On September 11, 2010, three beams illuminated the New York skyline to commemorate the THREE WTC skyscrapers that were brought down

It was a little past 9:00 PM on Saturday, September 11, 2010. Brett Bracewell and I were standing on the corner of Walker and Church Streets in Lower Manhattan, facing south and looking up into the New York City sky. Something big was about to happen, and we knew what it was.

Brett and I were in New York to attend the three-day I.N.N. World Report “How the World Changed After 9/11” conference, which brought together world-renowned scholars, scientists, educators, elected officials, military officers, intelligence experts, law enforcement professionals, firefighters, 9/11 survivors and family members, along with the architect and engineer supporters of AE911Truth, some of whom were behind the big surprise that was about to happen.

As they had for the past seven years, officials participating in New York City’s “Tribute in Light” memorial had turned on the two official beams of light shining high up into the darkness where the World Trade Center Buildings 1 and 2 once stood, in remembrance of the attacks of September 11, 2001, and the lives lost that day. However, for the 2010 memorial there would be more to it than that.

Suddenly at 9:11 PM there was a third beam of light shooting up into the sky above lower Manhattan. While many of the thousands of onlookers stood puzzled by the sight of the third beam in the sky, Brett and I were each smiling from ear to ear.

“Third Beam Team” coordinator Barbara Honegger looks on during AE911Truth press conference at Ground Zero

Brett and I were members of the “Third Beam Team,” a group of architects, and engineers, family members of 9/11 victims, and other volunteers from around the country working under the careful guidance of educator, author, and 9/11 researcher Barbara Honegger of California. The purpose of the third beam of light was to represent and bring attention to the often overlooked and under-reported World Trade Center Building 7, a 47-story steel-framed building which was not struck by an airplane and suffered only a few minor office fires, yet at 5:20 PM on 9/11/01 came down in a symmetrical collapse into its own footprint at nearly free-fall acceleration.

Honegger had searched the country for spotlights strong enough to match the candlelight power of the lights used for the other two beams. She finally found two such spotlights in Florida and another two in upstate New York. The “Third Beam Team” then needed to find someone to deliver the two lights from Florida. Because I’m listed as the local contact for a national peace and justice organization, I was contacted and asked to help. Part of the Statement of Purpose of Central Florida Veterans For Peace is to bring an end to our government’s use of war as an instrument of national policy, so bringing attention to something that questions the validity of the government’s sole justification for the wars is a no-brainer. I told Honegger to count me in.

I then called Brett Bracewell, a local member of the Florida chapter of WeAreChange, to see if he could help with the mission. WeAreChange is a non-partisan, non-profit organization of everyday people who advocate for the sick and dying 9/11 first responders and victims’ family members and who continue to call for a new independent investigation into the 9/11 catastrophe to get to the truth, wherever it might take us. Brett, like me, said to count him in.

Brett Bracewell of WeAreChange Florida loading “Third Beam” spotlights into the Buick

So, off we went to the lighting company, and with some oomphs and some grunts we were able to squeeze the two spotlights into the trunk and back seat of the old Buick. Then we headed north on I-95, destined for New York City.

After arriving later that day, we met up with the rest of the “Third Beam Team.”We took the spotlights to a secure location and moved on to the “How the World Changed After 9/11” conference at the I.N.N. World Report building at 56 Walker Street. The conference was wonderful, with presentations from one brilliant panelist after another throughout the entire weekend. Yet the real kicker for us was seeing the three beams of light shining simultaneously high above the New York City skyline.

Even though the “go along to get along” corporate media and government public servants once again completely ignored World Trade Center Building 7 and blacked out any reporting on the third beam of light, their telephones were ringing off the hook due to New Yorkers calling in and wondering what the third beam of light represented. In the months to follow, 9/11 victims’ family members from NYC CAN, along with Architects & Engineers for 9/11 Truth supporters, were able to launch two separate television ad campaigns urging New York City-area viewers to demand a new independent investigation into the mysterious collapse of WTC Building 7. Funds are currently being raised for another television ad campaign. Please visit www.rememberbuilding7.org and donate to this promising new project.

AE911Truth.org founder Richard Gage, AIA, with Phil Restino (left) and Brett Bracewell (right) at “How the World Changed After 9/11” conference

To commemorate the 10^th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks, the more than 1,500 credentialed architects and engineers of AE911Truth are arranging for public screenings worldwide of their new documentary, “9/11: Explosive Evidence – Experts Speak Out,” which takes a scientific approach in examining the collapses of World Trade Center Buildings 1, 2 and 7.

In Central Florida, there will be two separate screenings of the documentary, on Saturday, September 10 and Sunday, September 11, at 6:30 PM and 5:30 PM respectively, in the function room at Steve’s Famous Diner in the Office Depot Shopping Center at 1584 South Nova Road in Daytona Beach.

In addition, members of WeAreChange and Veterans For Peace from Central Florida will be joined by supporters of AE911Truth from throughout Florida for tabling of literature and DVDs, along with educational displays and public discussion in front of the Steak ‘N’ Shake restaurant at the northwest corner of Nova Road and International Speedway Boulevard from 12 Noon to 6 PM on Saturday, September 10, and from 11 AM to 5 PM on Sunday, September 11.

Donation cans will be circulating at both the outside tabling events and the inside documentary film screenings to raise money for the non-partisan, non-profit FealGood Foundation, which helps the sick and dying 9/11 first responders, of which 1,020 have already died from illnesses related to their search and rescue efforts at New York City’s WTC complex.

After 10 years, literally millions of lives have been destroyed in the wars and occupations that have also bankrupted our nation and have been based solely on the U.S. government’s untenable theory of the conspiracy of September 11, 2001. It is time for the American people to come together as a whole and demand an actual criminal investigation into one of the greatest and most costly crimes in U.S. history. We owe it to our dead, our sick and our dying, and we owe it to ourselves and to our children’s future. Investigate 9/11 now!

Restino is co-chair and a founding member of the Central Florida chapter of Veterans For Peace and a member of Military Families Speak Out - Florida. He lives in Port Orange, FL. Veterans For Peace is made up of veterans working together for peace and justice through non-violence since 1985. The Central Florida chapter covers from Greater Orlando east to Greater Melbourne and north to Greater Jacksonville. For more information, visit the chapter website at www.cflveteransforpeace.org or the national VFP website at www.veteransforpeace.org.