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In Remembrance
Age:
44
Place of Residence:
Rockaway, NJ
Location on 9/11:
WTC
Occupation:
Port Authority of New York & New Jersey | Police Officer
Biography:

Liam Callahan always made it out of dangerous situations. So it was fully expected that Mr. Callahan, a Port Authority police officer, would emerge from the trade center wreckage -- even if days later.

So his wife, Joan, waited. They were supposed to celebrate 20 years of marriage on Sept. 12. But his homecoming was going to be sweeter, a wedding anniversary combined with a hero's welcome at their home in Rockaway, N.J., where they were raising four children: Brian, 17; Bridget, 15; Ellen, 13; and James, 11. Officer Callahan, however, died in the line of duty.

Police work was the lifeblood of Officer Callahan, 44, a 22-year police veteran who got at least a half of a dozen citations for exemplary actions, including a group citation for "heroic efforts" during the first trade center bombing in 1993, the police said.

One of his first rescues as a rookie came on Sept. 9, 1982. A distraught 20-year-old man was threatening to jump from the roof of the Port Authority bus terminal. "Suddenly, he slid closer to the edge, and I grabbed him," Officer Callahan told The New York Post that day. "If I didn't get him then, he would have been gone."