Longboat prepares for annual Sept. 11 memorial

The town of Longboat Key this year will again commemorate the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001 with a display of 2,977 American flags, arrayed along Gulf of Mexico Drive over the length of the island.

Longboat Key launched the flag display in 2002, a year after the terror attacks in New York, Pennsylvania and Washington D.C., as a low-key memorial to the nearly 3,000 victims.

 The project was the brainchild of Longboat Key Chamber of Commerce President Gail Loefgren. The town’s Public Works Department has set up the display every year since.

The flags will be installed in the afternoon of Sept. 10, each about 20 to 30 feet apart on both sides of the highway and along Bay Isles Road, and will fly through the day Wednesday, Sept. 11.

They will be removed Sept. 12.