Newark Liberty International Airport is marking a milestone – today is the 20th anniversary of security being taken over by the Transportation Security Administration.

TSA was created in the wake of 9/11 to strengthen security at airports across the country. There were 225 employees when it started at the airport. Now, there are 1,300.

TSA leaders thanked those employees who have been with the agency since its start. Within a year after 9/11, TSA assumed responsibility for security at airports across the country and deployed a federal workforce to screen all commercial airline passengers and baggage.

United Flight 93 departed from Newark’s Terminal A on Sept. 11, 2001 – its intended target was the U.S. Capitol Building, but the passengers on the flight fought back and the plane crashed in Shanksville, Pennsylvania, killing all 44 people on board. Since the creation of the agency, TSA has introduced a wide variety of state-of-the-art technologies to screen passengers, cargo and baggage.

"Without TSA, our country cannot prosper, so again, thank you for 20 years of service,” said former TSA Federal Security Director Donald Drummer.

There are now 60,000 TSA employees across the country.