⚫A new drone display honoring the 2,977 victims joined NYC’s 9/11 commemoration
⚫NJ communities will hold ceremonies Friday, with some events moving to Saturday
⚫ A new moment of silence honors people who have died from 9/11-related illnesses
Friday marks the 25th anniversary of the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center, the Pentagon and a plane that went down in western Pennsylvania, as a new light display joins the commemoration in New York.
A drone show called 2,977 Lights Over New York Harbor takes its name from the number of victims on September 11, 2001. Presented by Sky Elements Drone Shows, it outlines the twin towers in a moving display.
The drone show flew Wednesday night during a practice lighting of the Tribute in Light, making for a breathtaking display.
The drone lights were launched from a helix to create a full-scale display of the towers. The helix is similar to the unbuilt design for the World Cultural Center proposed for the World Trade Center site.
“Shaped by the voices of the 9/11 family, survivor, and responder community, the project aims to hold witness to individual lives. As 9/11 family member Terry Strada noted, ‘To illuminate the sky is to remind a new generation not only of all we lost, but of who we became in the aftermath, one nation united in grief, in love, and in resolve, rising together from the ashes,'” Sky Elements said.
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New Jersey communities prepare to remember 9/11
A number of New Jersey towns will commemorate the occasion with ceremonies on Friday that mirror the timeline of events. Some will wait until Saturday to accommodate the Jewish holiday Rosh Hashanah.
Hunterdon County commemorates the day with a new memorial on Hilltop Reserve in Raritan Township. Many people went there on the day of the attacks to see the smoke from the World Trade Center billowing into the air for several days, according to Sheriff Fred Brown.
Fifteen county residents died in the attack, according to Brown, who was the police chief in Raritan Township at the time. The county put in some benches, a small pavilion and a flagpole at the site.
“It’s not an active recreation park. It’s a quiet meditation park where someone can think about what happened and remember,” Brown told Erin Vogt on Thursday’s Jersey Thing. “That’s the most important thing is to let young people what happened and how America was attacked.”
Brown remembers how the country came together in the days after the attacks and hopes the park can play a small part in bringing the country together again in a similar way.
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The toll of 9/11 continues 25 years later
At the National September 11 Memorial & Museum ceremony, a seventh moment of silence was added to permanently honor those who have died from 9/11-related illnesses. Many of them are first responders and construction workers who spent months cleaning up the rubble from the collapsed towers.
It will be observed after the reading of all the names of the victims.
“As the years pass and the human toll grows, we reckon with the cost of September 11th whenever another New Yorker is stolen from us too soon,” Mayor Zohran Mamdani said this week. “Now, close to 25 years later, more people have died from 9/11-related illnesses than were killed on the day itself.”
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2026 9/11 Commemorations in New Jersey (listed alphabetically)
Friday, September 11, 2026 will mark the 25th anniversary of the tragic events in 2001 when planes struck the World Trade Center in Manhattan, the Pentagon in Washington and a field in Pennsylvania. Most ceremonies are scheduled for 9/11 but some take place on other days. Please let us know about your event with an email to dan.alexander@townsquaremedia.com.
Gallery Credit: Dan Alexander
