9/11, 23 years later: The grief remains, and the families of the victims fear that the significance of the date will disappear from public memory

“Not a day,” wrote the poet Virgil in the words emblazoned on the wall of a 9/11 memorial and museum, will erase the victims of the attacks “from the memory of time.”

But on the 23rd anniversary of the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, the families who gather year after year in Lower Manhattan for the annual remembrance ceremony are grappling not only with the grief of the loved ones they have lost, but also with the fear that the significance of this day will fade from public memory.

On Wednesday morning, grieving families held photos of their loved ones at the National 9/11 Memorial and Museum as bells rang to mark key moments of the attack, beginning at 8:46 a.m. when the hijacked American Airlines Flight 11 struck the World Trade Center. Bells then rang as the South Tower and Pentagon were struck, the Twin Towers collapsed and the hijacked United Airlines Flight 93 crashed in Pennsylvania.

After all these years, relatives gathered for the memorial service on Wednesday told the New York Metro they fear future generations may forget the impact of the catastrophic attacks on the country and millions of people.

“It's not just about 9/11. I live every day in pain and with the emptiness of my brother in my heart,” said Anthoula Katsimatides, who lost her brother John Katsimatides that morning. “There seems to be a new wave of people that weren't there 20 years ago, and that's scary. This was the largest terrorist attack on U.S. soil that has ever taken place in this country. It's not something that happened anywhere else. It happened here, and we are in the place where thousands of people lost their lives. If we don't educate people, we are doomed to have history repeat itself.”

Katsimatides remembers her brother as a bright-eyed, spirited and funny 31-year-old bond broker who worked on the 104th floor for Cantor Fitzgerald; he was one of more than 600 Cantor Fitzgerald employees killed in the attack.

The vibrancy of his personality gave her comfort and hope that he would return home on that terrible morning of September 11. For a month she kept hoping, but he never came home. One day he was simply gone.

“I knew he would come home – I had no doubt about that. I remember crying and falling to my knees when the towers fell because I was crying for my city. I was crying for all the people who were killed that day and still had hope that he would return. I think I held that hope for a month. We never got anything,” said a tearful Katsimatides, speaking out about the importance of the annual commemoration.

“It is important to hear the names of our loved ones because it makes it clear to people around the world who are following this event that these were real people. This is where they lost their lives. This is where they released their souls,” she added.

Magaly Lemagne also stressed the importance of the phrase “never forget”. She mourns the loss of her brother, port official David Lemagne, who died in the terrorist attacks of September 11 after making the ultimate sacrifice to save others.

David Lemagne, 27, had only been on the job for nine months when he watched the first plane hit the North Tower from Exchange Place in Jersey City. He was also a medic with experience from the first World Trade Center bombing in 1993. He defied orders to be deployed to Liberty State Park and instead ran headlong into the Twin Towers, where he lost his life.

“He said, 'I know what I'm doing. I have to go there.' So he came here in a car with someone else, and we got pictures where… I think we got them two years later… of him rescuing someone. But when the second tower collapsed, he died,” Lemagne said. “When we got that picture, he wasn't afraid. He was doing his job. He was carrying a woman, and they used a door as a makeshift stretcher.”

Lemagne made sure to bring her 13-year-old son to the memorial service and said that he was named after his uncle.

“He did what he loved and that was saving people,” Lemagne said. “He made a sacrifice that day, so I will always be here on 9/11.”

President Joe Biden and the two candidates seeking to succeed him in the November election – Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump – attended the ceremony on Wednesday, along with the families of the September 11 victims.

Former Mayor Mike Bloomberg, who now chairs the board of the 9/11 Memorial and Museum, and Rudy Giuliani, who took office during the 9/11 attacks, stood alongside Biden, Harris, Trump and other dignitaries at the start of the ceremony.

Mayor Eric Adams, who tested positive for COVID-19 earlier this week, laid a memorial wreath in front of Gracie Mansion, his official residence.