Las Vegas events honor victims, fallen heroes on 25th anniversary of 9/11

Devan Patel, Glenn Puit and Casey Harrison, Las Vegas Review-Journal on Sep 11, 2026

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LAS VEGAS — Twenty-five years after one of the most harrowing days in modern American history, several events in the Las Vegas Valley paid homage Friday to the first responders and thousands of people who were killed in the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.

A large crowd turned out for the annual Tolling of the Bells took place at 6:45 a.m. at Las Vegas Fire Station 5 at 1020 Hinson St., where a flag that once stood atop the World Trade Center was raised to half-staff.

Standing in front of a piece of steel recovered from the World Trade Center, Las Vegas Assistant Fire Chief Randall Wilbanks said the rusted steel reminds us all “to remember and honor the ultimate sacrifices made by the first responders on that tragic day.”

Firefighters carried out the ringing of a bell during the ceremony in sets of five to honor a longtime firefighter tradition of ringing a bell to let others know a firefighter had died.

“I came here last year, and I was really touched by how they did this, so I wanted to come back and just be a part of remembering,” said Glynis Morris, who was in New York on 9/11 and walked across the Manhattan Bridge to get to her home in Brooklyn that fateful day.

Morris has attended multiple remembrance anniversaries in New York at Ground Zero.

“It is super important not to ever forget what happened to us,” Morris said.

Tony Anzilotti was born and raised in the Bronx and is a retired police officer who attended Friday’s ceremony.

“I have to do something,” Anzilotti said. “I have to let my face be shown and my presence be known to show everyone I support our first responders.”

Attendee Artie Kaye expressed a similar sentiment, saying he showed up at the ceremony off West Charleston Boulevard “to remember what everyone went through.”

In another Las Vegas tradition, hundreds of students and Junior ROTC cadets will hold a memorial at 8:30 a.m. for Barbara Edwards, a 58-year-old teacher at Palo Verde High School who was aboard the American Airlines jet that hijackers steered into the Pentagon.

The Las Vegas Ten-13 Club will also host a remembrance for those who died on 9/11 at Police Memorial Park, located at 3250 Metro Academy Way.

Hundreds of Palo Verde High School students and dozens school staff and first responders met at an auxiliary athletic field on campus Friday morning for an annual ceremony honoring a former teacher who was aboard one of the airliners hijacked on 9/11.

Barbara Edwards was a German and French teacher at Palo Verde who was aboard American Airlines Flight 77, which crashed into the Pentagon on Sept. 11, 2001. Edwards, 58, was the only full-time Las Vegas resident who died in the terrorist attacks that killed nearly 3,000 people a quarter century ago.

The school’s tribute started just before 9 a.m. Palo Verde Junior ROTC cadets lowered and replaced a tattered American flag with a new one, a choir sang the Star Spangled Banner, and and a bagpipes player performed a rendition of Amazing Grace. The field was a few feet away from a memorial dedicated in Edwards’ memory in 2019.

After the new flag was raised, the old one was presented to Gail Fahy, a retired educator who led Palo Verde’s foreign language department and friend of Edwards’ who has been coming to the yearly ceremony for years.

Sept. 11 is an especially bittersweet day for Fahy, who’s birthday was Friday. Fahy said she’s planning to give the flag lowered during this year’s ceremony to someone who knew Edwards.

Fahy didn’t say if she had a particular person in mind.

“This flag means everything to me,” Fahy said. “Every year, I’ve given it to someone who knew her, and I think there are a few people left that I haven’t given it to, so that’s where it will go.”

Palo Verde senior and Junior ROTC Cadet Wing Commander Thadus Roberts III said during opening remarks the annual event is an important reminder of the sacrifices made by first responders and ordinary Americans who died in the attacks.

“This dedication ceremony is proper and fitting to ever remind us of the sacrifices made every day by our armed forces and by all Americans who put themselves in harm’s way to protect the freedoms we enjoy every day.”

Fahy said it is encouraging to see so many students still turn out for the yearly event.

Unlike for Fahy and others who lived through that day 25 years ago, 9/11 for most students at Palo Verde is just an event studied in history class.

“These kids really need to remember what happened,” Fahy said. “I’m at peace finally. It took a long time to calm down and not get so emotional every time we celebrate it (but) I think about her every day. She’s still alive in my book.”

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