Twenty-five years ago, now-retired Chicago Fire Chief Patrick Maloney was part of a crew of first responders who traveled to New York City just hours after 9/11.
The convoy arrived in the early morning hours after an overnight drive. Fires were still burning and, Maloney said, the scene felt “surreal” and “apocalyptic.”
“I’ll never forget the New York chief saying, ‘Hey Chicago, welcome to hell,’” Maloney said.
On Wednesday, he joined fellow Chicago firefighters, along with members of the New York City Fire Department, to honor the 25th anniversary of 9/11 at the Engine 18 firehouse on the Near West Side.
The event was part of the Tunnel to Towers Foundation’s “Steel Across America” tour, which is bringing a 21-foot beam salvaged from the south tower of the World Trade Center to more than 35 cities nationwide. After Chicago, the beam will make five more stops before completing its loop of the country in New York.
More than 50 people, some wearing New York City Fire Department baseball caps distributed by the organizers, stood under a cloudy, gray sky to watch the 16,900-pound beam as it pulled into Engine 18 in a custom-made truck, accompanied by a police escort and the sound of bagpipes and drums.
Guests bow their heads during the “Steel Across America” ceremony on Aug. 12, 2026, at the Engine 18 fire station in Chicago’s Near West Side, commemorating the 25th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks. (Brian Cassella/Chicago Tribune)
As rain began to fall, attendees moved inside for a memorial ceremony. The mood was somber as they listened to speeches from first responders.
“Everyone standing here today is what remembrance is about,” Maloney said.
Afterward, attendees were encouraged to climb atop a platform and touch the beam, which organizers called a “symbol of resilience.”
The Tunnel to Towers Foundation, which organized the tour, was created by the family of New York firefighter Stephen Gerard Siller, who died responding to the attacks. The nonprofit provides mortgage-free homes to families of fallen first responders and builds specially adapted homes for injured veterans.
Siller’s son, Stephen Siller Jr., was just 9 months old at the time of 9/11. He said the response to the tour has been “unbelievable.”
“No matter where we went, we met people who had a personal tragedy that day,” he said.
A total of 2,977 people died in the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, including 343 members of the New York City Fire Department.
Retired New York Fire Department Lt. Joe LaPointe has been on tour with the beam for months. Twenty-five years on, he said 9/11 feels like it was both “yesterday” and “a lifetime ago.”
Chicago Fire Department members salute the arrival of a beam from the World Trade Center on Aug. 12, 2026, at the Engine 18 firehouse in the Near West Side, during the “Steel Across America” tour commemorating the 25th anniversary of the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. (Brian Cassella/Chicago Tribune)
The beam’s tour is meant to “reinforce and remind people to never forget,” LaPointe said. It also honors the firefighters and first responders who came to New York’s aid nationwide.
“When Sept. 11 occurred, the whole country and even the world came to help the FDNY and the city of New York,” he said. “A lot of these guys, they attended our funerals.”
Douglas Crowley, Chicago Fire Department district chief for the South Side, called the memorial a “profound experience.” He was also among the Chicago crews that traveled to New York to help extinguish the remaining fires and assist with search and rescue operations.
“I was overwhelmed by the sheer scale of destruction,” he said. “It’s something that’s imprinted on you as a core memory.”
Years later, the event is still difficult for Crowley to comprehend.
“We’ve been unpacking it for 25 years, and I don’t think we’ll ever finish,” he said.