SHANKSVILLE, Pennsylvania // It is hard to tell at a glance that this small coal-mining town was one of the first battlefields in the "war on terror".
Among the rolling green hills and rural landscape of Pennsylvania, the working-class people here prefer to talk about the Vikings, a local high school basketball team, rather than terrorist plots.
They patiently give directions to the thousands of visitors who now pass through, but the town's 180 or so residents would prefer to be left to go about their business.
The people of Shanksville cannot undo the morning of September 11, when United Airlines Flight 93, a hijacked plane bound for Washington, DC, slammed into a field on the outskirts of town. They do not like to guess how things might have been different had it crashed a few towns over.
"It happened here, so everybody just deals with it," said Jean Young, who lives about two kilometres from the crash site and who said her window curtains flew "straight in" from the force of the plane's impact. "I thought a tree in the yard went down."
The townspeople, like Ms Young, will eventually welcome a new national memorial planned for the crash site - delayed by an ugly dispute between the National Park Service and the land's owners - even though it might bring thousands more visitors to this remote south-western corner of the state.
They smile and grant interviews to journalists who flood the town each year around the anniversary of the September 11 attacks, even if they have been asked the same questions a hundred times before.
But if Shanksville is to be remembered forever as a place where something terrible happened that changed the world, the town itself has changed very little - at least that is what most of the people who live here say.
"We're just the same as we was," said Bobby Lambert, the town's mayor, a stocky, jovial man who spent decades as a fireman before taking office in 2005. "Maybe for people who live in the big cities it would be different, but around here life is the same.
"There are a lot of people coming through here now. But then the evening comes, they go, and we're still here."
After all, the 205-year-old town of Shanksville is not the type of place that lends itself to change.
There are just two local shops, including Ida's Country Store, which doubles as the town's meeting place. There is a Lutheran church and a Methodist church, a school up the road and a mechanic at a petrol station that no longer sells petrol. A small hall houses the volunteer fire department, but there is no police station and no traffic lights - or traffic to speak of.
When two people pass on the street, they wave. A weathered sign greets visitors in the same spirit: "Welcome to Shanksville: 'A Friendly Little Town'."
"It's just a little country town, that's about it," Mr Lambert said. "Everybody knows everybody and everybody is pretty nice - it's no hassle. We don't know no hassle here."
But behind the small town simplicity, the weight of that tragic morning - and the fact that Flight 93's passengers fought back against the hijackers, almost surely sparing another target in the US capital - is never far from the surface.
A stack of 9/11 T-shirts is waiting to be sold behind the register at the general store; a small plaque appended to the town sign says: "Shanksville honors the heroes of Flight 93."
Some say there are more US flags about town, too. Both sides of Main Street are lined with stars and stripes, as if Fourth of July parade floats will soon come rolling past. Each house flies at least one US flag as if there were a municipal law.
But most of the townspeople say that even the overwhelming display of patriotism is nothing new, or remarkable.
"Maybe there's a few more poles that were put up after the crash," said Ms Young, who runs an embroidery shop out of her home that produces many of the 9/11 T-shirts, including a popular design with the words "Proud to be an American" emblazoned across the chest.
"I'm not going to say this made people more patriotic, people just were."
Perhaps the biggest sign that something significant occurred here are the various small-scale monuments that have sprung up around town. The newest is a steel cross made from the beams of the fallen World Trade Center and put up last month by New York City firemen. But wrapped in a US flag, it too somehow blends into the landscape as if it had always been there.
Even at the crash site itself, a sprawling green field among many green fields, there is a sense that this stretch of Appalachian countryside is the same as it ever was.
The crater where the plane hit at faster than 800kph has been backfilled and is marked only by a lone US flag, which is barely visible in the tall grass. Most of the visitors on Monday stood in a windy silence, broken only by the tapping of flags against their metal poles.
But not everyone thinks the town can just go on being the quaint little place that it always had been.
The Rev Robert Way, who became pastor of the Lutheran church on Main Street five weeks before the plane crashed, said the psyche of the people in town has been altered, whether they realise it or not.
"I think the mentality of the people has changed somewhat. They are aware that they are part of something larger than they were before," Mr Way said.
"For many of the people here, it was their own little Shangri-La - this was their place. It's no longer their place. Their place now belongs to the rest of the world now as well."
Mr Way, who said he was on hand after the crash to give last rites to victims, added that people have become used to sharing their country roads with outsiders.
Before 2001, "if a car from Georgia drove through the centre of town, people would go, 'Well, I wonder who that is, that's not somebody I know or a car that I recognise'. Now even if it's a German vehicle that runs through with German plates ? it's just another car."
But seven years after the plane went down, there are also signs that the attention thrust upon this town may soon subside, allowing Shanksville and its residents to fade back into the mosaic of rural Pennsylvania.
"The spotlight is not shining as brightly as it was the first couple of years," said Rick King, the former assistant fire chief and one of the first to arrive on scene after the crash. "I don't think there's much of anything new to say anyway. I tell [journalists] the same things I told them last year."
In Ms Young's embroidery shop, where she once sold thousands of commemorative shirts with the words "Shanksville, Pa" on them, business has slowed to a more customary small-town pace.
"Nowadays I sell very few," she said. "If I sell a dozen in a year, that would be lucky."
In a recent order of 500 memorial hats, a customer even asked her to remove the town's name from the logo.
"They remember the planes crashing, but they have no idea about the town of Shanksville anymore," she said. The September 11 attacks "put us on the map, but not in a big way".
And for people like Mr Lambert, the mayor, that is a good thing.
"A bunch of us old guys go to the [petrol station] every morning just to talk, you know, and then we go for the mail and we come home and do whatever we do - mow the yard; in the wintertime we shovel snow, and that's about it.
"That's what we did before 9/11. It won't change."
@email:sstanek@thenational.ae
The smuggler
Eldarir had arrived at JFK in January 2020 with three suitcases, containing goods he valued at $300, when he was directed to a search area.
Officers found 41 gold artefacts among the bags, including amulets from a funerary set which prepared the deceased for the afterlife.
Also found was a cartouche of a Ptolemaic king on a relief that was originally part of a royal building or temple.
The largest single group of items found in Eldarir’s cases were 400 shabtis, or figurines.
Khouli conviction
Khouli smuggled items into the US by making false declarations to customs about the country of origin and value of the items.
According to Immigration and Customs Enforcement, he provided “false provenances which stated that [two] Egyptian antiquities were part of a collection assembled by Khouli's father in Israel in the 1960s” when in fact “Khouli acquired the Egyptian antiquities from other dealers”.
He was sentenced to one year of probation, six months of home confinement and 200 hours of community service in 2012 after admitting buying and smuggling Egyptian antiquities, including coffins, funerary boats and limestone figures.
For sale
A number of other items said to come from the collection of Ezeldeen Taha Eldarir are currently or recently for sale.
Their provenance is described in near identical terms as the British Museum shabti: bought from Salahaddin Sirmali, "authenticated and appraised" by Hossen Rashed, then imported to the US in 1948.
- An Egyptian Mummy mask dating from 700BC-30BC, is on offer for £11,807 ($15,275) online by a seller in Mexico
- A coffin lid dating back to 664BC-332BC was offered for sale by a Colorado-based art dealer, with a starting price of $65,000
- A shabti that was on sale through a Chicago-based coin dealer, dating from 1567BC-1085BC, is up for $1,950
ARM%20IPO%20DETAILS
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UPI facts
More than 2.2 million Indian tourists arrived in UAE in 2023
More than 3.5 million Indians reside in UAE
Indian tourists can make purchases in UAE using rupee accounts in India through QR-code-based UPI real-time payment systems
Indian residents in UAE can use their non-resident NRO and NRE accounts held in Indian banks linked to a UAE mobile number for UPI transactions
Specs
Engine: Dual-motor all-wheel-drive electric
Range: Up to 610km
Power: 905hp
Torque: 985Nm
Price: From Dh439,000
Available: Now
In numbers: PKK’s money network in Europe
Germany: PKK collectors typically bring in $18 million in cash a year – amount has trebled since 2010
Revolutionary tax: Investigators say about $2 million a year raised from ‘tax collection’ around Marseille
Extortion: Gunman convicted in 2023 of demanding $10,000 from Kurdish businessman in Stockholm
Drug trade: PKK income claimed by Turkish anti-drugs force in 2024 to be as high as $500 million a year
Denmark: PKK one of two terrorist groups along with Iranian separatists ASMLA to raise “two-digit million amounts”
Contributions: Hundreds of euros expected from typical Kurdish families and thousands from business owners
TV channel: Kurdish Roj TV accounts frozen and went bankrupt after Denmark fined it more than $1 million over PKK links in 2013
Test
Director: S Sashikanth
Cast: Nayanthara, Siddharth, Meera Jasmine, R Madhavan
Star rating: 2/5
Formula Middle East Calendar (Formula Regional and Formula 4)
Round 1: January 17-19, Yas Marina Circuit – Abu Dhabi
Round 2: January 22-23, Yas Marina Circuit – Abu Dhabi
Round 3: February 7-9, Dubai Autodrome – Dubai
Round 4: February 14-16, Yas Marina Circuit – Abu Dhabi
Round 5: February 25-27, Jeddah Corniche Circuit – Saudi Arabia
The specs
Engine: Four electric motors, one at each wheel
Power: 579hp
Torque: 859Nm
Transmission: Single-speed automatic
Price: From Dh825,900
On sale: Now
THE SPECS
Engine: 6.75-litre twin-turbocharged V12 petrol engine
Power: 420kW
Torque: 780Nm
Transmission: 8-speed automatic
Price: From Dh1,350,000
On sale: Available for preorder now
The specs
Engine: 1.5-litre turbo
Power: 181hp
Torque: 230Nm
Transmission: 6-speed automatic
Starting price: Dh79,000
On sale: Now
At a glance
Global events: Much of the UK’s economic woes were blamed on “increased global uncertainty”, which can be interpreted as the economic impact of the Ukraine war and the uncertainty over Donald Trump’s tariffs.
Growth forecasts: Cut for 2025 from 2 per cent to 1 per cent. The OBR watchdog also estimated inflation will average 3.2 per cent this year
Welfare: Universal credit health element cut by 50 per cent and frozen for new claimants, building on cuts to the disability and incapacity bill set out earlier this month
Spending cuts: Overall day-to day-spending across government cut by £6.1bn in 2029-30
Tax evasion: Steps to crack down on tax evasion to raise “£6.5bn per year” for the public purse
Defence: New high-tech weaponry, upgrading HM Naval Base in Portsmouth
Housing: Housebuilding to reach its highest in 40 years, with planning reforms helping generate an extra £3.4bn for public finances
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Mercer, the investment consulting arm of US services company Marsh & McLennan, expects its wealth division to at least double its assets under management (AUM) in the Middle East as wealth in the region continues to grow despite economic headwinds, a company official said.
Mercer Wealth, which globally has $160 billion in AUM, plans to boost its AUM in the region to $2-$3bn in the next 2-3 years from the present $1bn, said Yasir AbuShaban, a Dubai-based principal with Mercer Wealth.
“Within the next two to three years, we are looking at reaching $2 to $3 billion as a conservative estimate and we do see an opportunity to do so,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Mercer does not directly make investments, but allocates clients’ money they have discretion to, to professional asset managers. They also provide advice to clients.
“We have buying power. We can negotiate on their (client’s) behalf with asset managers to provide them lower fees than they otherwise would have to get on their own,” he added.
Mercer Wealth’s clients include sovereign wealth funds, family offices, and insurance companies among others.
From its office in Dubai, Mercer also looks after Africa, India and Turkey, where they also see opportunity for growth.
Wealth creation in Middle East and Africa (MEA) grew 8.5 per cent to $8.1 trillion last year from $7.5tn in 2015, higher than last year’s global average of 6 per cent and the second-highest growth in a region after Asia-Pacific which grew 9.9 per cent, according to consultancy Boston Consulting Group (BCG). In the region, where wealth grew just 1.9 per cent in 2015 compared with 2014, a pickup in oil prices has helped in wealth generation.
BCG is forecasting MEA wealth will rise to $12tn by 2021, growing at an annual average of 8 per cent.
Drivers of wealth generation in the region will be split evenly between new wealth creation and growth of performance of existing assets, according to BCG.
Another general trend in the region is clients’ looking for a comprehensive approach to investing, according to Mr AbuShaban.
“Institutional investors or some of the families are seeing a slowdown in the available capital they have to invest and in that sense they are looking at optimizing the way they manage their portfolios and making sure they are not investing haphazardly and different parts of their investment are working together,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Some clients also have a higher appetite for risk, given the low interest-rate environment that does not provide enough yield for some institutional investors. These clients are keen to invest in illiquid assets, such as private equity and infrastructure.
“What we have seen is a desire for higher returns in what has been a low-return environment specifically in various fixed income or bonds,” he said.
“In this environment, we have seen a de facto increase in the risk that clients are taking in things like illiquid investments, private equity investments, infrastructure and private debt, those kind of investments were higher illiquidity results in incrementally higher returns.”
The Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, one of the largest sovereign wealth funds, said in its 2016 report that has gradually increased its exposure in direct private equity and private credit transactions, mainly in Asian markets and especially in China and India. The authority’s private equity department focused on structured equities owing to “their defensive characteristics.”
The White Lotus: Season three
Creator: Mike White
Starring: Walton Goggins, Jason Isaacs, Natasha Rothwell
Rating: 4.5/5
8 traditional Jamaican dishes to try at Kingston 21
- Trench Town Rock: Jamaican-style curry goat served in a pastry basket with a carrot and potato garnish
- Rock Steady Jerk Chicken: chicken marinated for 24 hours and slow-cooked on the grill
- Mento Oxtail: flavoured oxtail stewed for five hours with herbs
- Ackee and salt fish: the national dish of Jamaica makes for a hearty breakfast
- Jamaican porridge: another breakfast favourite, can be made with peanut, cornmeal, banana and plantain
- Jamaican beef patty: a pastry with ground beef filling
- Hellshire Pon di Beach: Fresh fish with pickles
- Out of Many: traditional sweet potato pudding
Tax authority targets shisha levy evasion
The Federal Tax Authority will track shisha imports with electronic markers to protect customers and ensure levies have been paid.
Khalid Ali Al Bustani, director of the tax authority, on Sunday said the move is to "prevent tax evasion and support the authority’s tax collection efforts".
The scheme’s first phase, which came into effect on 1st January, 2019, covers all types of imported and domestically produced and distributed cigarettes. As of May 1, importing any type of cigarettes without the digital marks will be prohibited.
He said the latest phase will see imported and locally produced shisha tobacco tracked by the final quarter of this year.
"The FTA also maintains ongoing communication with concerned companies, to help them adapt their systems to meet our requirements and coordinate between all parties involved," he said.
As with cigarettes, shisha was hit with a 100 per cent tax in October 2017, though manufacturers and cafes absorbed some of the costs to prevent prices doubling.
Afcon 2019
SEMI-FINALS
Senegal v Tunisia, 8pm
Algeria v Nigeria, 11pm
Matches are live on BeIN Sports
Living in...
This article is part of a guide on where to live in the UAE. Our reporters will profile some of the country’s most desirable districts, provide an estimate of rental prices and introduce you to some of the residents who call each area home.
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The National's picks
4.35pm: Tilal Al Khalediah
5.10pm: Continous
5.45pm: Raging Torrent
6.20pm: West Acre
7pm: Flood Zone
7.40pm: Straight No Chaser
8.15pm: Romantic Warrior
8.50pm: Calandogan
9.30pm: Forever Young
A MINECRAFT MOVIE
Director: Jared Hess
Starring: Jack Black, Jennifer Coolidge, Jason Momoa
Rating: 3/5
BORDERLANDS
Starring: Cate Blanchett, Kevin Hart, Jamie Lee Curtis
Director: Eli Roth
Rating: 0/5
The specs: Macan Turbo
Engine: Dual synchronous electric motors
Power: 639hp
Torque: 1,130Nm
Transmission: Single-speed automatic
Touring range: 591km
Price: From Dh412,500
On sale: Deliveries start in October
THE DEALS
Hamilton $60m x 2 = $120m
Vettel $45m x 2 = $90m
Ricciardo $35m x 2 = $70m
Verstappen $55m x 3 = $165m
Leclerc $20m x 2 = $40m
TOTAL $485m
The specs
Engine: Dual 180kW and 300kW front and rear motors
Power: 480kW
Torque: 850Nm
Transmission: Single-speed automatic
Price: From Dh359,900 ($98,000)
On sale: Now
Real estate tokenisation project
Dubai launched the pilot phase of its real estate tokenisation project last month.
The initiative focuses on converting real estate assets into digital tokens recorded on blockchain technology and helps in streamlining the process of buying, selling and investing, the Dubai Land Department said.
Dubai’s real estate tokenisation market is projected to reach Dh60 billion ($16.33 billion) by 2033, representing 7 per cent of the emirate’s total property transactions, according to the DLD.
Sam Smith
Where: du Arena, Abu Dhabi
When: Saturday November 24
Rating: 4/5
Key facilities
- Olympic-size swimming pool with a split bulkhead for multi-use configurations, including water polo and 50m/25m training lanes
- Premier League-standard football pitch
- 400m Olympic running track
- NBA-spec basketball court with auditorium
- 600-seat auditorium
- Spaces for historical and cultural exploration
- An elevated football field that doubles as a helipad
- Specialist robotics and science laboratories
- AR and VR-enabled learning centres
- Disruption Lab and Research Centre for developing entrepreneurial skills
MATCH INFO
Alaves 1 (Perez 65' pen)
Real Madrid 2 (Ramos 52', Carvajal 69')
Where can I submit a sample?
Volunteers can now submit DNA samples at a number of centres across Abu Dhabi. The programme is open to all ages.
Collection centres in Abu Dhabi include:
- Abu Dhabi National Exhibition Centre (ADNEC)
- Biogenix Labs in Masdar City
- Al Towayya in Al Ain
- NMC Royal Hospital in Khalifa City
- Bareen International Hospital
- NMC Specialty Hospital, Al Ain
- NMC Royal Medical Centre - Abu Dhabi
- NMC Royal Women’s Hospital.
The specs
Engine: 3.9-litre twin-turbo V8
Power: 620hp from 5,750-7,500rpm
Torque: 760Nm from 3,000-5,750rpm
Transmission: Eight-speed dual-clutch auto
On sale: Now
Price: From Dh1.05 million ($286,000)
How to help
Call the hotline on 0502955999 or send "thenational" to the following numbers:
2289 - Dh10
2252 - Dh50
6025 - Dh20
6027 - Dh100
6026 - Dh200
MATCH INFO
Uefa Champions League semi-finals, second leg:
Liverpool (0) v Barcelona (3), Tuesday, 11pm UAE
Game is on BeIN Sports
RESULTS
Manchester United 2
Anthony Martial 30'
Scott McTominay 90 6'
Manchester City 0
Bombshell
Director: Jay Roach
Stars: Nicole Kidman, Charlize Theron, Margot Robbie
Four out of five stars
