Florida’s Capital City had a number of 9-11 commemorations today. The one at the city’s newest fire station on Easterwood Drive included a survivor of the World Trade Center Attack.
Speakers at the Fire Station Sixteen ceremony included Tallahassee Mayor Andrew Gillum.
“Fourteen years ago our lives, many of our lives, the way we see ourselves, changed,” he told the crowd, made up mostly of the city and county’s first responders.
There was also a steel girder from the fallen World Trade Center towers and a human survivor: Jim Mathieu was at his desk on the South Tower’s 54th floor when the first plane hit the North Tower. He called his escape a near miracle.
“Everything I did from getting that last subway to the last train was just pushing me home. I felt I had two obligations, to help anyone who needed help along the way, but most importantly to get home to my family.”
And Mathieu had a message on the fourteenth anniversary of the attacks.
“While never forgetting the terrible events of 9-11 and the attacks since then, whether they’re here on this soil or overseas, it’s an ongoing threat and something we have to deal with,” he said after the ceremony.