September 11 is a day of personal tragedy for Roman, a Russian native of New York. He lost his daughter during the attacks on the Twin Towers.
"It was a normal working day. I was sitting in the office and my wife called. She said that our daughter did not call at the usual time and it worried her. She called her every day," he told Sputnik.
Roman quickly found out what happened, as he was working not far from the Twin Towers. When he looked out the window, the blood froze in his veins.
"I ran, went in the direction of Manhattan, I called my wife, I called my daughter. I continued to walked there and prayed to God that she was not there," he recalled.
But police did not let him enter the area.
"I just sat down, people walked by, gave me water. I was sure that no one would come out of there. Yet, I hoped that my daughter had time to escape, maybe she was on the lower floors," he said.
He and his wife searched hospitals to find their daughter but their attempts were in vain. They never found her.
Together with Russian-speaking New Yorkers who lost their loved ones in the tragedy, he became a part of the September 11 family. He and his wife planted a weeping willow in Asser Levy Park to pay tribute to their daughter.
10 September 2021, 06:15 GMT
In 2011, on the tenth anniversary of the tragedy, the authorities founded the National September 11 Memorial and Museum at the site of the destroyed Twin Towers in New York. The memorial is a park with more than 400 white oak trees that surround two pools with waterfalls. The names of almost 3,000 victims of the attacks are inscribed on bronze parapets surrounding the twin Memorial pools.
In 2002, September 11 was dubbed Patriot Day in the United States. Since 2009, following the approval of Act 111-13 of US General Law, this date has been referred to as the National Day of Service and Remembrance.