Today will be remembered at Texas A&M and across Texas on today's 20th anniversary of the Aggie Bonfire collapse.
It was about 3AM on November 18th, 1999, that the massive, 59 foot tall stack of logs, which was on its way to being completed for what was an annual ritual before the football game against the University of Texas, collapsed. Eleven students and one former student were killed at 27 were hurt.
The first memorial happened early this morning at the time of the bonfire collapse.
Brooke Wilson, who heads A&M's 'Traditions Council' says several other memorial events will take place today, because A&M stresses the importance of traditions.
Wilson said, "one thing about the Aggie community that I think is so special, is we are never going to turn down another Aggie, and we will do everything we can to help out."
Wilson says freshmen at Texas A&M who hadn't been born yet on that day twenty years ago are participating in today's events in memory and in honor of the 12 victims.
Special monuments and memorial rooms have been created on campus.
The Aggie Bonfire dated back to 1907, and came to symbolize A&M's 'burning desire to beat the hell out of T.U.," as Aggies call the University of Texas. At one point in the forties, Bonfire was referred to as 'the greatest event of the football season.
The annual tradition evolved into the bonfire as it was known in the late 1990's, a massive bonfire that consumed an orange outhouse, as thousands of Aggies looked on and cheered.
Since the bonfire collapse, Bonfire has not been a sanctioned campus event, but student led bonfires have emerged in the woods around College Station.