"Shanksville and United Flight 93" Shanksville by skipbourque

The Flight 93 National Memorial protects the site of the crash of United Airlines Flight 93, which was hijacked in the September 11, 2001 attacks, in Stonycreek Township, Pennsylvania, about 2 miles (3.2 km) north of Shanksville, and 60 miles (97 km) southeast of Pittsburgh. The memorial will be made to honor the passengers of Flight 93, who stopped the terrorists from reaching their target. A temporary memorial to the 40 victims was established soon after the crash, with a permanent memorial slated to be constructed and completed by September 11, 2011.

http://www.nps.gov/flni/

Only 20-minutes flying time from Washington, D.C.

The plane crashed into a reclaimed coal strip mine in Stonycreek Township at 10:03:11. The National Transportation Safety Board reported that the flight impacted at 563 miles per hour (906 km/h) at a 40 degree nose-down, inverted attitude. The impact left a crater eight to ten feet deep (c. 3 m), and 30 to 50 feet wide (c. 12 m). Subsequent analysis of the flight recorders revealed how the actions taken by the passengers prevented the aircraft from reaching the hijackers' intended target.

The flight data recorder, recovered evidence and responses to future interrogatons revealed that the terrorists' intended target was the United States Capitol, where the nation's legislators were in session.

Only known picture of smoke cloud at crash site

The plane crashed in Stonycreek Township, near Shanksville, in Somerset County, Pennsylvania, about 80 miles (130 km) southeast of Pittsburgh and 150 miles (240 km) northwest of Washington, D.C., killing all on board including the four hijackers.

Kelly Leverknight was watching news of the attacks when she heard the plane. "I heard the plane going over and I went out the front door and I saw the plane going down. It was headed toward the school, which panicked me, because all three of my kids were there. Then you heard the explosion and felt the blast and saw the fire and smoke." Another witness, Eric Peterson, looked up when he heard the plane, "It was low enough, I thought you could probably count the rivets. You could see more of the roof of the plane than you could the belly. It was on its side. There was a great explosion and you could see the flames. It was a massive, massive explosion. Flames and then smoke and then a massive, massive mushroom cloud." Val McClatchey had been watching footage of the attacks when she heard the plane. She saw it briefly, then heard the impact. The crash knocked out the electricity and phones. McClatchey grabbed her camera and took the only known picture of the smoke cloud from the explosion.

Of the four aircraft hijacked on September 11 (the others were American Airlines Flight 11, American Airlines Flight 77 and United Airlines Flight 175), United Airlines Flight 93 was the only one that failed to reach its intended target.

• In a nutshell:WE WILL NEVER FORGET 9/11