Contact: Mike Litterst, 202-306-4166 Contact: Alanna Sobel, 202-354-6486
Hundreds of Volunteers Honor the Heroes of Flight 93 MEMORIAL CONTINUES RESTORATION EFFORT WITH THIRD MASSIVE TREE PLANTING EFFORT Shanksville, Pa. - On April 25-26 the National Park Service, the National Park Foundation, and Friends of Flight 93 National Memorial are continuing a major reforestation effort that will eventually result in 150,000 new trees at Flight 93 National Memorial, which commemorates the passengers and crew of United Flight 93 and remembers all those lost on September 11, 2001. Every year during National Park Week, America's national parks host public events and coordinate volunteer opportunities to celebrate the special occasion. For a third year, Flight 93 National Memorial will honor National Park Week with Plant a Tree at Flight 93. The tree-planting events will take place from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. on April 25-26. Businesses and organizations have already committed to providing more than 150 volunteers each day, but 50 additional individuals are still needed each day to complete the work. All interested volunteers must pre-register online (first-come, first-serve) and be at least 14 years of age. Flight 93 National Memorial will still be open to the public during regular visiting hours (9 a.m. to 7 p.m., with last entry at 6:30 p.m.) on the days of the tree-planting effort. The previous two years' reforestation efforts consisted of hundreds of volunteers planting nearly 28,000 seedlings. This year, a team of more than 400 volunteers under the guidance of tree-planting experts will have the special opportunity to continue this effort and plant an additional 20,000 seedlings over 30 acres at the memorial. These trees, which are a mixture of several native species, will form an essential windbreak to protect trees planted in nearby memorial groves. Many sponsors have joined with the National Park Foundation to make this effort possible including Alcoa Foundation, Arbor Day Foundation, Enterprise Rent-A-Car, Roy A. Hunt Foundation and The UPS Foundation. Additional National Park Service partners include the American Chestnut Foundation; Appalachian Regional Commission; Appalachian Regional Reforestation Initiative; Department of Agriculture, U.S. Forest Service; Department of Interior, Office of Surface Mining, Reclamation, and Enforcement and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service; Green Forests Work; Home Depot; Indiana University of Pennsylvania;Penn State University;Pennsylvania Department of Conservation and Natural Resources, Bureau of Forestry; Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection, Bureau of Abandoned Mine Reclamation; Pennsylvania Game Commission; Rosebud Mining Company; Starbucks, Somerset. In addition to the Flight 93 National Memorial, other parks in Western Pennsylvania will also be hosting their own National Park Week events. For a full listing of all National Park Week events in Pennsylvania and across the country, go to www.nationalparkweek.org. For more information about how to support Flight 93 National Memorial, visit www.nps.gov/flni.
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Last updated: February 26, 2015