How Cranberry Township Volunteer Fire Company got a piece of the World Trade Center
Everyone understood what the deformed 900-lb steel beam carried on the back of Assistant Chief Bruce Hezlep’s truck represented as he carried it across the George Washington Bridge and Interstate 80 on its way to the Cranberry Township Volunteer Fire Company.
Cars honked as they passed the piece of the World Trade Center on the bridge. Crowds gathered around it at rest stops on I-80.
“They recognized the significance of the steel,” said Hezlep, who was the fire company’s president in 2010 when he traveled to retrieve the steel beam from Fresh Kills Landfill in Staten Island.
It took about a year and a half to get approval from government agencies in New York and New Jersey for him to take the steel beam. It couldn’t be part of a private collection or used for financial gain, and a memorial design had to be vetted, Hezlep said.
The beam had to serve as a reminder.
“Guys like me, we remember very, very vividly,” Hezlep said.
Hezlep knew 25 years ago there would come a generation that doesn’t remember exactly where they were or what they were doing that day, which is why he and other township and fire company officials wanted a monument.
He even took his son out of third grade for the day with no warning to go with him and then-assistant chief Jeff Berneburg. Berneburg is now a lifetime member of the fire company. Hezlep’s son, Nathan Hezlep, is now a lieutenant with the company.
It was “a trip they’ll always remember,” Bruce Hezlep said.
The fire company broke ground on the monument in 2011 after securing the steel beam, one of three in Western Pennsylvania, the previous year. The monument was finished in 2012.
“It was truly something that brought the entire community together,” Hezlep said.
The memorial cost between $50,000 and $60,000 and garnered donations from the township and several community businesses. Hezlep remembered bringing the beam home through the township in a parade.
The steel beam sits on stone replicas of the Twin Towers, which sit on top of a stone that depicts a map of what the area around the towers looked like. A nearby stone includes a timeline of what happened the morning of Sept. 11, 2001.
“We get people who had relatives and family members killed who leave flowers,” Hezlep said.
The monument and beam are able to be touched, but Hezlep said his daughter refused to touch it when it was first brought to the township. He said she knew what it meant. It was from a crime scene.
“It’s quite remarkable,” Hezlep said.
Hezlep also said nobody is sure what part of the towers the steel beam came from.
The fire company will commemorate Sept. 11 on Friday. A large American flag will be hung from a ladder truck from sunrise to sundown. Lifetime member John Pristas will play taps in front of the memorial six times, one each for when the planes crashed and the towers collapsed.
Hezlep added people often want to buy the firefighters lunch or show their appreciation in other ways on Sept. 11, but he said they’re not the heroes.
