Gander, Newfoundland and Labrador, known for its vast wartime runways and a population of about 10,000 in 2001, was transformed in the days after Sept. 11, 2001, and has seen steady growth in the decades since. The town’s emergency response to the diversion of dozens of aircraft that day — and the hospitality shown to thousands of stranded passengers — has become a defining part of its identity and a driver of tourism and local development.
On Sept. 11 and in the days that followed, Canadian air traffic controllers rerouted 38 large jets to Gander International Airport, bringing roughly 6,700 passengers to the town over five days at the height of the crisis. Gander’s residents, municipal officials and emergency services organized shelter, food, clothing and medical care for the arrivals as the United States closed its airspace; the community response is credited with providing immediate relief and comfort to those who had been stranded.
Town leaders and local volunteers say the scale of the response was enabled by planning and by community institutions. A 1997 provincial directive had prompted Gander to develop an emergency plan that brought together the Red Cross, social services, the regional hospital, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police and the Salvation Army. College campuses, schools, churches, community centres and private homes were pressed into service as makeshift shelters. School bus drivers who had recently planned to strike instead helped transport passengers from the airport to accommodations.
Percy Farwell, who was deputy mayor at the time and is now mayor, described the weeks after the attacks as an "oasis" amid terror and uncertainty. Farwell said residents emptied closets for clothing donations, brought blankets, cooked and delivered food, and opened their doors without knowing when — or whether — the passengers would be able to return home. Mac Moss, a former administrator at the College of the North Atlantic’s campus in Gander, recalled that staff at the college and elsewhere worked around the clock to meet needs and comfort frightened arrivals.
The hospitality extended to the so-called "plane people" included a local tradition known as the Screech-In, which granted honorary Newfoundland status to many visitors. Entertainment and informal community gatherings were organized for children and other passengers, and volunteers played music and staged events to keep spirits up while flights remained suspended.
The crisis also accelerated Gander’s emergence as a place of visitation and remembrance. The community response inspired the stage musical Come From Away, which dramatizes how residents accommodated the diverted passengers. The musical’s popularity has brought thousands of visitors to Gander to see the town and the local productions; officials say roughly 50,000 people have come to town in recent years to watch performances staged in a 400-seat theatre.
The long-term effects extend beyond tourism. By 2021 Gander’s population had risen by more than 20 percent from its 2001 level, municipal officials say. The town retains its aviation focus — it hosts a campus that trains aircraft maintenance technicians and continues to operate an international airport with runways built in the Second World War — and has added a regional hospital, retail amenities and a growing mining sector, including recent gold exploration near the town.
Residents and officials describe the growth as both practical and symbolic. "When we look around us and you see all the division in the world, and you see all the hatred in the world and the violence and all these sorts of things, sometimes you need some reassurance that it's not all like that," Farwell said. He and others stress that annual memorial services held in Gander are intended to honour those who died and those who were affected by the attacks, not to celebrate the town’s role.
Local responders say the experience left a lasting emotional imprint. Volunteers and emergency workers reported difficulty returning immediately to normal routines after living at a high level of intensity for several days; some described symptoms consistent with post-traumatic stress. Officials also noted a quiet period after the passengers left — a town that had felt twice its size in the crisis suddenly became a "ghost town," and the full weight of what had occurred only settled in for many residents later.
Transportation and security also changed permanently after Sept. 11. Civil aviation in the United States resumed under stricter regulations, and the global aviation system adopted far tighter security measures. For Gander, the 2001 diversions reinforced the town’s strategic importance and its capacity for crisis response, while also making the story of local compassion among the best-known narratives of that day.
Each Sept. 11, Gander holds a somber memorial that draws both local participants and visitors from abroad, with remote viewers often joining by livestream. Town leaders say the annual observance serves to remember the nearly 3,000 people killed in the attacks and to recognize the bonds of friendship that formed when strangers were cared for in the middle of a global tragedy.
Officials and residents say Gander’s identity has shifted from an isolated aviation outpost to a more diversified regional centre. The town now markets itself for visitors who want to see where the events unfolded, for students training in aviation trades, and for workers drawn by new economic opportunities. While the memories of Sept. 11 remain solemn, the community’s leaders emphasize that the lasting legacy is the compassion shown that week and the connections that have endured since.