Eagles Remember 9/11 With ROTC Stair Climb at Daytona International Speedway

Embry-Riddle Army ROTC cadets climb Daytona Beach International Speedway stands to commemorate 9/11
Embry-Riddle Army ROTC cadets climb Daytona Beach International Speedway stands to commemorate 9/11. (Photo: Embry Riddle/Cadet Cassidy Burns)

Melanie AzamMelanie Azam /

Sep 13, 2024, 8:53 AM

Running for a Cause

On Sept. 29, 2024, the Embry-Riddle Worldwide Student Government Association and Eagles in Service will participate in the Tunnel to Towers 5K walk/run in Manhattan, New York. The event honors the first responders who lost their lives that day, and money raised during the event assists programs that benefit first responders and catastrophically injured service members.

About 1,000 ROTC cadets and midshipmen climbed more than 2,000 stairs at the Daytona International Speedway — a symbolic climb of the one made by firefighters as they tried to save those trapped inside the World Trade Center in New York City on Sept. 11, 2001.

“It was a good way to remember everyone we lost in the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks,” said Alex Dellapenna, an Army ROTC cadet and senior business major at Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University.

Embry-Riddle’s Army ROTC Eagle Battalion organized the 9/11 Memorial Stair Climb, and ROTC students from Embry-Riddle, Stetson University, Bethune Cookman and Daytona State participated in the event early Wednesday morning. Volusia County and Daytona Beach first responders also joined the climb.

“This was a first-time event that we hope to continue every year,” said Lt. Col. Jerome Reitano, commander of the Daytona Beach Campus Army ROTC program and professor of Military Science.

On the same day, at Embry-Riddle’s Prescott Campus, Air Force and Army ROTC cadets also commemorated 9/11 and its victims. They ran the “Warrior Loop” trail around campus, holding an American flag and a POW flag.

Embry-Riddle Air Force and Army ROTC detachments on the Prescott Campus participate in a 9/11 memorial run
Embry-Riddle Air Force and Army ROTC detachments on the Prescott Campus participate in a 9/11 memorial run. (Photo: Embry‑Riddle/Wilson Van Ness)

Most of the ROTC students weren’t even born when the 9/11 attacks occurred 23 years ago. But they said they were aware of the significance of the event, in which nearly 3,000 people were killed, and they wanted to do something to honor those who died that day.

“I think the entire time we were climbing, we were thinking about the lives lost,” said Reina Garnett, a senior Embry-Riddle Aerospace Engineering student and Army ROTC cadet.

The climb was a workout, especially in the hot, humid weather, but Navy ROTC midshipman Horace Huntsberry said completing it with his fellow midshipmen made it easier.

“The spirit and camaraderie helped me get through it,” said Huntsberry, a sophomore Aeronautics student at Embry-Riddle.

Cody Kagle, who works for Volusia County Fire Rescue, was one of about 30 local first responders who participated in the event. Clad in his fire gear, Kagle said he was doing the 9/11 memorial climb to “honor the cause and remember the fallen.”