9/11 anniversary: families attend funeral for Flight 93 passengers

Burial takes place at crash site in Shanksville, Pennsylvania, where United Airlines Flight 93 came down on September 11 The few remains of the 40 passengers and crew killed when their plane crashed in Pennsylvania as they struggled to seize control of the aircraft from hijackers on September 11 2001 were finally buried on Monday. The private funeral for nearly 500 family members was held a day after the public commemoration at the crash site in Shanksville, attended by Barack Obama, to mark the 10th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks. The burial took place at the crash site where a 17-tonne boulder in a field of wildflowers marks the spot where the plane hit the ground on the edge of woods. It is now part of the Flight 93 National Memorial and park, which was officially opened on Saturday in the first of three days of remembrance. What little remained of the victims after the plane disintegrated from the impact and the explosion of the fuel was stored by the local coroner, Wallace Miller, for the past decade. DNA tests found some matches for all of the passengers and crew, as well as the four hijackers, but most of the remains could not be identified. Family members and mourners placed flowers on the three full-sized coffins holding the remains, before they were buried in concrete vaults. A plaque is to be placed on the boulder, serving as a collective headstone. Among those officiating at the funeral were a Catholic priest, a Lutheran minister, a Jewish rabbi and a Buddhist sensei. The dead included nationals of the US, Japan and Germany. Carole O’Hare, whose mother, Hilda Marcin, was killed, said the ceremony brought some peace. “There’s definitely peace of mind. I was always concerned about what would happen with the unidentified remains,” she told the Associated Press. “And now my feeling is they’re at peace, and where they are meant to be.” September 11 2001 Pennsylvania United States Chris McGreal guardian.co.uk

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