Americans marked the 25th anniversary of the September 11 attacks on Friday with solemn ceremonies honouring the nearly 3,000 people killed when hijacked planes crashed into the World Trade Center, the Pentagon and a field in Pennsylvania.
In New York, victims’ relatives, many carrying photographs of their loved ones, gathered at Ground Zero alongside Vice President JD Vance and four former US presidents.
The ceremony began at 8.46am ET (12.46pm GMT), with a moment of silence marking the time American Airlines Flight 11 struck the World Trade Center’s North Tower in what became the deadliest attack on US soil.
Family members then read out the names of all 2,977 people killed in the September 11 attacks, along with the six victims of the 1993 World Trade Center bombing. The reading lasted around four hours.
Some of those taking part were children who were not yet born when their relatives were killed in 2001, underscoring the passing of a generation since the attacks.
Additional moments of silence were held to mark the crashes of the other three hijacked planes and the collapse of the Twin Towers. For the first time, another moment of silence was also observed for the thousands of people who have died from illnesses linked to exposure to toxic dust following the attacks.
Gregory Carafello attended the ceremony to remember his lifelong friend James Martello, who worked for financial firm Cantor Fitzgerald, which lost more than 650 employees on September 11. Carafello was on the 18th floor of the South Tower but managed to escape.
“Everyone should realise that it was a very bad, catastrophic day for many families,” he said. “These were not warriors. These were people like you and me going to work.”
At the Pentagon in Arlington, Virginia, where American Airlines Flight 77 crashed into the building’s western side, killing 184 people, President Donald Trump recalled several of the victims aboard the plane.
He spoke of a woman who was pregnant with her first child, a family of four travelling to Australia and three sixth-graders who were on a school field trip.
Trump and Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth also used their speeches to defend the US war in Iran, arguing that military action was necessary to prevent Tehran from obtaining nuclear weapons.
“We salute our first responders and law enforcement, and we love them,” Trump said. “And we salute the service members working right now to ensure the world’s number one sponsor of terror, the Islamic Republic of Iran, will never ever have a nuclear weapon.”
Meanwhile, mourners gathered in Shanksville, Pennsylvania, at the site where passengers fought back against hijackers aboard United Airlines Flight 93. The aircraft crashed into a field after being hijacked while en route to Washington.
The September 11 attacks have shaped generations of Americans, influencing US foreign policy, domestic politics and public attitudes towards national security.
For those directly affected — including victims’ families, first responders and rescue workers — the anniversary remains a deeply personal remembrance of the lives lost and the suffering that followed.
Caroline Ogonowski’s father, John, was the captain of Flight 11, which departed Boston 47 minutes before crashing into the North Tower.
Ogonowski, now 39, welcomed her first child this year and named him after her father. She brought her son to her father’s grave the previous week and attended a memorial ceremony in Boston on Friday.
“This year, there’s this new sadness in knowing that they won’t ever get to know each other,” Ogonowski said. “My father will never know his grandson. And my son will never know his grandfather.”
She said future generations should continue learning about the attacks and the people who died, adding that the country had come together and become stronger in their aftermath.
A generation has now grown up since 2001 without memories of the attacks, although their consequences continue to shape American life.
The attacks triggered the so-called “war on terror”, leading to prolonged US military interventions in Afghanistan and Iraq. The public backlash against those wars later contributed to the political rise of Trump, whose pledge to avoid new foreign entanglements has since been tested by the Iran war.
In the immediate aftermath of September 11, Americans displayed widespread solidarity and patriotism alongside profound grief.
However, Muslim Americans and immigrants from Muslim-majority countries also faced increased prejudice and hate crimes. Public opinion surveys have found that the attacks continue to influence American perceptions of Muslims.
New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani, the city’s first Muslim mayor, faced calls from some Republicans to skip Friday’s ceremony but rejected them.
The death toll linked to September 11 has also continued to grow. Rescue workers who spent weeks or months at Ground Zero, as well as nearby residents and others exposed to toxic substances, later developed illnesses linked to the disaster.
The New York City Fire Department lost 343 members on the day of the attacks. Since then, more than 600 additional firefighters, including retired members who took part in rescue operations, have died from 9/11-related illnesses, according to department figures.
Twenty-six of those deaths have occurred this year alone.
