9/11 Museum construction continues

Joe Daniels, center, president of the 9/11 Memorial, speaks to reporters during a media tour of the National September 11 Memorial and Museum, Friday, Sept. 6, 2013 in New York.

Construction is racing ahead inside the museum as the 12th anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks draws near.

The wedge-shaped pavilion entrance of the National September 11 Museum (center) is located between the square outlines of the memorial waterfalls at the World Trade Center in New York.

When the museum opens next spring, the first relics that visitors will see are two massive pieces of structural steel that rose from the base of the North Tower. Now the rusty red columns soar above ground into the sunlit glass atrium that encloses the entrance to the museum.

"They're so large - about 70 feet tall - that we built the museum around them," explained Daniels.

This artist's rendering offers a view of the National 9/11 Museum, which is scheduled to open next spring.

The museum is growing a permanent collection of artifacts, stories, photos, video and other material on the 9/11 attacks.

Anthoula Katsimatides, right, a member of the 911 Memorial board, views the wreckage of FDNY Engine 21 recovered from the World Trade Center site and installed at the 911 Memorial Museum in this June 27, 2013 photo. Her brother, John Katsimatides, was killed when planes struck the towers (where he worked as a trader for Cantor Fitzgerald) on September 11, 2001.

Engine Company 21 was dispatched to the World Trade Center after Flight 175 struck the South Tower; it was parked beneath an elevated walkway when the towers fell.

9/11 Memorial president Joe Daniels and museum director Alice Greenwald speak to reporters during a media tour of the National September 11 Memorial and Museum, Friday, Sept. 6, 2013 in New York.

In this photo taken Thursday, Sept. 5, 2013, visitors to the National September 11 Memorial and Museum in New York walk between the pavilion entrance to the museum (top) and the memorial waterfalls (lower right).

One World Trade Center overlooks the pavilion entrance of the National September 11 Museum, lower right, and the square outlines of the memorial waterfalls in New York.

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9/11 Memorial Museum

The Associated Press contributed to this report.