Roswell will pause at 8:46 a.m. Friday, Sept. 11, for a moment of silence marking 25 years since the 2001 terror attacks.

The city's annual remembrance ceremony begins at 8:30 a.m. on the back lawn of City Hall, 38 Hill St., near the Faces of War Memorial. The event is free and open to the public.

Mayor Mary Robichaux will deliver personal reflections alongside Fire Chief Pabel Troche and Police Chief James W. Conroy. The 8:46 a.m. silence marks the moment American Airlines Flight 11 struck the north tower of the World Trade Center. The program also includes a prayer and a color guard presentation by the Roswell police and fire honor guards.

"For those who were alive 25 years ago, we all have a story or some sort of personal connection to that terrible day," Robichaux said in a statement reported by Appen Media. She said she and the chiefs will share reflections "on how we endured one of the worst days in U.S. history, as well as pay tribute to the nearly 3,000 lives lost."

The attacks on Sept. 11, 2001, killed 2,977 people after members of the al-Qaida terror group hijacked four planes. Two struck the World Trade Center in New York, one hit the Pentagon in Virginia and one crashed in a field in rural Pennsylvania after passengers fought to retake it.

The anniversary has a direct Roswell connection. Claude Michael Gann, a Roswell resident and sales executive for the software company Algorithmics, was among those killed at the World Trade Center. Gann was attending the Risk Waters Conference at Windows on the World on the 106th floor when the first plane hit, according to prior Appen Media reporting.

The ceremony takes place beside the Faces of War Memorial, a 14-foot-tall Vietnam War monument dedicated in 1995. Its bronze centerpiece depicts a life-size soldier reaching for the hand of a small girl, surrounded by 50 sculpted faces with a thin veil of water cascading over them.

More details are available at roswell365.com.