(JustPatriots.com)- This year marks the 21st anniversary of the horrific terrorist attacks in the United States on September 11, 2001, which resulted in the deaths of over 3,000 people.
Online tributes were paid by many former presidents, including George W. Bush, Bill Clinton, and Barack Obama, among others.
President Joe Biden gave a speech at the Pentagon, which was also struck by the attacks, and First Lady Jill Biden stated the site in Pennsylvania where a jet piloted by hijackers crashed.
One of the most moving tributes was provided by NASA.
An astronaut aboard the International Space Station took heartbreaking pictures of the aftermath of the assaults, which NASA has shared with the public (ISS).
Expedition 3 Commander Frank Culbertson captured pictures of the city as the International Space Station sailed over New York City. On Sunday, the United States Space Agency uploaded a number of those photographs to its website. The images accompanied a video and Culbertson’s thoughts on the attacks.
Culbertson was the lone American aboard the ISS and began documenting the event as the station flew over the New York City region.
In the hours that followed, he photographed some powerful scenes. He recorded his observations of the changing world below him and his reactions to those observations. One of the images depicts a smoke plume above Manhattan that is “visible from space,” and it is thought to have been taken after the collapse of the Twin Towers,
In a letter dated September 11, 2001, Culbertson wrote about his vantage point of the horror unfolding below. The following day, he elaborated, saying, “It’s dreadful to witness smoke flowing from wounds in your own country from such a great vantage position.”
“And the knowledge that everything will be different by the time we land is a little disconcerting,” he said. “The dichotomy of being on a spacecraft dedicated to improving life on earth and watching life being destroyed by such willful, terrible acts is jolting the psyche, regardless of who you are.”
