As someone born and raised in New York, I would be remiss this month if I did not take note of the 25th anniversary of 9/11, that darkest of days that abruptly changed the trajectory of the 21st century, not just for America, but for all the world.

I was actually in Washington DC that fateful morning in 2001, expecting to represent Design-Build magazine at a meeting with members of the Design-Build Institute of America (DBIA). But that meeting had fallen through for me the night before, so on the morning of 9/11, I had told my wife that I was trying to arrange a tour of the newly renovated wedge of the Pentagon, which had just been completed via design-build project delivery. 

Luckily for me, I was unable to set up a last-minute tour and that very section of the Defense Dept. headquarters was the same one struck that morning by a hijacked commercial airliner. Traveling around DC that day, I will never forget the otherworldly, movie-set feel of unreality on the streets of our nation's capital, as its confused and terrified citizens tried to grasp what the heck was going on.

Army jeeps with machine gun turrets were deployed on dowtown overpasses, as anxious soldiers stood guard, scanning passing traffic for God-knows-what. Some 225 miles north, of course, at the southern tip of Manhattan, things were much, much worse, as chaos, fear and toxic dust gripped my hometown...

INDEED, community service is the aspect that I would like to close on here.

Twenty-five years after 9/11, we seem to have forgotten so many of the hard lessons that we learned that day and in the months of extraordinary compassion and international solidarity that immediately followed. But arguably, ASHRAE and the international engineering community somehow seem to have held on to that feeling, that tighter, universal bond of respect and solidarity, forged by tragedy.

So my wish for this solemn anniversary is that we as a nation can follow your lead as engineers, that we may look back on 9/11 not with anger, but with hope. Renewed determination and commitment to see each other as members of a global community that builds not just solid structures, but strong relationships... that can withstand even the darkest of days.

For 2001-2002 ASHRAE President Bill Coad's comments, click here.

For 2002-2003 ASHRAE President Don Colliver's own essay, click here.

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