A Somerset County town held a ceremony Tuesday evening to honor six members of the community killed in the Sept. 11 attacks.

Franklin Township resident Sam Velu says that he remembers the day of the attack 18 years ago very clearly. His office was across the street from the World Trade Center.

"It's still fresh, I can still see the people. I remember everyone I was walking with,” Velu says.

Velu says that he was outside when the second plane flew into the South Tower.

“People were panicking and they were leaving…the toughest part was watching the people fall from the towers. They were jumping and they were right there,” says Velu as he gets emotional. “That's a part that will never go away for me."

Velu attended Tuesday night’s ceremony to honor his neighbors. Six Franklin Township residents died in the attack.

“There's a sense of community, there's a sense of family. On Sept. 11, we lost part of that family, so it is really important that we not only honor them the first year after it happened, but year after year,” says Franklin Township special projects manager Saffie Kallon.

Velu says that it hasn’t gotten any easier to deal with the tragedy. But he says that he learned an important lesson.

"This is my second life, I don't care about what people think, I live to my fullest. I live like I’m going to die today,” he says.

A memorial was put up in the township’s municipal complex in 2015. The township also received a beam from the World Trade Center to put in its memorial.