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September 11, 2003

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Two years ago today, on September 11, 2001 at 8:47 am American Airlines Flight 11 out of Boston crashed into the north tower of the World Trade Center, tearing a gaping hole in the building and setting it afire. At 9:03 am a second plane, United Flight 175 also from Boston crashed into the south tower. Both buildings were ablaze. At 9:43 am American Airlines Flight 77 crashes into the Pentagon. At 10:10 am, United Airlines Flight 93 crashes in Sommerset County, Pennsylvania. Some 2,792 people died at the World Trade Center, 184 at the Pentagon and 40 in the plane crash in the Pennsylvania field. More than 90 nations lost citizens in these attacks. As the world’s attention is focused on the site now known as "Ground Zero," just blocks from our firehouse studios, we continue with Part 2 of Democracy Now!’s special 9-11 coverage.

September 11th has now become synonymous with the tragic events of two years ago. It brings forth images of the death and destruction here in the US: the towers crumbling, people fleeing through streets or jumping from buildings, desperate to learn anything about their missing loved ones. But for others around the world this date evokes different images and memories of terror. Today on Democracy Now!, we will spend the hour looking at September 11ths throughout history.

We’ll go back to September 11, 1973 the day Chile’s democratically-elected President Salvador Allende died in a CIA-backed military coup; to September 11, 1977 the day anti-apartheid leader Stephen Biko was being driven to Pretoria where he would die a day later on a prison floor after being beaten by South African police; to September 11, 1990 when Guatemalan anthropologist Myrna Mack was murdered by US-backed death squads; to September 11, 1971 to the Attica Prison uprising that saw New York State Troopers kill 39 men and wound 88 others.