SANDY, Utah — Shohini Sinha remembers training at the gym for her FBI fitness test when the Twin Towers fell.
“The academy class that I was in was the first one that was onboarded after the attacks, and we really had a sense of purpose,” she said. “Not that you apply to the FBI without that, right? But those attacks and our reason for being there was really crystallized by the events of 911.”
Wednesday morning, more than 100 first responders climbed up and down 2,071 steps: the same number of steps taken by those who helped people trapped at the World Trade Center.
According to Sinha, many of Wednesday’s participants don’t even remember 9/11.
“This is an opportunity for them to be around other folks who have more solid memories, and also really take part in that remembering process,” she said.
Sinha said that the annual Tower Stair Challenge immerses these men and women into that day and how it impacted families nationwide.
“It was an attack like we had never seen on American soil, but those people remembered their mission, remembered their training, and went in and to do what they did every day of their lives, which is put their lives on the line to rescue complete strangers, which is what we do," said Sinha.
