NAMPA, Idaho — Twenty-five years after the September 11th attacks, a piece of the World Trade Center remains on display at Nampa Fire Station One.
Nampa Fire Protection District Deputy Chief Nick Adams said the department applied for the piece in the years following the attacks. As part of the application, the department agreed to keep it on display and available for the public to see.
On the 25th anniversary, Nampa neighbor Loni MacDonald brought her sons to the station and explained why she wanted them to understand what happened on September 11, 2001.
WATCH: See how a piece of the World Trade Center is helping preserve the history of September 11th in Nampa
“There have not been many times in history where we have actually been attacked on American soil, Pearl Harbor, and this,” MacDonald said. “We’re a great country, but we’re not an invincible country.”
In Caldwell, Elevate Academy organized a 9/11 remembrance at Indian Creek Plaza. There, retired NYPD officer Brian Bartley shared his firsthand memories of the attacks.
Bartley was only weeks into the police academy when he heard a plane fly overhead in what he said should have been restricted airspace.
“Hearing that first plane come over was definitely strange,” Bartley said. “It would be a no-fly zone, but you didn’t think that it was going to be something as big as what it was.”
Minutes later, Bartley said they learned a plane had struck the World Trade Center. After the second plane hit, he realized the situation was much larger than they initially thought.
Bartley later worked at Ground Zero in the weeks following the attacks. He said the smoke, ash and debris are among the details he still remembers 25 years later.
“I think that’s the thing that I remember the most is the smell and you can actually taste the smoke,” Bartley said.
Members of the public can ask to see Nampa Fire’s World Trade Center piece and small museum by ringing the buzzer at Fire Station One when crews are available.
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