25 Years After 9/11, a New Generation Answers the Call

A Uniformed Services University medical student and former EMT carries her firefighter father's September 11 lessons into military medicine.

September 10, 2026 by Sharon Holland

Twenty-five years ago, Americans watched firefighters, EMTs, paramedics, police officers, military personnel and other first responders move toward unimaginable danger.

Victoria Capobianco wasn't there to see it.

She hadn't been born yet.

But September 11, 2001, has been part of her life for as long as she can remember.

Her father, a firefighter/EMT with the Scarsdale Fire Department in New York, was at home when he learned the World Trade Center towers had been struck. He told his pregnant wife he needed to go help. His department wasn't organizing a response, and his chief told those who chose to go that they would be on their own.

Her father went anyway.

He loaded a large passenger van and headed toward New York City. Nine other people joined him. In the days that followed, they spent about a week at Ground Zero participating in rescue efforts before the operation shifted from rescue to recovery.

For Capobianco, that story wasn't something she learned from a textbook or documentary. It was part of her family.

She grew up just north of New York City with a fire-service radio in the house. The morning radio test became part of the rhythm of her childhood. She watched her father answer calls and saw in him something she admired: the willingness to show up when someone else was having perhaps the worst day of their life.

Eventually, she wanted to experience that responsibility herself.

After working as a medical assistant, Capobianco became an EMT while preparing for medical school.

"It was the opportunity to do something like Dad did," she said, describing her decision to become an EMT.

Her experience on the ambulance gave her a different understanding of what it means to care for someone-not simply treating a patient in a clinical setting, but meeting people where they are, physically and emotionally, often on the worst day of their lives.

One call in particular stayed with her.

Working in Yonkers, New York, she responded with her partner to a 911 call involving an unresponsive patient. Her partner didn't speak Spanish; Capobianco did. As the patient's condition deteriorated, her ability to communicate with the patient and family became an important part of the response.

The experience reinforced something she had begun learning as an EMT: sometimes caring for a patient means more than knowing what to do medically. It means being able to provide stability, direction and connection when everything around a patient feels chaotic.

That lesson now follows her into medical school at the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences (USU) School of Medicine.

Capobianco ultimately chose military medicine because she didn't want to leave behind the operational experiences that had drawn her to emergency medicine. At USU, she saw opportunities to practice medicine in austere and high-stress environments-settings where she would have to make clinical decisions with fewer resources and in unfamiliar circumstances.

"I didn't want to let go of those experiences by choosing to be a physician," she said.

25 Years Later

For Capobianco, September 11 isn't simply a historical date.

She was not alive when the attacks occurred. Her understanding of the day has evolved as she has grown older-from an awareness of the lives lost that day to a deeper understanding of the lives that continue to be affected.

"Never forget," she said, is not simply about remembering those who died. It also means recognizing the continuing consequences of the day for those who survived and those who responded.

She has seen those consequences firsthand.

Her father rarely talks about September 11. She estimates she could count on one hand the number of times her father has talked to her about that day.

It took him until 2024-23 years after the attacks-to return to Ground Zero for the first time. Although he had visited New York City hundreds of times, he struggled to orient himself when he returned because the landscape was so different from the place he remembered.

His experience has given Capobianco an understanding of 9/11 that she says she could never have learned from a textbook.

She remembers hearing him describe the dust and debris, and how responders worked until black dust covered their faces while public officials were telling them the air was safe. She has heard him talk about searching for people and finding no trace of them.

She has also seen the long-term effects of that experience-not only the physical consequences, but the psychological ones.

The Next Generation

Capobianco's story is personal, but she is not alone.

USU's Class of 2030 includes an unusually large number of students who came to medical school after serving as EMTs, paramedics, firefighters or other first responders.

For some, the experience was the first step toward medicine.

For others, it reinforced a family tradition of service.

And for others, it provided a firsthand understanding of what it means to care for people under pressure-an experience they now bring with them into medical school.

Capobianco represents the generational connection. Other members of the class illustrate the breadth of the phenomenon: students who grew up in firefighting families, served as EMTs in major cities, worked as military paramedics and firefighters, or discovered through emergency service that they wanted to become physicians.

Together, they represent something larger than a collection of interesting biographies.

They represent a generation that learned about September 11 from history-and, in some cases, from parents who lived it-and then chose to make service part of their own lives.

"Remembering Your Why"

Asked what today's military medical students can learn from the first responders who ran toward danger on September 11, Capobianco talks about being afraid and going anyway.

Her father was afraid that day, she said. But he didn't allow that fear to interfere with the oath he had taken or his calling to serve.

That's the lesson she hopes to carry into her own career. She hopes there is never another Sept. 11, she said, but if future generations face a moment when people need help, she hopes they will remember their reason for serving and put other people ahead of their own comfort.

She wants to care for service members and their families, people she views, in many ways, as first responders themselves. "I wanted to do something and be a part of something that was bigger than myself," she said.

Twenty-five years ago, her father answered a call he never expected to receive.

Today, his daughter is answering her own.