Merrick-Bellmore ‘thrilled’ that bin Laden is gone

“I’m thrilled that he’s gone.”

That is what Merokean Carol Gies had to say on Monday morning about the death of Osama bin Laden, shortly after President Obama announced to the world on Sunday night that the al Qaeda leader and 9/11 mastermind was killed in a 40-minute firefight with U.S. Navy seals at a fortified compound outside of Islamabad, Pakistan’s capital.

Gies’s husband, Ronnie, a New York City firefighter and Merrick Fire Department chief, died trying to save others inside the World Trade Center on Sept. 11, 2001. He was one of 343 city firefighters who were killed in the worst terrorist attack perpetrated on American soil. Ever since, Carol Gies said that she and her three sons –– Tommy, Ronnie Jr. and Bobby –– have struggled to make sense of the attacks and find some sense of closure, some relief from their psychic pain.

News of bin Laden’s death reopened the “raw” wounds that Gies felt in the days and weeks after 19 al Qaeda hijackers slammed two jets into the Twin Towers, causing them to crash to the ground in a fireball. At the same time, Gies said, news of his death gave her a moment to pause. She said she worries about her two oldest sons, Tommy, 28, and Ronnie, 26, both of whom followed in their father’s footsteps and joined the Fire Department of New York. She said she fears a retaliatory attack in the city that her sons could become caught up in.

“I’m worried for my children, very worried for my children,” Carol Gies said.

Her mix of emotions after bin Laden’s death mirrored the reactions of many Merrick and Bellmore residents, who a decade after the 9/11 attacks are, in many ways, still coping with the horror of the event. The Merrick-Bellmore community lost 24 residents on Sept. 11, including four New York City firefighters.