CONCORD, New Hampshire — After helping scores of police officers and firefighters search for survivors following the 9/11 terrorist attacks, Police Chief Robert Merner in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, remembers the sense of unity and hypervigilance that had taken hold in New York City and across the country.
Sixteen years later, Merner wants to ensure a new generation remembers those events and the important lessons that emerged from the attack that left more than 2,700 people dead when hijacked planes slammed into the World Trade Center towers on Sept. 11, 2001. Many more died when hijackers crashed planes in Washington, D.C., and in Pennsylvania.
Merner, a 29-year Boston police veteran who took over the crime scene of the 2013 Boston Marathon bombing and helped capture bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, will speak at a 9/11 memorial event Monday in front of the Portsmouth police station.
It’s one of many ways cities across New England plan to commemorate the 16th anniversary of 9/11, including moments of silence and a stair climb to honor the hundreds of firefighters who died that day.
