Firemen search through rubble at the site of the collapsed World Trade Center in New York in the aftermath of the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks in the United States. - FILE

EIGHT YEARS after her daughter perished in the terrorist attack on the World Trade Center in New York, Lelith Burgen is still living in denial.

She does not believe her little girl, Venesha Rodgers-Richards, is dead.

"Some people might say I am crazy, but I still believe that one day she is going to walk through my front door because I have seen nothing, nothing at all to convince me that she is gone," said Burgen.

Speaking with The Gleaner yesterday from her New Jersey home, Burgen, who has been living in the United States for the past 30 years, stressed that for the first five years after the 2001 tragedy, she would group up with thousands of people in the US to commemorate the deaths of the victims.

"I don't do that anymore. Like tomorrow (today), I am just going to lock away myself. Sometimes I cry, read my Bible and beg God to give me strength. It has been an uphill task for me. My daughter and I were very close, she was like my best friend," said Burgen.

Last words

She still remembers vividly the last conversation she had with her 26-year-old daughter, who was employed as a claims representative at Marsh and McLennon Insurance Company, which was located in one of the twin towers at the time.

"The last we spoke was the evening before the incident. She came to my house to pick up her daughter. Just before she left, she jokingly said to me, 'Woman, mi have a life, so mi going home'. She blew a kiss to me and I blew her back one. I then walked her to the porch and watched her car drive up the road until it vanished out of sight. I never saw her again," said Burgen, who is the mother of four other children.

Her daughter was among nearly 3,000 people who died on the morning of September 11, 2001, when al-Qaida terrorists hijacked four commercial passenger jets and intentionally crashed two of the airliners into the twin towers of the World Trade Center. More than 20 of the victims were Jamaicans.

The hijackers crashed a third airliner into the Pentagon in Arlington, Virginia, just outside of Washington, DC. The fourth plane crashed into a field near Shanksville in rural Pennsylvania after some of its passengers and flight crew attempted to retake control of the plane, which the hijackers had redirected towards Washington, DC. There were no survivors from any of the flights.

glenroy.sinclair@gleanerjm.com