Las Vegas, NV (KXNT) - A pair of remembrance events will be held Saturday morning in tribute to all those who lost their lives Sept. 11, 2001, in the World Trade Center attack.
A longtime tradition in the fire service known as the “Tolling of the Bells” will be a part of one of them.
At 6:45 a.m., (the approximate time of the South Tower collapse at the World Trade Center) a bell will toll in front of Las Vegas Fire Station Five. The tribute will be transmitted over the Las Vegas Fire & Rescue's communications channel and on the Las Vegas Fire and Rescue Facebook page in remembrance of all those who lost their lives that day.
The ringing of the bell is a longtime tradition of the fire service known as the “tolling of the bells.” Many years before radio communications existed in the fire service, communication was done via fire alarm boxes on street corners that were assigned a “box number” much like an address. Firefighters had to memorize the box numbers and their locations. When a person pulled a fire alarm, the signal would go to all the fire stations by wire and ring the bell in the stations. The bell would ring the number issued to that box and firefighters would respond. Fire dispatch would also have designated ringing of the bells to alert department members of certain events.
If a firefighter was killed in the line of duty, fire dispatch would ring the bell in sets of five, three times. This would let everyone on the department know that a firefighter had just lost his or her life in the line of duty.
In addition, to the ringing of the bells, a special United States flag that once flew over the World Trade Center will be hoisted to half-staff on the flagpole in front of Fire Station Five. On display in front of the station is a piece of steel from the World Trade Center. The city of New York has requested that the special flag be flown over the piece of steel at half-staff Sept. 11 each year. It has been done every year since the city received the flag in 2004.
The tribute can be watched live on the LVFR Facebook page: www.facebook.com/LasVegasFD
Meanwhile, The city of Las Vegas and the Las Vegas Ten-13 Club will host a Sept. 11 remembrance event at Police Memorial Park on Saturday at 11 a.m. The park is located at 3250 Metro Academy Way and includes a tree grove and memorials to pay tribute to fallen law enforcement officers in our community.
The Las Vegas Ten-13 Club is comprised of retired New York City police officers and retired law enforcement officers from other police agencies. The group has hosted a remembrance event every year since 2001.
The ceremony will conclude with the planting of a sapling that began as seedling from a pear tree that survived the collapse of the World Trade Center Towers.
Las Vegas was given two seedlings from the original Callery pear tree that is now at the National September 11 Memorial & Museum site in New York. In addition to the tree being planted at Police Memorial Park on Saturday, the second seedling was planted at Fire Station 5.