The Story A Picture Tells

September 11, 2001 is a day full of vivid, iconic, and heartbreaking images.  One of the most iconic was captured by an amateur photographer.  

Aaron McLamb was a native North Carolinian.  He had grown up wanting to be a fireman.  In the fall of 2001, at age twenty, he lived not too far from the firehouse on Middagh Avenue in Brooklyn Heights that was home to Engine 205 and Ladder 118.  On the morning of Tuesday, September 11, 2001, Aaron McLamb was doing volunteer work, printing Bibles at a Jehovah's Witness facility in Brooklyn.  Shortly after the North Tower was struck at 8:46 am, he looked out a window and saw flames shooting out of the building.  An amateur photographer, he grabbed his gear and took up a position outside a bay window on his building's tenth floor, a vantage point that allowed him to see the Brooklyn Bridge and the World Trade Center.

From where he sat, he saw the men who were among his heroes, the men of Ladder 118, charging across the Brooklyn Bridge in order to join the battle.  It is a breathtaking photograph.

Ladder 118 crossing the Brooklyn Bridge on September 11, 2001

Photo Credit:  Aaron McLamb/New York Daily News

It is also a heartbreaking photograph. 

All six members of Ladder 118 who raced to the World Trade Center that morning joined the battle with aplomb upon their arrival.  They went to work at the Marriott World Trade Center Hotel, rescuing countless guests, and were last seen heading up into the hotel to save more lives when the Hotel was obliterated first by the collapse of the South Tower, which split the building in half, and thereafter the collapse of the North Tower, which effectively destroyed what was then left of the Hotel.  The FDNY, including the six brave men of Ladder 118, rescued hundreds of the Hotel's guests but paid a terrible price.  

All six members of Ladder 118 who rode through the Gates of Hell that morning were killed.  They were  Lieutenant Robert Egan, Firefighter Joseph Agnello, Firefighter Vernon Cherry, Firefighter Scott Davidson, Firefighter Leon Smith, and Firefighter Peter Vega.  

Board at Ladder 118 - September 11, 2001

Photo Credit:  New York Daily News

Every picture does indeed tell a story.  Learn it.  Commit it to memory.  Never forget it. 

Engine 205 Ladder 118 Brooklyn Heights 

Photo Credit:  Brooklyn Eagle

-AK