World Trade Center 1993 Bombing: NYC Marks 20th Anniversary Of Terrorist Attack (PHOTOS, VIDEO)

PHOTOS: 20th Anniversary Of WTC Bombing

The World Trade Center bombing in 1993 was 20 years ago this Tuesday. The attack, on February 26, 1993, killed six people in New York City and injured 1,000.

A truck bomb exploded in the parking garage of the North Tower at 12:18 p.m. According to CNN, "The blast from the homemade 1,500-pound urea-nitrate bomb blew a hole five stories deep and half-a-football field wide."

It took officials 11 hours to completely evacuate roughly 50,000 people from the massive buildings.

A noontime ceremony is planned Tuesday to honor those that were killed. From ABC:

Four of the six killed -- Robert Kirkpatrick, 61, Stephen A. Knapp, 47, William Macko, 57, and Monica Rodriguez Smith, 35 -- were employees of the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, which owned the buildings. John DiGiovanni, 45, a dental-supply salesman visiting the World Trade Center, and Wilfredo Mercado, 37, a purchasing agent for Windows on the World restaurant, also died.

More from the AP:

The attack was the first dramatic demonstration that "terrorism is theater and New York is the biggest stage," said Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly.

The ceremony was being held at the 9/11 memorial that honors more than 2,700 people who died in the 2001 terrorist attack at the World Trade Center.

A moment of silence will be observed at 12:18 p.m., the time when a truck bomb was detonated below the north tower.

Six Islamic extremists were convicted of carrying out the bombing, including mastermind Ramzi Yousef.

At first, officials assumed the explosion on a chilly day was an accident.

The initial report to police that day called it an apparent transformer explosion at the trade center.

Kelly raced to the scene, where the bomb planted in a parked Ryder van had left a crater half the size of a football field in the trade center garage, causing more than a half-billion dollars in damage.

"I remember seeing this tremendous sea of first-responder vehicles ... and smoke was coming out," said Kelly, who was on his first stint as police commissioner.

The trade center stood in the darkness that night for the first time since it opened in 1973.

It was only the next day, after a utility mishap was ruled out, that authorities "started to come to the conclusion it was bomb," Kelly said.

Investigators then found a vehicle identification number on a piece of the blown-up van that they traced to Mohammed Salameh, who had rented the van.

World Trade Center Bombing 1993

Before You Go

9/11, Sept 11, ground zero

WTC Spire Base Installation

Popular in the Community

Close

What's Hot