2024 FDNY Headquarters September 11th Memorial Service honors 4 Department leaders who made the Supreme Sacrifice

September 11, 2024

The FDNY honored the four Department leaders who made the Supreme Sacrifice on September 11, 2001, when responding from headquarters to Manhattan Box 5-5-8087 World Trade Center.

Fire Commissioner Robert S. Tucker welcomed the families of Chief of Department Peter J. Ganci Jr., First Deputy Commissioner William M. Feehan, Assistant Chief Gerard A. Barbara and Assistant Chief Donald J. Burns as they attended the FDNY Headquarters September 11th Memorial Service on the 23rd anniversary of the 2001 attacks.

"Your presence and everyone who has shown up here for you is proof that we stick to our word (to never forget)," Commissioner Tucker said at Wednesday's event inside the Commissioner Robert O. Lowery Auditorium. "For 23 years, we have mourned and grieved our loved ones. I'm feeling grateful that we get to do this. ... I hope that this coming together, in this space every year, brings a level of comfort for you that it's bringing for me.

Acting Chief of Department John Esposito said: "Twenty-three years ago, the lives of everybody in this department, both uniform and civilian, changed forever. All ranks suffered losses. We lost our first deputy commissioner; we lost our chief of department; we lost probies on their first day in the firehouse. We lost fathers and sons, and we lost entire companies."