9/11 commemoration held in open plaza

Former New York City Mayor Rudolph Giuliani stands at the edge of the North Pool during memorial observances on the 13th anniversary of the Sept. 11 terror attacks on the World Trade Center in New York.

NEW YORK (AP) — With the solemn toll of a bell and a moment of silence, the nation paused Thursday to mark the 13th anniversary of the Sept. 11 terror attack at the hallowed site that has been transformed into a bustling plaza.

Family and friends of those who died read the names of the nearly 3,000 people killed in New York, at the Pentagon and near Shanksville, Pennsylvania.

Thelma Stuart, whose husband, Walwyn Wellington Stuart Jr., 28, was a Port Authority Police Department officer, said the nation should pray for its leaders, “that God will grant them wisdom, knowledge and understanding on directing them on moving forward.”

The sad roll call paused only four times: to mark the times when the first plane struck the World Trade Center, when the second plane struck, when the first tower fell and when the second tower fell.