City and County of Honolulu leaders, Hawaiʻi state officials, military leaders, first responders and residents gathered Friday evening in a solemn ceremony at the Honolulu Hale in remembrance of the 2,977 victims of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, and first responders who answered the call to service.
Officials presented lei at the base of the eternal flame in front of the Honolulu Hale. The Royal Hawaiian Band performed the national anthem and Hawaiʻi Ponoʻi and Celtic Pipes and Drums of Hawaiʻi played American the Beautiful and Amazing Grace.
Lt. Col. Gilbert Mestler, a retired special forces officer and lifelong New Yorker, remembered the “unimaginable horror” of the attacks and the “extraordinary courage” of people on Sept. 11.
He honored the victims of the attacks, first responders, the more than 6,000 people who have suffered illnesses linked to toxic exposure from 9/11, military veterans and servicemembers who fight for freedom.
“We remember them all,” he said. “We remember the smoke, the smells, the sirens, the faces, the tears and the anguish. We remember the people who went to work that beautiful Tuesday morning and never came home. We remember the courage of those who answered their country when their fellow Americans needed them the most.
Honolulu Police Chief David Lazar and Honolulu Fire Chief Kalani Hao honored the fallen first responders and encouraged first responders present at Friday’s ceremony to live a life worth of their example.
“In 2001 when the world seemed to stop, first responders moved. Police officers, firefighters, paramedics, port authority and emergency personnel, they moved towards smoke, fire, falling debris and uncertainty because somewhere ahead of them, someone needed help,” Lazar said.
Governor Josh Green remembered the heroism of first responders on 9/11 and said that day informs how brave Americans can be. He linked the first responders that ran towards the World Trade Center on Sept. 11, 2001, to the first responders in Hawaiʻi who ran towards the Maui fires in August 2023, the Kona low floods on the North Shore in March and recent destruction caused by hurricanes, saying that they served with the same service and professionalism.
“The skyline of New York may have changed, the landscape on the North Shore may change, Lahaina may need to be rebuilt, but the heroism and the heart of first responders, military leaders, volunteers had not changed,” Green said. “It has not changed 25 years later in America. It endures because America is an extraordinary nation with extraordinary people.”
The ceremony also honored the victims of the 9/11 terrorist attacks that had ties to Hawaiʻi.
Maile Hale, 26, chief operating officer and vice president of Boston Investor Services, was attending a conference at the World Trade Center. Hale was a 1993 valedictorian at Kaiser High School and studied chemistry at Wesleyan University. According to Hale’s obituary, she loved dancing, the ocean and chocolate.
The Foundation of the Rotary Club of Honolulu established the Maile Hale Endowment Fund in October 2001 and the fund now exceeds $3 million. Funds go towards growing the club’s ability to perform “service above self” through a yearly international service project in Southeast Asia, workdays at Pālama Settlement and YMCA Kokokahi, the annual Will J. Henderson Scholarship and additional scholarships, and the Don Anderson Youth Leadership Fellows Program.
Heather Ho, 32, was working as an executive pastry chef at the Windows of the World restaurant on the 107th floor of the North Tower. She graduated from Punahou School in 1987 before attending Boston University and the Culinary Institute of America. She was named one of six rising star chefs by the San Francisco Chronicle in 1999 and the San Francisco magazine city’s pastry chef of the year in 2000.
Her family established the Heather Malia Ho Scholarship Fund at the REHAB Hospital of the Pacific in 2008 to provide continuing education to the clinical staff.
Richard Y.C. Lee, 34, grew up in Hawaiʻi and was a 1986 Punahou School graduate. He attended Yale University where he majored in political science and played football. He was working as vice president and director of equities technology for Cantor Fitzgerald e-speed on the 103rd floor of Tower One.
Lee’s wife, Karen Lee, told the Honolulu Star-Bulletin in 2001 that Lee was “utterly devoted to family and friends,” especially his 22-month-old son.
Punahou Director of Communications Robert Gelber told ASD, “To mark the 25th anniversary of September 11, members of our faculty, staff and student body gathered privately on campus to remember alumni Heather Ho ’87 and Richard Lee ’86, and to reflect on the way that their compassion, purpose, and commitment may inspire us all.”
Patricia (Pritchford) Colodner, 39, was an executive secretary for Marsh & McLennan on the 96th floor of the North Tower. Colodner was born and raised in Hawaiʻi and graduated from Our Redeemer Lutheran High School in 1979.
Georgia Rose Corrigan, 56, and Christine Snyder, 32, were both on United Airlines Flight 93 when hijackers took over the plane and it crashed near Shanksville, Pennsylvania.
Rose was on her way home to Hawaiʻi after helping her brother run a booth at a Massachusetts antique show. She grew up in Ohio before moving to Hawaiʻi where she worked as an antiques and collectibles dealer, specializing in 1950s rhinestone jewelry.
Snyder was on her way home from attending the American Forestry Conference in Washington, D.C. and visiting New York City. She was a project manager for The Outdoor Circle environmental group.
Winston Welch, executive director of The Outdoor Circle, told ASD that while he didn’t know Snyder, she left a lasting impact on the organization.
Snyder’s mission to keep Hawaiʻi “clean, green and beautiful” continues today, Welch said. Welch invites residents to commemorate and honor Snyder’s legacy by planting and maintaining trees in their own yard to make the state a better place and keep Hawaiʻi beautiful.
The Outdoor Circle and other organizations have planted trees across Hawaiʻi and the Mainland in Snyder’s honor, including a milo tree planted by the Mayor’s Office on Magic Island, a bodhi tree at Kuroda Field in Waikīkī, a pua ikenikeni tree at the Aikahi Fire Station in Kailua, and a tree in Minitowoc, Wisconsin. The alumni association at Snyder’s alma mater, Kalaheo High School, built a remembrance garden in Snyder’s memory in 2024 around a golden shower tree that was planted on the morning of Sept. 11, 2001. The Christine Snyder Memorial Fund supports tree planting and education efforts in Snyder’s memory.
Other victims with ties to Hawaiʻi include David Laychak, 40, whose wife Laurie was a graduate of the Hawaiʻi Baptist Academy; Richard Keane, 54, whose sister Charlotte Keane worked as a nurse at Kuakini Medical Center, Michael Collins, 38, whose wife Lissa Jean Collins was a 1977 graduate of Leilehua High School, and former Maui resident Jude Larson, 31.
Haley Lehman can be reached at haley@alohastatedaily.com.
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