It wasn’t yet 9 a.m., but Jennifer Lynn Kane was already busy at work. The CPA liked to arrive early at her office before clients started calling and problems began popping up. Only 26, the Plymouth native was a rising star at the global professional services firm Marsh & McLennan, much admired by both management and staff for her professionalism and kindness.
At 8:46 a.m., a Boeing 767 slammed into the North Tower of the World Trade Center – hitting just below her 100th floor office and triggering a cascade of carnage that would consume 2,977 lives in New York City and other locations around the country.
The events 25 years ago will be forever remembered by their date: 9/11. The terrorist attacks by Islamic extremists altered the course of many lives, sending shivers of fear everywhere as the country’s sense of invulnerability burned away with the twin towers.
Locally, four people live with the horrors of those moments every day: George and Faye Kane, who lost their only daughter in the North Tower; Kingston Police Sergeant Mike La Natra, who as a New York City detective walked through falling dust and debris searching for survivors and victims; and Mike Kennedy of Duxbury, who was then a New York City firefighter rescuing people at the North Tower before it collapsed into a pile of rubble and ash.
Both the surviving first-responders will speak at a 25th commemoration Friday at 9:45 a.m. at the Plymouth 9/11 Memorial on South Spooner Street. Jennifer Kane’s parents are set to appear at a memorial in Boston.
“It doesn’t seem like 25 years ago,” George Kane said in a recent interview. “It’s still horrific. I’m angry about what happened. She was murdered. It makes no sense.”
The days following the attack were a blur of hope and dread as the Kanes waited for word about the fate of their daughter, praying she would be among the survivors. The Kanes’ two sons left immediately for New York City to look for their sister, followed by their parents a few days later.
As the days turned to weeks, their optimism faded and a dark reality set in: Jennifer – a beautiful young woman inside and out – would never come home to Plymouth again. What exactly happened to her remains unknown. No one above the 91st floor of the North Tower survived. Her remains were never found, but her presence is still felt.
“We never stop talking about Jennifer,” her mother, Faye Kane, said. “When you stop talking, that’s when you forget.”
La Natra, now married to state Rep. Kathy La Natra, was a detective in the Gang Unit at the 73rd Precinct in New York City. He was scheduled to testify at a federal courthouse just blocks away from the World Trade Center, but the prosecutor called the night before to cancel the proceeding.
“It was weird because that never happened,” he recalled. “I really think it was my grandfather looking out for me.”
When La Natra woke up the next morning, he felt an inexplicable chill. He went online and thought he was looking at an ad for a new disaster movie. Then his pager started beeping; it was his precinct calling him in to help with the catastrophe unfolding at the World Trade Center.
“As we walked up to Ground Zero, we went past a jet engine from one of the planes,” he said. “There were body parts everywhere. The dust in the air was so thick.”
For the next several weeks, La Natra worked 12-hour shifts at Ground Zero and a landfill where rubble from the destroyed building was taken. At first, he dug through the wreckage for survivors. Then it became a recovery operation.
“I remember this flat chunk of concrete – about the size of a tabletop – came in,” he said. “You could see arms and legs sticking out of it. The morgue worker asked me how many bodies I thought were there. I figured maybe two.”
“There are at least four, probably more,” the morgue worker told him. “That’s how much compression there was after the building collapsed.”
Kennedy was a firefighter with Engine 21 in Manhattan when the call came. He and the rest of the crew raced into the North Tower to rescue survivors. They were on the 27th floor when the South Tower came down. His boss, Capt. Billy Burke, ordered his firefighters out while he stayed behind to help a man in a wheelchair. That was the last time Kennedy saw either of them alive.
“I was stationed on Engine 21 during the attacks and lost my captain,” Kennedy said in a video recorded at Plymouth’s commemoration of the 20th anniversary of the attacks. He was unavailable to comment for this report.
For these four individuals, the horror is never far away. The memories come flooding back regularly, reviving the pain of lost loved ones and comrades in uniform. Until a few years ago, La Natra would feel the same chill every morning on Sept. 11.
“It was my grandfather reminding me of his help,” he said.
The Kanes turned their overwhelming grief into a positive force by creating a scholarship in Jennifer’s name at her alma mater, Villanova University.
“A hundred years from now, her name will still be on a scholarship because it is endowed,” her father said.
They also raise money through an annual golf tournament, speak at events about their daughter and her compassion for others, and take part in 9/11 commemorations. This year, they will speak during the ceremony at the State House in Boston.
“People ask me if I get upset when I see images of the attack on TV,” George Kane said. “Sure, I do, but I want people to see them. I want them to remember what happened and who did this.”
The parents also assist with the Jennifer Kane Memorial Softball Tournament, which honors their daughter’s love for the game as a player in Plymouth. This year, the tournament drew a team from Wellesley, which included one of Jennifer’s nieces.
“We are blessed to have five grandchildren who talk about their aunt all the time,” Faye Kane said. “It’s wonderful that they know her story and help us keep her memory alive.”
For the past several years, La Natra and Kennedy have participated in Plymouth’s commemoration of the tragedy. The town’s 9/11 Memorial includes granite pillars engraved with the names of all those who perished and a steel girder from the World Trade Center. It is now a Town monument, but it was privately built with funding from Select Board member Dick Quintal.
La Natra said he gets emotional at the commemorations as he recounts details of the tragedy and the fellow first-responders killed. However, his most vivid memory is from a few days after the disaster. He and other police were preparing to leave the 73rd Precinct – one of the busiest and most dangerous in New York City – for another day of searching for remains of victims.
“People were in the street waving American flags and holding signs that said ‘Thank you,’” he recalled. “I saw people we had arrested clapping for us and shouting inspirational messages like ‘We stand with you!’ It showed how America came together after a tragedy despite all of our differences. It makes me feel good when I think about that.”
Dave Kindy can be reached at davidkindy1832@gmail.com.