Tributes from all over the nation poured in to remember 9/11, often regarded as one of the most devastating attacks on U.S. soil in the nation's history. Some locals remember the day more vividly.
John Sikora threw the first pitch at Wednesday's San Francisco Giants game as the team sought to remember that day.
Sikora was just a few years into his San Francisco Fire Department career when he and other firefighters bought tickets to New York to respond to the aftermath.
"We knew there was going to be a lot of pain and a lot of heartache and a lot of hurt going on there, and we just felt like we had to," he said.
Each year since the terrorist attack, the SFPD seeks to honor first responders and civilians who died in the attacks in New York City, Washington D.C., and Pennsylvania.
Nearly 3,000 lives were lost 23 years ago, including the now national hero Betty Ann Ong.
Ong, who hailed from San Francisco's Chinatown and was a flight attendant, was the first to alert authorities on the ground that the plane she was on had been hijacked. She relayed critical information about the hijackers' identities, which led to the shutdown of all flights nationwide.
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The plane she was on crashed into the North Towner of the World Trade Center.
"It's very difficult, I think, especially for people who live within Chinatown to see that there is a light out there, and I believe that Betty is that light. That's someone that they can be very proud of for what she did on September 11," Cathie Ong-Herrera, Betty's sister, said.
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Today, Ong-Herrera resides in Bakersfield and said her family was finally able to dedicate a bench in Ong's honor at a fire station after years of legal gridlock.
"It's been very hot here, and today was just gorgeous, so it was, I think, a sign from Betty that she was really proud of what we were doing for her," Ong-Herrera said.
Since the attacks, Ong's family set up the Betty Ann Ong Foundation.
Though strangers initially, the families said they are forever linked through the tragedy.
All of them with the desire to "never forget," Sikora said.
