More than 650 people have signed up to climb 110 flights of stairs inside the Hilton San Diego Bayfront on September 5, each one wearing the badge of a first responder who died on September 11, 2001. The event marks 25 years since the attacks and is the 14th annual edition of San Diego’s memorial stair climb, which raises money for a nonprofit that supports local firefighters and their families.
The climb, first reported by FOX 5 San Diego and KUSI News, will take participants through the hotel’s stairwell in loops to reach a total of 110 flights, matching the number of flights in the World Trade Center. Each climber can choose to honor one of the 403 first responders who died that day, displaying that person’s professional headshot on their climber badge. Registration is open through the event website, and organizers have set a fundraising goal of $120,000, with more than $44,000 already raised as of late August, according to the San Diego Stair Climb event site.
Because the Hilton San Diego Bayfront stands 30 stories and 385 feet tall, per Wikipedia, climbers must loop through the interior stairwell multiple times rather than making a single ascent to hit the full 110-story count that honors the fallen. The opening ceremony is set for shortly after 8 a.m. on September 5, with the San Diego Fire-Rescue chief beginning the climb around 8:46 a.m. — the exact time American Airlines Flight 11 crashed into the World Trade Center’s North Tower, according to the seed report.
Honor Teams and a Piece of Ground Zero Steel
Other teams will begin climbing in waves according to their registration times, and honor teams will each represent a significant event that happened on 9/11. The top five fundraising teams will be designated as honor teams for the event. Past iterations of the San Diego climb have featured a recovered piece of World Trade Center steel that climbers touch while reciting the name of the fallen responder on their badge, a ritual detailed by CBS 8 San Diego…