15 years later, funeral held for NYC fire chief killed in 9/11 attacks

Nearly 15 years after his death in the terror attacks in New York City on 9/11, family and friends bid a final farewell Friday to Safety Battalion Chief Lawrence Stack in a funeral attended by hundreds.

The fire chief's family put off such a ceremony for years, hoping to find some remains, which are needed to conduct a Catholic funeral Mass, the New York Times reported. A breakthrough occurred last year, when a blood sample Stack donated to see if he could be a blood marrow donor for a child with cancer re-emerged.

Stack’s sample, donated 18 months before he died in the collapse of the World Trade Center, had been put in storage after it was found the chief was not a match. Stack’s wife, Theresa Stack, and her two sons visited the New York Blood Center last year, and the center located Stack’s blood in a storage facility in Minnesota, the Times reported.

“All of these years sitting and waiting patiently to bury Larry and always hitting a brick wall,” Theresa Stack told Newsday. “It’s almost like a miracle ... many, many years later that we would have this blood.”

Hundreds of people, including New York Mayor Bill de Blasio, attended Friday's funeral at SS. Philip and James Church in St. James on Long Island, Newsday reported. It was the first funeral for a firefighter killed on 9/11 in 10 years. The family chose the date because it would have been Theresa and Lawrence's 49th wedding anniversary, the Times reported.

The family plans to bury the blood vial at the Calverton National Cemetery with a military burial to honor Stack’s service in the Navy, the Times reported.