August 20, 2025 · 9:31 pm
Do you know that Key West has a memorial honoring the 9/11 New York firefighters who died on that tragic day? The memorial stands about 5′ tall upon an 8 pointed fireman’s cross full September 11-01 and FDNY reduce into it. This unimaginable shifting memorial is created from a chunk of metal recovered from the World Commerce Heart’s Twin Tower’s particles. Look shut and also you’ll truly see dents together with nuts & bolts imbedded into the metal as a consequence of excessive warmth and strain.
Have you ever ever questioned the place the time period ‘Firefighters’ got here from? Historical past lesson half#1: Through the Holy Crusades defenders of a walled metropolis had been struck by glass bombs containing a extremely flammable liquid. Once they turned saturated, the attackers would hurl a torch into their midst. Lots of had been burned alive; others risked their lives to save lots of their brothers-in-arms from dying painful, fiery deaths. These first heroic ‘Firefighters’ had been awarded a cross much like the one proven under! And now you realize the remainder of the story! 🙂
Historical past lesson half#2: The cross is eight-pointed and has the type of 4 “V”-shaped parts joined collectively at their suggestions, so that every arm has two factors. Its design relies on crosses used because the First Campaign and is a image of safety. It implies that the firefighter who wears this cross is prepared to put down his life for you simply because the crusaders sacrificed their lives for his or her fellow-man. For the reason that Knights lived on a tiny island within the Mediterranean Sea named Malta, the cross got here to be generally known as the Maltese Cross.
Historical past lesson half#3: Discover that memorial is damaged off at an angle on the high, this represents lives reduce quick… an unfinished life. Pictured under is an aviator’s grave stone with a damaged propeller symbolizing the identical that means of his life being reduce quick earlier than his time.
You possibly can come and pay your respects to this touching image of our Nation’s most horrific tragedy situated at 1600 N. Roosevelt Boulevard in entrance of the doorway to the Key West Fireplace Division fundamental workplace.