Kids get first-hand account of 9/11 horror
Papatoetoe High School, Auckland, Thursday, 9.45am.
Marvin Schuster wasn’t alive when the Twin Towers came down, and didn’t know much about the horrors of 9/11.
But that changed on Thursday when he and his Papatoetoe High School classmates had a visit from a legend of the New York City Fire Department, Steven San Filippo.
San Filippo inspired the youngsters with his tales of loss and redemption that emerged from the attacks, 15 years ago this weekend.
Schuster, a Year 9 student, was born a few months after the attacks that killed 3000.
‘‘We learnt about how much it affected everybody including the fire department, we got to see how New York has recovered.
‘‘We learnt a lot and Steven really showed how passionate he was about his job despite the attacks on 9/11 and a lot of other people gave up and moved on.’’
Schuster said he had never thought about being a firefighter before ‘‘but I do consider it now after this’’.
‘‘Five of my guys were killed that day, and they never found anyone, the only thing they found was one of my lieutenant’s badge,’’ he said.
‘‘Out of the 343 firefighters that were killed, I worked with or knew personally about 75 of those guys. We have a poster with the faces of every firefighter who died. Every morning I will glance at it and another face will pop out to me and I realise this guy isn’t here anymore.’’
After 20 years in fire department you can retire, but for San Filippo it will be 38 years next month.
‘‘I am here 18 years longer then I have to be, why, because I love it, I love doing what I do.’’
San Filippo was set to meet 150 firefighters from around the country when they take part in today’s eighth memorial climb up Auckland’s Sky Tower.
The climb is organised by Auckland firefighter Tony Scott. It pays tribute to the firemen killed in 9/11 and Kiwi firefighters killed in the line of duty.