Obama visits Ground Zero

Days after the killing of Osama bin Laden, US President Barack Obama met New York fire-fighters and police on Thursday and visited Ground Zero to offer comfort to a city still scarred by the September 11 attacks. His predecessor George W. Bush, just three days after hijacked planes destroyed the World Trade Center's Twin Towers, stood bullhorn in hand in the smouldering wreckage to declare: "The people who knocked these buildings down will hear all of us soon."
Almost a decade later, in a bookend to that historic visit, Obama came to New York to say that promise had been kept. He said the killing of bin Laden told the world, "that when we say we will never forget, we mean what we say." Obama visited Engine 54 in midtown, which with 15 deaths lost more members on 9/11 than any other firehouse, before heading to Lower Manhattan to talk with police and lay a wreath at Ground Zero where he also met with victims' families.
Obama told fire-fighters at the "Pride of Manhattan" firehouse: "I wanted to just come here to thank you." "This is a symbolic site of the extraordinary sacrifice that was made on that terrible day almost 10 years ago." "It didn't matter who was in charge, we were going to make sure that the perpetrators of that horrible act - that they received justice," Obama said.
Bin Laden, the al Qaeda leader who masterminded the September 11, 2001, attacks, was shot in the head by US forces who stormed his compound in Pakistan on Monday after a decade-long manhunt. Nearly 3,000 people were killed when al Qaeda hijackers crashed commercial planes into the Twin Towers, the Pentagon outside Washington, D.C., and a Pennsylvania field.
"We have been waiting for this for 10 years. It puts a little more American pride in people," said Al Fiammetta, 57, a safety engineer from Bellport, New York, who said he worked at Ground Zero clearing debris and waited to see Obama. New York City resident Caroline Epner, 32 and seven months pregnant, said: "It's OK for him to take a victory lap."
Later Obama met New York police, thanked them and urged them to be vigilant, saying there remain extremist threats. At Ground Zero during a bright and sunny afternoon, Obama laid a wreath of red, white and blue flowers to honour those who died. Obama then paused for a moment of silence.
Obama, who made no remarks at the site, greeted relatives of victims. The brief ceremony took place by the "Survivor's Tree," which amazingly survived the attacks and was nursed back to health and then returned to be part of the memorial that will open here on the 10th anniversary of the attacks.