SpaceX Reflects on Sept. 11 Anniversary (Photo)

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An American flies from the top of SpaceX's Falcon 9 rocket support structure at Vandenberg Air Force Base in California on Sept. 11, 2013.
An American flies from the top of SpaceX's Falcon 9 rocket support structure at Vandenberg Air Force Base in California on Sept. 11, 2013. (Image credit: SpaceX)

The private spaceflight company SpaceX joined Americans across the United States to mourn those killed in the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, this afternoon with a simple statement and patriotic photo.

This afternoon, SpaceX took a moment from preparing for its first Falcon 9 rocket launch from California to fly an American flag from its launch tower. SpaceX officials posted the image to its Twitter page (@SpaceX) with the simple message: "Today, we look onward and upward, but #neverforget."

The Hawthorne, Calif.-based SpaceX is preparing to launch an upgraded version of its Falcon 9 rocket from California's Vandenberg Air Force Base to loft the Cassiope space weather satellite for Canada. The rocket will launch on Sept. 15 and also carry a small satellite, called DANDE, built by students at the University of Colorado Boulder to study the drag effects of the Earth's upper atmosphere, known as the thermosphere, on satellites in space.  

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Tariq Malik
Tariq Malik
Editor-in-Chief

Tariq is the Editor-in-Chief of Space.com and joined the team in 2001, first as an intern and staff writer, and later as an editor. He covers human spaceflight, exploration and space science, as well as skywatching and entertainment. He became Space.com's Managing Editor in 2009 and Editor-in-Chief in 2019. Before joining Space.com, Tariq was a staff reporter for The Los Angeles Times covering education and city beats in La Habra, Fullerton and Huntington Beach. In October 2022, Tariq received the Harry Kolcum Award for excellence in space reporting from the National Space Club Florida Committee. He is also an Eagle Scout (yes, he has the Space Exploration merit badge) and went to Space Camp four times as a kid and a fifth time as an adult. He has journalism degrees from the University of Southern California and New York University. You can find Tariq at Space.com and as the co-host to the This Week In Space podcast with space historian Rod Pyle on the TWiT network. To see his latest project, you can follow Tariq on Twitter @tariqjmalik.