas Strong Resiliency Center’s team of trauma therapists. 

Ficarola said it is important for people who have experienced trauma to know what kinds of things might trigger a response and avoid those images or experiences. He also said it is vital for people to stick with healthy coping mechanisms when they are coming up on an anniversary that might spark an emotional response. 

He also suggests people who have loved ones that might be traumatized by the 9/11 anniversary, or the upcoming 1 October anniversary, to pay attention to warning signs like withdrawal, avoidance, or the use of negative coping mechanisms like drugs or alcohol.

Ficarola suggests reaching out to a professional if those feelings of fear and anxiety become overwhelming.

Guests

• Dan Ficalora, Counselor, Bridge Counseling 

Resources

• Bridge Counseling
• Vegas Strong Resiliency Center
• Las Vegas Ten-13 Club