The RTÉ television documentary 'Sept 11th - Stories from the Twin Towers' has won a major award at one of the biggest film festivals in America.
The programme received the Gold World Medal for The Best 9-11 Documentary at The New York Festival’s 45th Annual Television Programming Awards ceremony.
The Festival, which is regarded as a showcase for the world's best television programmes, attracted a total of 2,400 entries from filmmakers in 50 countries.
The special 9-11 Documentary Category was added to this year's Festival to honour the most outstanding documentaries made by television stations in the US and world-wide in the aftermath of the New York and Washington terrorist attacks.
'Sept 11th - Stories from the Twin Towers', produced by Caroline Bleahen and presented by RTÉ’s Western Correspondent, Jim Fahy, was praised by the adjudicators for its “powerful and sensitive portrayal of the events surrounding the attack on the World Trade Centre and its aftermath”.
The 36-minute documentary, first broadcast on RTÉ 1 in December 2001,tells the story of three families - two Irish and one Irish-American - who were caught up in the September attack on the Twin Towers.
The New York Gold World Medal is the fourth award the programme has received in the US. It won Best Documentary at the prestigious 2002 Hope and Dreams Film Festival in Hope, New Jersey and has received awards from the Pennsylvania Film Festival and the Columbus,Ohio, International Film Festival.
The documentary will be shown again on RTÉ 1 at 23:40 tonight, Thursday 23 January.
