Virginia Tech defensive end Cortez Harris (left) blocks a punt by VMI punter Ben Shrewsbury during the second quarter that was recovered by Knahlij Harrell for the Hokies' touchdown in Saturday's game at Lane Stadium.
Virginia Tech defensive end Cortez Harris (left) blocks a punt by VMI punter Ben Shrewsbury during the second quarter that was recovered by Knahlij Harrell for the Hokies' touchdown in Saturday's game at Lane Stadium.
There is a new chief on watch.
James Richards has stepped into the role at the Scruggs Volunteer Fire Department following longtime chief Dempsey Moore's recent decision to step down.
Moore was the department's chief for 14 years, succeeding one of the department's founders, V.T. "Slim" Crawford.
Scruggs Volunteer Fire Department Chief James Richards, left, looks over one of the fire trucks with former chief Dempsey Moore, who stepped down recently.
Originally from Pineville, West Virginia, Moore retired to Franklin County in 1997 after spending years as a coal miner. He met Crawford after only a few days in the county when he noticed Scruggs volunteers fighting a brush fire and decided to give them a hand.
"When we got done, he asked when I was going to fill out an application," Moore said of first meeting Crawford.
Moore joined the department and was named assistant chief within three years, beginning a new phase in his life as a volunteer firefighter. In that time, Moore said he learned to love the community and the people who have done so much to support the department over the years.
Scruggs is routinely one of the better-funded fire departments, as part of its support comes from residents at Smith Mountain Lake.
"He was the one that started this place and he got it off on the right foot," Moore said of Crawford. "For Slim, there was nothing like his community. He would fight for anything for this community and I would too."
Moore said it took some time for the community to accept him as the new chief following someone as well-loved as Crawford. But over the years he grew to be just as respected as his predecessor — and he shares that respect.
"To me, this community is my family," Moore said.
During his time as chief, Moore worked to protect that family within the department. He pushed for increased safety and training to help assure everyone who answers a call can come home unscathed.
Moore said it came from his previous career as a coal miner, where safety was critical.
Looking back, Moore said he would like to be remembered as someone who cared for his community and worked hard to grow the department.
"I did it because I loved it," he said. "Because I wanted to help people. I didn't just fill a position, I did things that made people respect me and see that I was trying to make us a better department, a safer department to provide better service for them."
Scruggs Volunteer Fire Department Chief James Richards, left, shakes hands with former chief Dempsey Moore.
Moore cited health reasons for his decision to step down as chief.
Although his time as chief is over, Moore is not leaving the department. Just as Crawford remained a volunteer to mentor Moore, he plans to remain on and provide assistance to Richards.
Richards was voted in by the department as the new chief in July. Moore said Richards was his first and only choice.
"I wouldn't have stepped down if he wouldn't have taken the position," Moore said.
Richards was previously a member of the Glade Hill Volunteer Fire Department before coming over to Scruggs four years ago. He said the department quickly welcomed him when he arrived.
When he is not volunteering at Scruggs, Richards works as a firefighter at Station 5 in Roanoke. He is a first lieutenant on the station's ladder truck.
As the new chief, Richards said his goal is to continue Moore's work. One area of focus is to continue growing membership.
Richards said Scruggs will take anyone willing to volunteer time at the department. That could be working in an office helping to write grants, assisting on the scene of a fire or incident, or even being someone who fights fires.
"There is always a job for somebody," Richards said.
Moore said the goal for both of them is to make sure the department continues to grow and be successful into the future. Richards added that will require hard work and high standards for their volunteers.
"I want to see this department keep growing," Moore said. "James wants the same thing. We are looking at 10, 15 years down the road. We want tomorrow to be good. We want to be ready for the future 15 years from now."
Jason Dunovant (540) 981-3324
Former Scruggs Volunteer Fire Department chief Dempsey Moore discusses his decision to step down.
RICHMOND — Robert Gray promised himself that this year, on the 25th anniversary of the terrorist attacks on Sept. 11, 2001, he would visit all three of the sites hit by hijacked airliners that day.
Gray, a retired battalion chief for the Arlington County Fire Department, fought the fires that engulfed part of the Pentagon after American Airlines Flight 77 slammed into the building at more than 500 miles per hour on that Tuesday morning. He led the monumental effort to shore up the damaged portion of the building to prevent its collapse, even as firefighters tried to quell the rooftop blazes that threatened to shut down the headquarters of the United States military.
Robert Gray, retired Arlington fire battalion chief, stands outside of the Pentagon in 2026.
He had donated the helmet and other fire gear he wore that day to the 9/11 Memorial & Museum in New York City, where 343 firefighters died after Al-Qaida terrorists flew two hijacked airliners into the twin towers of the World Trade Center in lower Manhattan.
But Gray had not visited the Flight 93 National Memorial in Somerset County, Pa., where a hijacked airplane, United Airlines Flight 93, crashed into a farm field near Shanksville after passengers fought the attackers and prevented them from targeting the U.S. Capitol or White House.
He finished his quest this month by speaking at a remembrance ceremony at the Pennsylvania site for the firefighters who responded to the crash, which killed 40 passengers and crew members.
"May we live worthy of the sacrifice they have made," Gray said, according to local news accounts.
The sacrifice includes the loss of 184 people at the Pentagon — 125 civilian and military employees, and 59 passengers on Flight 77 — whose story still isn't fully told at the site. The Pentagon is the only one of the three attack sites that doesn't have an education center for the 1 million people who visit each year.
"This has kind of been overlooked," Gray said.
No more.
A rendering of the 9/11 Pentagon Memorial Visitor Education Center is seen above.
Dawn is seen at the Pentagon Memorial, which features 184 benches, one to honor each victim of the Sept. 11 terrorist attack at the Pentagon.
The Pentagon Memorial Fund will break ground for a $100 million visitor education center on Saturday, the day after the 25th anniversary of Sept. 11, with plans to open it in 2029. The ground-breaking will be ceremonial, held at the National 9/11 Pentagon Memorial, which opened outside the Pentagon in 2008. The memorial features 184 benches to honor each victim, pointed to the sky from which the plane came for the passengers or the building that it hit for the employees.
Secretary of the Interior Doug Burgum has signed a "decision memo" to approve the National 9/11 Pentagon Memorial as an "affiliated area" of the National Park System, according to a source with knowledge of the agreement. Over the last several months, the source said the National Park Service has been collaborating with the Department of Defense and The Pentagon Memorial Fund to complete a three-way agreement.
The designation represents federal recognition of the site's historical significance, although the National Park Service would not own or operate it.
Virginia appropriated $1 million in its new budget this year to help build the center between the Pentagon and Arlington National Cemetery. The memorial fund is asking the state for an additional $2 million in the next fiscal year, which will begin on July 1. Congress appropriated $12 million for the project in the fiscal year that ends on Sept. 30, and the fund is seeking an additional $35 million in the federal defense appropriations bill for the next fiscal year, although the House of Representatives has proposed $15 million.
Private donors have already pledged upwards of $20 million. The memorial fund hosted a black-tie gala on Thursday night in Arlington in remembrance of the victims, survivors, families and first responders in the Sept. 11 attacks. The event also raised money for the 9/11 Pentagon Memorial Visitor Education Center.
"It's for the generations that were not there," said Joe Kornhoff, executive director of The Pentagon Memorial Fund.
Joe Kornhoff, executive director of the Pentagon Memorial Fund, is next to a plaque with the names of the 184 people killed in the terrorist attack on the Pentagon on Sept. 11, 2001.
Kornhoff was a 15-year-old student watching the attacks unfold on television in a classroom at his high school in Fairfax County. His mother, Carol Ann, was in the building, a former soldier who worked as a civilian for the U.S. Army, adjacent to the side of the building that the jet struck.
"I know every Sept. 11th, my mom looks up at the sky and thanks God she is here," he said.
Kornhoff is a former Army captain who received a Bronze Star and a Combat Infantry Badge for his service in Afghanistan. He served on active duty in the Army for six years. He then worked for 11 years in various roles as a civilian employee of the service.
"For me, it changed my life," he said of the Sept. 11 attacks.
Gray, a Woodbridge native who retired in 2011 after 30 years with the Arlington County Fire Department, was attending a regional meeting of heavy rescue teams in Washington, D.C. on Sept. 11, 2001. He was the captain of the heavy rescue team at Fire Station 4, which would fight its way into the building to fight the fire and rescue survivors.
After reports of planes hitting the World Trade Center in New York, they were told to report to their duty stations. Gray headed back to Arlington, "and that's when it all started."
Fire Station 5, which was part of his battalion, was the first to reach the Pentagon. When Gray arrived, he said, "It felt evil to me, absolutely evil."
Asked often to rate the challenge of fighting the Pentagon fire on a scale of 1 to 10, he said, "My answer is 250. It always will be."
Gray told his squad, contrary to official practice, to conserve as much of their oxygen supply as possible before entering the blazing building, knowing that it would take time and tremendous effort to advance into the massive building.
"You had to save your air," he recalled in an interview last month at the 9/11 Pentagon Memorial. "And then, when you really felt like you were at serious risk, then you put your mask on. That's why we made it in much deeper, much deeper, and we made it out safe. It's all about calculating the risk."
At the same time, firefighters faced the danger of the building collapsing, which Gray said "would have taken 60 to 70 people out" as they fought the fires.
On Sept. 11, 2001, firefighters work near the gap in the Pentagon after terrorists crashed American Airlines Flight 77 into the building.
Over the next two weeks, he led a team to shore up the building, which is why he titled his 2024 memoir, "Shoring Up Ourselves: An Inspirational Story of Never Giving Up."
Gray, who later suffered a traumatic brain injury from a fall at home, still draws inspiration from the sacrifices and heroism he witnessed on Sept. 11. In 2019, he founded the "9/11 Ride of Hope," which organizes bicycle rides every year to commemorate the anniversary of the 9/11 attacks.
This year, he planned the ride on Thursday morning, the day before the anniversary, starting at Fire Station 6 in northwest Arlington and ending at Fire Station 5 south of the Pentagon.
"It's time to reflect on what we've experienced and show our concern for those lost on that day," Gray said. "All of the losses are the same."
Michael Martz (804) 649-6964
Joe Kornhoff, executive director of the Pentagon Memorial Fund, describes the site of the proposed visitor education center.
Suhaila Suhail was a young child when she first saw American troops enter her village in Ghazni Province, Afghanistan. Although she had never seen the large military vehicles or the soldiers’ uniforms, she wasn’t afraid. To her, they were heroes.
She knew nothing about the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks in the United States. She can barely recall that period when the U.S. invaded her country in response, seeking to destroy the al-Qaida terror network that launched 9/11. What she remembers most from 2001 is that she felt encouraged by the new military presence because the soldiers were driving out the Taliban — and she was afraid of the Taliban.
“I respect them a lot because at that time I was so young and I felt so good when I saw them.”
Unlike her frightening experiences under the Taliban, Suhail said the arrival of foreign forces brought a sense of comfort, she noticed they treated men and women equally and wanted to help. Her parents had always warned her to stay away from the Taliban. They shared stories of a time when these precautions were not necessary, before the militants first seized control of the country in 1996.
“My family, my mother, my father, they talk about the Taliban and they talk with me and they said, please be careful about your hijab and don't go out a lot because the Taliban will arrest you.”
Suhaila Suhail, former officer in the Afghan National Army, is pictured in her Blacksburg apartment in 2023. She's since co-founded a nonprofit, She Leads Tomorrow, empowering Afghan women through education.
When Suhail graduated from college at age 18, she joined the Afghan National Army. She studied law and intelligence and transitioned to become an intelligence officer for her country's military, working with U.S. troops. She wanted to stand up for equal rights for women and keep the Taliban out of her country. When they were under Taliban rule, girls were not allowed to attend school past sixth grade.
"I wanted to fight for the vulnerable because I believe the Taliban have caused a lot of pain and suffering in our society, Suhail said.
It was not until Suhail came to the United States that she truly learned about the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks that had set her life path on fighting extremism. After the U.S. withdrawal from her county in August 2021, she fled for her life and has come to make a new home in the Roanoke Valley.
Suhail came to Blacksburg about five years ago, learned to speak English, and is working on a college degree in information technology. During her time here she visited New York City and The National September 11 Memorial on the site of the former World Trade Center towers.
“I felt sad, too many people died,” Suhail said.
Her life, like Americans’, was upended by al-Qaida, the Islamic militant group that not only executed the Sept. 11 attacks but also supported the Taliban’s rise to power in Afghanistan. Since 2021, the Taliban has reimplemented its ban on education for girls and women beyond primary school, the only country in the world to do so, according to the United Nations.
“We should work for equality, be human and live together without people losing their family or their homeland,” Suhail said.
While Suhail is rebuilding her life, she has never forgotten the women left behind in Afghanistan. Twenty-five years after she first saw U.S. forces enter her village, her fight against terrorism continues — not with weapons, but by uplifting women through She Leads Tomorrow, a nonprofit she co-founded with Virginia Tech professor Scott Bailey, who also founded and is president of Blacksburg Refugee Partnership.
She Leads Tomorrow directly supports Afghan women’s education. It began with Suhail and Bailey helping a few women who reached out for help with the Test of English as a Foreign Language, or TOEFL, and college applications to study abroad. Then it quickly expanded into an online chat group that grew to hundreds of eager students. Recognizing the immense need, Suhail and Bailey pooled their expertise to expand the initiative.
Today, the organization has impacted more than 700 women in Afghanistan by offering a diverse curriculum that ranges from core subjects like math, science and journalism to crucial mental health resources. Professionals from around the world volunteer their time to teach these free, online classes, while the nonprofit raises funds to cover internet costs so the students can safely connect to their classrooms.
Bailey said the women who apply for the program are thirsty to learn.
“They're hardcore. Nobody gets a pass because they have a difficult situation. They have to apply,” Bailey said.
Bailey shared stories of women going above and beyond to get an education. In one instance, he said, a woman sent him a photo of a large snake she had to kill on her rooftop. She had snuck up in the cover of night to study in secret.
He notes that one way to rise from the tragedy of Sept. 11 is to help Afghan women reclaim their country through education.
“You know 9/11 was about how much anger there was in the world and hatred and desire for vengeance,” Bailey said. “Everything with these women is about peace, and you know forget all this evil that's going on in the world. Let's focus on education and mutual support and overcome all of that peacefully.”
Heather Rousseau (540) 981-3394
Afghan Army Veteran reads a poem she wrote about her homeland
Boone District representative Mike Meredith, left, announced his resignation at the Franklin County Board of Supervisors meeting Aug. 18. The announcement came days after he revealed that a data center proposal, Project Flash, had ended.
Mike Meredith will not fight to retain the Boone District seat on the Franklin County Board of Supervisors, citing a lengthy legal process and significant costs.
“I want to sincerely thank the citizens for their support throughout this difficult period,” Meredith said in a Facebook post announcing his decision. “I plan to fully support whoever is appointed, and I hope they will continue to serve the Boone District with openness, communication, and dedication.”
Meredith announced he was resigning during a board meeting Aug. 18, two days after he told the public that a proposed data center in the county — dubbed Project Flash — would not be proceeding.
He told the Roanoke Times that the decision to resign came out of a closed session before the meeting, where the board discussed how the release of confidential information — the status of the data center — could be detrimental to the county.
But on Aug. 31, Meredith sent an email to the board stating his intention to complete his term. He wrote in the email that his resignation was not officially completed, because there was no motion, resolution or recorded vote regarding his announcement.
Meredith wrote in the Facebook post that the legal process to retain his seat would be an uphill battle that would accrue significant costs for both himself and the county. He added that the process would take weeks and could be resolved close to 2027, when a special election is already scheduled.
“With that in mind, I believe it is in everyone’s best interest not to move forward,” Meredith said.
He thanked citizens for their support, adding that he knows the situation “has been overwhelming for many in our county.”
“I hope we can now return to a sense of normalcy and focus on helping Franklin County grow in a positive, constructive way,” he said.
The county has moved forward with the process of filling the Boone District seat. It announced five applicants for the position on Sept. 3 and is set to vote on Meredith’s replacement during a special called meeting Friday.
