Crowds flocked to Ground Zero on Sunday night as news of the death of terrorist leader Osama Bin Laden at the hands of Navy SEALS via a covert, Barrack Obama-sanctioned operation broke and began to spread.  A good chunk of the people that ventured downtown to the former site of the Twin Towers were the surviving family members of those lost in the September 11th attacks of 2001. The news that Bin Laden was taken out brought a lot of still unhealed memories to the surface, but there was an overwhelming sense of vindication at the news and the reality it represented.

NY1 reports that Dianna Massaroli, widow of Cantor Fitzgerald employee Michael Massaroli, couldn’t stay away. “I had to come. Wide awake, beaming, we had to come,” said Massaroli.

Ricky Rubenfeld returned to the site to honor her cousin who perished in the attacks; his remains were not found until a full two weeks later. “We’re here not only to commemorate his death but to celebrate this amazing victory,” she said. “It’s a sense of relief and a sense of justice that [this] brought for our family. For all of the pain and the suffering that my cousin and his wife and his daughters and my father and the rest of the family endured.”

Katie McAvoy’s firefighter father John lost his life trying to save the lives of others on that fateful day. McAvoy was just  a teen when she lost her dad, but she has a very adult view and perspective regarding the matter.  “Justice has been served,” she said. “I think he would hopefully feel satisfied.”

Where were you when you heard the news that Osama Bin Laden had been killed?