Remembering 9/11 Victims From Scotch Plains 20 Years Later

SCOTCH PLAINS, NJ — Anyone older than 25 in Scotch Plains likely remembers where they were on 9/11.

Americans felt a collective trauma as first one and then another plane flew into the twin towers of the World Trade Center in New York City on Sept. 11, 2001. As the truth dawned on people watching from their TVs that America was under attack, another plane took aim at the Pentagon. A fourth was brought down in a field in Pennsylvania in a final act of heroism by passengers who realized their flight had been hijacked.

Nearly 3,000 Americans, including two from Scotch Plains, were killed in the suicide attacks carried out by 19 militants associated with the Islamic extremist group al-Qaida.

On the 20th anniversary of the attacks, our state remembers and mourns:

List all victims from your state, including their hometowns, and whether they died at the World Trade Center, on Flight 93, or at the Pentagon.

• Mark "Mickey" Rothenberg, Scotch Plains, United Airlines 93
• James Walsh, Scotch Plains, World Trade Center

Mark Rothenberg, 52 - Owner of MDR Global Resources, Rothenberg, 52, was aboard United Airlines Flight 93 when it was hijacked and later crashed in Pennsylvania, according to Legacy.

James Walsh, 37 - A computer programmer for Cantor Fitzgerald, Walsh, 37, passed away on his daughter Caroline’s second birthday on Sept. 11. Walsh was known by family and friends as a genuinely great guy becuase of his warm and fun personality. He is survived by his wife Kate and his daughter, according to Legacy.

All 9/11 victims will be remembered at memorial services planned across the nation on Sept. 11 to mark the 20th anniversary of the attacks.

Scotch Plains will host a 9/11 Memorial Ceremony on Saturday at 9 a.m. at Alan M. Augustine Village Green, 430 Park Avenue, Scotch Plains.

The Union County Board of County Commissioners invites members of the public to attend a special ceremony to honor the memory of the 60 Union County residents killed in the attacks of September 11, 2001. The ceremony will be held at the Union County September 11th Memorial in Echo Lake Park, in Mountainside, beginning at 11 a.m. on Saturday.

At the FanJam concert, at 11:45 a.m. on Saturday, a ceremony to remember 9/11 and honoring first responders will take place in front of the main stage. Shiloh Verrica will start by singing the Star-Spangled Banner. Immediately following the National Anthem, the Union County Sheriff’s Office Honor Guard will perform the Presentation of Colors to commemorate the 20th Anniversary of the September 11th attacks. Shiloh will then launch the musical portion of Fan Jam with her acoustic performance of “Some Gave All” by Billy Ray Cyrus.

At the 9/11 memorial in Lower Manhattan, New York — an area known for years after the attacks as “Ground Zero” — the names of the fallen will be read aloud.

“Throughout the ceremony, we will observe six moments of silence, acknowledging when each of the World Trade Center towers was struck and fell and the times corresponding to the attack on the Pentagon and the crash of Flight 93,” the 9/11 Memorial & Museum wrote on its website.

The annual “Tribute of Light,” which are lights pointed to the sky in the shape of the Twin Towers, will go on that night.

Most 9/11 victims were from either New York or New Jersey, where many who lived across the Hudson River from the World Trade Center recall the horror of watching the twin towers collapse from their homes in Hoboken and Jersey City.

More than 2,700 people died at the World Trade Center alone on 9/11, including the passengers of American Airlines Flight 11 and United Airlines Flight 175. Another 184 were killed when American Airlines Flight 77 crashed into The Pentagon in Washington, D.C., and 44 died on United Airlines Flight 93 near Shanksville, Pennsylvania.