A bald eagle joined a memorial ceremony in Minnesota on Tuesday commemorating the 17th anniversary of the September 11 terrorist attacks, according to a viral Facebook video capturing the moment.
The Facebook video shows the bald eagle perched on top of a fire truck holding up an American flag parked on a highway overpass in Coon Rapids, Minnesota, as members of the Andover Fire Department and several other fire departments gathered to pay tribute to the lives lost on that day.
“Isn’t that unbelievable?” Andover Fire Chief Jerry Streich said in the Facebook video. “Phenomenal.”
Streich told KARE the eagle’s landing took place at the same time as the national moment of silence, inducing chills all around.
“There’s no better symbol to represent America today than a flag but then for an eagle to land on a fire truck holding a flag, I mean, it doesn’t get much more symbolic than that,” he said.
The eagle’s unplanned landing took place after firefighters parked a few fire trucks on the overpass with U.S. flags, and hung a banner that read, “We will never forget.”
The video since gone viral, racking up more than 3.3 million views and 144,000 shares.