The middle schoolers who bought FDNY a firetruck, remembering 9/11 25 years later

Twenty-five years after the Sept. 11 attacks, students and staff from White Knoll Middle School in West Columbia, South Carolina, recalled raising more than $500,000 for firefighters. The fund followed the al-Qaeda coordinated hijackings on Sept. 11, 2001: two planes struck the Twin Towers in Manhattan, a third hit the Pentagon in Arlington, Virginia, and a fourth crashed in Pennsylvania after passengers and crew members counterattacked. Nearly 3,000 people died, and the article notes lasting illnesses affecting first responders, survivors, and residents. Principal Nancy Turner alerted students over the intercom, and fundraising efforts including bake sales, button sales, car washes, and T-shirt sales culminated in buying a new FDNY firetruck.