It's been eight years since the 9/11 attacks that destroyed the World Trade Center and killed almost 3,000 innocent prople— enough time for two presidential elections; U.S. military involvement in Afghanistan and Iraq; the fall of a dictatorship; the battle of New Orleans versus Katrina; the Great Recession; and countless other famous and infamous news-making events. However, none have supplanted the memory of that tragic morning when horrified Americans and our neighbors across the world watched the devastation unfold.

Throughout these eight years, many 9/11 memorials have been suggested. Some have been realized, some scrapped, and some are in development. Perhaps the most fitting to date, the USS New York, steamed into New York harbor Nov. 2 as firefighters, bagpipers, and those who lost loved ones on 9/11 watched. As reported on CNN.com, the new Navy assault ship's bow was fabricated using seven and a half tons of steel recovered from the wreckage of the WTC.

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Editors know that fab shop owners wear many (many, many) hats, and depending on the size of the shop, have to be equal parts accountant, purchasing agent, sales manager, marketing guru, safety officer, shop supervisor, process troubleshooter, training manager, human resources department, and maybe even chief cook and bottle washer. Heck, some probably even get to lend a hand on the shop floor once in a while, doing the one thing they probably love the most: running the machines that fabricate metal products. Taking a bigger look at the process sheds some light on a bigger process: The metal cycle. The process starts with a metal ore and ends when the finished item's service life comes to an end when a product is thrown away, a car is junked, or a building is torn down. But the material itself doesn't have to be banished to the scrap heap. Many of the alloys we use today can be recycled many times over, perhaps indefinitely.

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