Twenty-five years after the September 11 attacks, families gathered at Ground Zero on Friday morning to read the names of the 2,983 people killed on that day and in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing, while parallel ceremonies at the Pentagon and in Shanksville, Pennsylvania, marked the milestone anniversary with wreaths, bells and moments of silence.
At the National September 11 Memorial in Lower Manhattan, the program began at 8:30 a.m. with family members taking turns at the podium on the Memorial plaza, a tradition organizers have kept since the first anniversary. The first moment of silence fell at 8:46 a.m., the moment American Airlines Flight 11 struck the North Tower. Six more silences followed through the morning, marking the second plane’s impact, the collapse of each tower, the attack on the Pentagon and the crash of United Flight 93 in a Shanksville field. For the first time in the ceremony’s history, organizers added a seventh silence dedicated specifically to first responders, recovery workers, survivors and residents who have died in the years since from cancers and respiratory illnesses tied to the toxic dust at the site. The 9/11 Memorial has banned political speeches from the plaza since 2012, and this year was no exception: elected officials attended, but the reading of names stayed the center of the program.
Vice President JD Vance represented the administration at the World Trade Center ceremony. President Trump chose instead to mark the day at the Pentagon, where the Army hosted its own observance beginning at 9 a.m. That ceremony, held on the grounds where American Airlines Flight 77 struck the building, is not open to the public but draws Defense Department leadership and Pentagon survivors and families each year. Ahead of this year’s observance, the National Park Service announced it would designate the Pentagon memorial as an “Affiliated Area of the National Park System,” a status that formalizes federal support for the site’s upkeep without transferring full ownership from the Defense Department.
In Shanksville, the Flight 93 National Memorial held its own morning program starting at 8:30 a.m., with a reading of the 40 victims’ names, a musical performance and the ringing of the Bells of Remembrance. Wreaths were laid near the visitor center at the times corresponding to each stage of the day’s attacks. In the afternoon, a separate ceremony at 1 p.m. featured keynote remarks, including from Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro, more music and a wreath-laying at the Wall of Names, the black granite panels engraved with the names of the passengers and crew who died fighting to retake the plane from its hijackers.
The 25th anniversary lands at a point when 9/11 is no longer living memory for a large share of the country. More than a third of Americans alive today were born after the attacks. That shift shows up at the memorial itself: this year’s lottery for a chance to read a victim’s name closed August 2, and many of the names are now read by grandchildren, nieces and nephews who never met the relatives they are honoring, alongside spouses and siblings who lived through that morning firsthand.
The anniversary also arrives alongside a broader accounting of the health toll from the attacks. Federal health officials and advocacy groups have long tracked illnesses tied to exposure to the dust cloud that settled over Lower Manhattan after the towers fell, and the addition of a dedicated moment of silence this year reflects how firmly that toll is now woven into how the day is remembered, not as a coda to the attacks but as part of their ongoing cost.
Sources: National September 11 Memorial & Museum, 25th Anniversary Commemoration · CNN, “Trump to mark the 25th anniversary of Sept. 11 at the Pentagon, forgoing a visit to ground zero” · CBS News Pittsburgh, “How the Flight 93 National Memorial will commemorate 25 years since the 9/11 attacks” · PBS NewsHour, “How to watch 9/11 memorial events as U.S. marks 25th anniversary”
