7 January 2002
Date: Sun, 06 Jan 2002 12:25:07 -0700 From: American Patriot Friends Network <APFN@apfn.org> To: APFN SMARTGROUP <APFN@smartgroups.com> CC: NCEpanacea@aol.com, jmcm5@lycos.com, senator@clinton.senate.gov, director@fema.gov Subject: ~Firefighter Magazine Raps 9/11 Probe~ -------- Original Message -------- Subject: Re: Firefighter Magazine Raps 9/11 Probe Date: Sun, 06 Jan 2002 10:29:51 -0800 From: "Jim McMichael" <jmcm5@lycos.com> These articles were brought to my attention by a friend Ken at NCEpanacea@aol.com : 1. The New York Daily News paraphrase and interview with Bill Manning, editor of fire Engineering 2. Manning's original Fire Engineering editorial, January 2001. 3. Another Fire Engineering editorial, same issue. The third article affirms the plane wrecks by suicide hijackers, affirms the collapse of the WTC by fire -- but most compelling, observes that WTC is "[t]he first total collapse of a high-rise during a fire in United States history." Ahem. Quite a landmark event. Most remarkable, given the statements in NYDN editorial that: "The World Trade Center is not the only lightweight, core construction high-rise in the U.S. It's a typical method of construction." But the US Government (FEMA etc.) is moving rapidly to destroy the evidence, cutting it up and selling it for scrap without serious investigation -- eerily reminiscent of the Murrah Building (OKC) destruction and cleanup, and of the quarantine and excavation of the site where scores of Branch Davidians died in Waco. Row, row, row your boat ... truth is whatever they tell us it is. J ========================= http://www.nydailynews.com/2002-01-04/News_and_Views/City_Beat/a-137143.asp?last6days=1 [Note: If you want to see on its original web page through the URL above, I suggest you get it today. Otherwise, it may be available only through the archives.] From: News and Views | City Beat | Friday, January 04, 2002 Firefighter Mag Raps 9/11 Probe By JOE CALDERONE Daily News Chief of Investigations A respected firefighting trade magazine with ties to the city Fire Department is calling for a "full-throttle, fully resourced" investigation into the collapse of the World Trade Center. A signed editorial in the January issue of Fire Engineering magazine says the current investigation is "a half-baked farce." The piece by Bill Manning, editor of the 125-year-old monthly that frequently publishes technical studies of major fires, also says the steel from the site should be preserved so investigators can examine what caused the collapse. "Did they throw away the locked doors from the Triangle Shirtwaist fire? Did they throw away the gas can used at the Happy Land social club fire? ... That's what they're doing at the World Trade Center," the editorial says. "The destruction and removal of evidence must stop immediately." Fire Engineering counted FDNY Deputy Chief Raymond Downey, the department's chief structural expert, among its senior advisers. Downey was killed in the Sept. 11 attack. John Jay College's fire engineering expert, Prof. Glenn Corbett, serves as the magazine's technical editor. A group of engineers from the American Society of Civil Engineers, with backing from the Federal Emergency Management Agency, has been studying some aspects of the collapse. But Manning and others say that probe has not looked at all aspects of the disaster and has had limited access to documents and other evidence. A growing number of fire protection engineers have theorized that "the structural damage from the planes and the explosive ignition of jet fuel in themselves were not enough to bring down the towers," the editorial stated. A FEMA spokesman, John Czwartacki, said agency officials had not yet seen the editorial and declined to comment. Norida Torriente, a spokeswoman for the American Society of Civil Engineers, described her group's study as a "beginning" and "not a definitive work." Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) has joined a group of relatives of firefighters who died in the attack in calling for a blue-ribbon panel to study the collapse. "We have to learn from incidents through investigation to determine what types of codes should be in place and what are the best practices for high-rise construction," Manning told the Daily News. "The World Trade Center is not the only lightweight, core construction high-rise in the U.S. It's a typical method of construction." ========================================================= http://fe.pennnet.com/Articles/Article_Display.cfm?Section=OnlineArticlesSubSection=Display&PUBLICATION_ID=25ARTICLE_ID=131225 "Burning Questions...Need Answers": FE's Bill Manning Calls for Comprehensive Investigation of WTC Collapse Fair Lawn, NJ, January 4, 2002 - Bill Manning, Fire Engineering's editor in chief, is summoning members of the fire service to "A Call to Action." In his January 2002 Editor's Opinion, "$elling Out the Investigation" (below ), he warns that unless there is a full-blown investigation by an independent panel established solely for that purpose, "the World Trade Center fire and collapse will amount to paper- and computer-generated hypotheticals." Manning explained: "Clearly, there are burning questions that need answers .... The lessons about the buildings' design and behavior in this extraordinary event must be learned and applied in the real world." In an interview with the New York Daily News today, Manning reiterated his call for a "full-throttle, fully resourced" investigation into the collapse of the World Trade Center. He is asking members of the fire service to read "WTC 'Investigation'? A Call to Action" in the January 2002 issue of Fire Engineering and at fireengineering.com and to contact their representatives in Congress and officials in Washington to ask that a blue ribbon panel be convened to thoroughly investigate the WTC collapse. Among those also calling for the investigation are Sally Regenhard, the mother of Christian Regenhard, the Fire Department of New York (FDNY) probationary firefighter killed in the World Trade Center (WTC) attack, and founder of the Campaign for Skyscraper Safety; Give Your Voice, a civilian relatives' group headed by Michael Cartier, who lost his brother in the collapse; prominent structural engineers and fire-safety experts, and New York State Senators Charles Schumer and Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton. [Continuing text from the Fire Engineering page] $elling Out the Investigation By Bill Manning Did they throw away the locked doors from the Triangle Shirtwaist Fire? Did they throw away the gas can used at the Happyland Social Club Fire? Did they cast aside the pressure-regulating valves at the Meridian Plaza Fire? Of course not. But essentially, that's what they're doing at the World Trade Center. For more than three months, structural steel from the World Trade Center has been and continues to be cut up and sold for scrap. Crucial evidence that could answer many questions about high-rise building design practices and performance under fire conditions is on the slow boat to China, perhaps never to be seen again in America until you buy your next car. Such destruction of evidence shows the astounding ignorance of government officials to the value of a thorough, scientific investigation of the largest fire-induced collapse in world history. I have combed through our national standard for fire investigation, NFPA 921, but nowhere in it does one find an exemption allowing the destruction of evidence for buildings over 10 stories tall. Hoping beyond hope, I have called experts to ask if the towers were the only high-rise buildings in America of lightweight, center-core construction. No such luck. I made other calls asking if these were the only buildings in America with light-density, sprayed-on fireproofing. Again, no luck-they were two of thousands that fit the description. Comprehensive disaster investigations mean increased safety. They mean positive change. NASA knows it. The NTSB knows it. Does FEMA know it? No. Fire Engineering has good reason to believe that the "official investigation" blessed by FEMA and run by the American Society of Civil Engineers is a half-baked farce that may already have been commandeered by political forces whose primary interests, to put it mildly, lie far afield of full disclosure. Except for the marginal benefit obtained from a three-day, visual walk-through of evidence sites conducted by ASCE investigation committee members- described by one close source as a "tourist trip"-no one's checking the evidence for anything. Maybe we should live and work in planes. That way, if disaster strikes, we will at least be sure that a thorough investigation will help find ways to increase safety for our survivors. As things now stand and if they continue in such fashion, the investigation into the World Trade Center fire and collapse will amount to paper- and computer-generated hypotheticals. However, respected members of the fire protection engineering community are beginning to raise red flags, and a resonating theory has emerged: The structural damage from the planes and the explosive ignition of jet fuel in themselves were not enough to bring down the towers. Rather, theory has it, the subsequent contents fires attacking the questionably fireproofed lightweight trusses and load-bearing columns directly caused the collapses in an alarmingly short time. Of course, in light of there being no real evidence thus far produced, this could remain just unexplored theory. The frequency of published and unpublished reports raising questions about the steel fireproofing and other fire protection elements in the buildings, as well as their design and construction, is on the rise. The builders and owners of the World Trade Center property, the Port Authority of New York-New Jersey, a governmental agency that operates in an accountability vacuum beyond the reach of local fire and building codes, has denied charges that the buildings' fire protection or construction components were substandard but has refused to cooperate with requests for documentation supporting its contentions. Some citizens are taking to the streets to protest the investigation sellout. Sally Regenhard, for one, wants to know why and how the building fell as it did upon her unfortunate son Christian, an FDNY probationary firefighter. And so do we. Clearly, there are burning questions that need answers. Based on the incident's magnitude alone, a full-throttle, fully resourced, forensic investigation is imperative. More important, from a moral standpoint, for the safety of present and future generations who live and work in tall buildings-and for firefighters, always first in and last out-the lessons about the buildings' design and behavior in this extraordinary event must be learned and applied in the real world. To treat the September 11 incident any differently would be the height of stupidity and ignorance. The destruction and removal of evidence must stop immediately. The federal government must scrap the current setup and commission a fully resourced blue ribbon panel to conduct a clean and thorough investigation of the fire and collapse, leaving no stones unturned. Firefighters, this is your call to action. Visit WTC "Investigation"?: A Call to Action, then contact your representatives in Congress and officials in Washington and help us correct this problem immediately. ============================================================ http://fe.pennnet.com/Articles/Article_Display.cfm?Section=OnlineArticlesSubSection=Display&PUBLICATION_ID=25ARTICLE_ID=130026 WTC "INVESTIGATION"?: A CALL TO ACTION Never again! In the wake of the World Trade Center, we are left with many thoughts-thoughts of friends lost, thoughts of devastated families, thoughts of the tremendous impact on so many lives for so many years to come. Yet, we-America's fire service-are left with one critical thought: How can we prevent a disaster like this from ever happening again? Yes, it was the terrorist pilots who slammed two jetliners into the Twin Towers. It was the ensuing fire, however, that brought the towers down. Make no mistake about it: This high-rise collapse was no "fluke." The temperatures experienced and heat release rates achieved at the World Trade Center could be seen in future high-rise fires. There are many, many questions to be asked by us about the World Trade Center collapse and its implications on high-rise firefighting across the nation. Some questions are political, many are technical, others are philosophical. Here are a few (in no particular order) to think about. * Given the typical resources of most fire departments, can we be expected to handle every high-rise fire thrown at us? When was the last time your city manager asked you for a complete list of resources that you need to fight a high-rise fire, including personnel? When was the last time a high-rise building owner asked if you would like him to install a special "firefighter elevator" for your exclusive use during a high-rise fire? When was the last time a building code committee called up a "downtown" battalion chief and asked him what he thought of the unlimited area and height provisions found in all of the model building codes-is it OK if we allow a 400-story building in your battalion, Chief? The bottom line is, Can we really handle high-rise fires adequately? Who are we kidding? Isn't this the "big secret" that Chief Vincent Dunn has been talking about for years? * Beware the truss! Frank Brannigan has been admonishing us for years about this topic. It has been reported that the World Trade Center floors were supported by lightweight steel trusses, some in excess of 50 feet long. Need we say more? * Modern sprayed-on steel "fireproofing" did not perform well at the World Trade Center. Haven't we always been leery about these materials? Why do many firefighters say that they would rather fight a high-rise fire in an old building than in a modern one? Isn't it because of the level of fire resistance provided? How much confidence do we have in the ASTM E-119 fire resistance test, whose test criteria were developed in the 1920s? ASTM E-119 is an antiquated test whose criteria for fire resistance do not replicate today's fires. * The defend-in-place strategy was the wrong strategy at the World Trade Center. Many of those who ignored the directions to "stay where you are" are alive today because they self-evacuated. Do you still use defend-in-place strategies for large high-rise fires? When should you use them, and when should you not? * We can see live broadcasts from Afghanistan, but we can't communicate via radios in many high-rise buildings. What gives? There are many more questions, more than we have answers for. What is clear is that things must change. Where do we begin? By putting things in perspective. The World Trade Center disaster was * The largest loss of firefighters ever at one incident. * The second largest loss of life on American soil. * The first total collapse of a high-rise during a fire in United States history. * The largest structural collapse in recorded history. Now, with that understanding, you would think we would have the largest fire investigation in world history. You would be wrong. Instead, we have a series of unconnected and uncoordinated superficial inquiries. No comprehensive "Presidential Blue Ribbon Commission." No top-notch National Transportation Safety Board-like response. Ironically, we will probably gain more detailed information about the destruction of the planes than we will about the destruction of the towers. We are literally treating the steel removed from the site like garbage, not like crucial fire scene evidence. The World Trade Center disaster demands the most comprehensive detailed investigation possible. No event in our entire fire service history has ever come close to the magnitude of this incident. We, the undersigned, call on FEMA to immediately impanel a "World Trade Center Disaster Review Panel" to coordinate a complete review of all aspects of the World Trade Center incident. The panel should be charged with creating a comprehensive report that examines a variety of topics including determining exactly how and why the towers collapsed, critiquing the building evacuation procedures and the means of egress, assessing the buildings' fire protection features (steel "fireproofing," fire protection systems, etc.), and reviewing the valiant firefighting procedures employed. In addition, the Panel should be charged with preparing a detailed set of recommendations, including the critical changes necessary to our building codes. Please e-mail this (italicized) call to action to: President George W. Bush (president@whitehouse.gov) Senator Charles Schumer (senator@schumer.senate.gov) Senator Hillary Clinton (senator@clinton.senate.gov) FEMA Director Joe M. Allbaugh (director@fema.gov) To obtain e-mail addresses for your representatives, go to; U.S. SENATE: http://www.senate.gov/contacting/index.cfm U.S. HOUSE: http://www.house.gov/writerep/ Francis L. Brannigan, SFPE Glenn P. Corbett, PE Deputy Chief (Ret.) Vincent Dunn, FDNY http://www.apfn.org/apfn/eagle_and_firemen.jpg =================================================================== THIS MESSAGE POSTED APFN MESSAGE BOARD AT: http://disc.server.com/discussion.cgi?id=149495article=15544 APFN 911 INFO AND LINKS: http://www.apfn.org/apfn/WTC.htm SUBSCRIBE APFN SMART GROUP: EMAIL: apfn-subscribe@smartgroups.com http://www.smartgroups.com/groups/apfn WITHOUT JUSTICE, THEIR IS JUST_US! http://www.apfn.org/old/apfncont.htm ++++++ PLEASE FORWARD +++++++
http://www.nydailynews.com/2002-01-06/News_and_Views/City_Beat/a-137323.asp?last6days=1
New York Daily News, January 6, 2002
SPECIAL REPORT
Grim task at Fresh Kills
By Richard T. Pienciak
Daily News Senior Correspondent
Standing amid the transplanted ruins of Sept. 11, the immensity of the task underway at this makeshift City on the Hill is difficult to comprehend. Death and its aftermath are spread out everywhere.
The 175-acre encampment, born of the World Trade Center attacks, ultimately will serve as the final resting place for the countless tiny pieces of humanity that will prove to be unretrievable from the 1.2 million tons of Ground Zero debris.
Any failure to decipher completely the minute fragments of human flesh entombed in the mounds of waste will not be for lack of effort, though.
[Photo] A grappler sifts through wreckage from the World Trade Center.
Literally billions of pieces of debris are being scrutinized meticulously at the reopened Fresh Kills landfill on Staten Island in the hope of finding a victim's body part or a personal belonging that can help give a heartbroken family a bit of solace.
"It's a corporal work of mercy," said NYPD Deputy Inspector James Luongo, who heads the sifting and retrieval effort. "We're helping to bury the dead."
The site has a second mission, although the importance of that has diminished over time: The search continues for a chunk of incriminating evidence and for the so-called black boxes from the jetliners that hit the twin towers, killing nearly 3,000 people.
Already 900,000 tons have been processed in this arduous effort, including heavy steel that has been recycled. At the center of the operation are several work areas, each equipped with three large conveyor belts: one for fine soil and particles, one for solid pieces as tiny as one-quarter inch, and one for larger chunks.
Working daily from 5 a.m. to midnight, hundreds of NYPD detectives and federal agents dressed in protective gear stand watch along the conveyor belts — as many as eight to a belt — searching through every fragment. When warranted, a piece of debris is picked up and given closer scrutiny.
Items such as a ripped woman's shoe are examined carefully, but usually are put back on the line because they lack any identifying feature.
Possible body parts are placed in plastic buckets, which are handed over to the NYPD Crime Scene Unit. Stored in freezers, the body parts are quickly passed on to the medical examiner's office.
A forensic anthropologist is often on site. Because there were many restaurants in the WTC complex, investigators have been finding animal bones among the debris.
So far, 2,900 human body parts have been recovered at the landfill, an average of about 30 a day — and an average of about one per victim.
46 Victims Identified
By last week, 46 victims had been identified from remains retrieved here, some by fingerprints, some by dental charts and some by DNA. Many more human parts are being tested for DNA. Special Agent Richard Marx, the FBI's lead representative here, said one victim was identified recently from a four-inch piece of bone.
The most dramatic reminder of the terrorist attacks is the collection of burned-out and crushed vehicles — row upon row of civilian cars, NYPD police vans, patrol cars and a wide variety of fire apparatus. There are more than 1,200 wrecked vehicles here already, with another 800 expected when crews at Ground Zero get to the Trade Center's subterranean garages.
[Photo] Recovery workers search among the debris.
The cars are stacked up to four high. Alongside, there's a Con Ed truck, a Verizon van, a sport-utility vehicle that was used by an NYPD undercover team. In between are mangled motorcycles and police scooters.
The graveyard of fire trucks is a sobering and humbling sight. Several of the trucks are so squished they are barely recognizable. The long ladders of several trucks had been softened by the intense heat of the WTC fires, then reshaped into half circles.
The contents of car trunks and back seats reveal clues about their former owners: a Wilson Hammer 5.0 tennis racket cover, tattered pages from a Nancy Drew & The Hardy Boys Super Mystery paperback ("Murder on the Fourth of July"), a kid's two-wheel scooter, stuffed animals, a shopping bag from Saks Fifth Avenue, a VCR tape of "Seinfeld," cell phone bills, a jumpsuit, exercise equipment, a hair dryer, a box of wedding invitations.
One day the searchers found hundreds of shopping bags from a Gap store. Another day, they found a large selection of Gap clothing, with the price tags still attached.
Engine parts from American Airlines Flight 11, which crashed into the north tower, sit outside the FBI trailer, next to several landing-gear tires.
Searchers have found several box cutters, though they don't know for certain if these were among the ones used by the hijackers.
While the larger pieces of debris "bring the message home," Luongo said, the retrieval operation is the heart of the City on the Hill — the reason for its being.
"There's no glamour, no Hollywood here," said Luongo, contrasting this barren parcel to the celebrity atmosphere exhibited from time to time at Ground Zero. "This is the nonsexy part of the operation. This is where the work is being done."
[Photo] Workers must don protective gear in the hazardous recovery area.
The site, carved out of the 3,000-acre landfill that was shut last March after 50-plus years, is staffed by 300-350 NYPD detectives, drawn on a rotating basis from across the city. They are joined by Sanitation Dept. personnel and up to 60 federal agents, including representatives of the FBI, Secret Service, Customs, the Federal Emergency Management Agency and the Department of Agriculture.
While much has been written about the bravery and heroism displayed at the WTC site, there are many unsung heroes toiling here, too.
"It is important that people understand the dedication of the detectives working up here," said Luongo, a 21-year NYPD veteran and father of four.
Luongo's top assistant, Lt. Bruce Bovino, who had a Sept. 11 birthday dinner reservation with his wife at a WTC restaurant, added, "We're the lucky ones. We're getting to do something."
John Paccione, 36, a 12-year NYPD veteran who usually works out of the 60th Precinct Robbery Squad, said, "You hope that by working here you can help bring some finality to the families, whether they are police or fire or civilians.
"We all have to do our part," he added. "We're at war."
Paccione, who's been reporting to the landfill one or two days a week for three months, has been part of teams that have found clothing and pieces of human remains. "The most important thing is to find bodies, or at least body parts, to help bring about that finality," he said.
Health and Safety Paramount
The investigators work in a highly compartmentalized environment. At the start of each shift, they're given a brief introductory speech, then outfitted in protective gear — full-length white Tyvek suits, half-face respirators with HEPA filters, hard hats, goggles, hearing protection and protective footwear.
Concerns for health and safety are paramount. The air is sampled regularly for asbestos and other contaminants. Test results are posted prominently.
Before meal and coffee breaks, and at the end of the shift, all workers undergo decontamination, including showers, if needed.
The site had been operating on two 12-hour shifts, starting at 5 a.m. and 8 a.m. "But the mission has changed appreciably in recent days," Luongo said. "There are fewer big pieces. The debris stream is much finer now; it needs more care and attention."
Last week, Luongo added a third shift, starting at noon. Equipment maintenance and repairs are performed in the remaining five predawn hours.
Site methodology has come a long way, too. Assisted by Bovino and Marx, 33, Luongo started out supervising detectives sifting through the debris with garden rakes, or manually, on their hands and knees.
Today, the work force uses sophisticated heavy equipment, much of it fabricated from the commercial recycling industry. One of the new machines, made by a company in Ireland, consists of a long, round cylinder that resembles a giant clothes dryer. It spins big hunks of debris to loosen and separate fine particles that had clumped together around one or two large pieces.
"It is a constantly evolving situation," Marx said of the developing technology.
The so-called City on the Hill is now its own community. There's a mess hall, complete with hot food, the Salvation Army and elderly Southern Baptist Convention volunteers from Florida.
[Photo] Up to 700 meals a day are served at "The Hilltop Cafe."
All of the eating, changing and decontamination centers are heated. So are many of the outside raking and sifting areas.
Inside the food hall, there's a Christmas tree in the center of the eating area; photos and brief biographies of victims serve as ornaments. There's a big-screen TV at one end of the hall. On Friday, a cabaret singer, accompanied by a piano player, entertained the landfill troops, sort of like a USO show.
The mess hall walls are filled with hundreds, if not thousands, of supportive letters and drawings from school kids throughout the nation. Outside stands the only surviving tree from the outdoor areas around the WTC.
Bovino, a 46-year-old father of two, acknowledged he and his colleagues had heard the complaints and concerns from some victims' relatives that at times there hasn't been enough reverence paid during the sifting process.
"I'm not going to say that we're going to find every piece and every bit," Bovino said. "We may miss things. But it won't be for a lack of trying. It's just that there's so much debris. We're doing the best we can."
Officials hope to close the operation by September. The most optimistic view has the job being completed by July.
But much work remains to be done. And heated tents notwithstanding, winter is setting in.
Once the retrieval operation is completed, and the remains of so many are buried here, Luongo and the others hope the city erects a memorial.
"This wasn't only a police and fire tragedy. This wasn't only for New York," Luongo said. "This was a tragedy for the whole country."
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/01/07/nyregion/07SITE.html
The New York Times, January 7, 2002
By Eric Lipston
The gargantuan cleanup is set to be finished by June. The caved-in subway line is slated to be rebuilt and running again by November. The first new office tower could start rising as early as the end of the year. And the PATH commuter line from New Jersey, for which hundreds of millions of dollars have already been made available, is scheduled to be back in service by the end of 2003.
It is a pace of progress at the World Trade Center site that was unthinkable right after Sept. 11, and that has surprised everyone from city and state officials to real estate developers to victims' families.
But the stunningly rapid work also means that questions about what comes next may no longer be a comfortably distant debate: officials acknowledge in interviews that a 16- acre hole will occupy the site by summer's start, and they admit such a scene - debris gone, a sense of promise palpable - could well create pressure to have answers about downtown's future faster than anyone ever expected.
"We don't want that hole to be sitting there with nothing going on. That would be the worst thing," said John C. Whitehead, the chairman of the Lower Manhattan Development Corporation, a joint state and city panel formed in late November to coordinate downtown's rebuilding. "So we are going to try to have plans lined up as quickly as possible to permit construction to begin as soon as possible."
The emerging recognition of an accelerated timetable for rethinking and rebuilding downtown is having a ripple effect, officials said last week. Public hearings on the best use of the site could begin within about six weeks; a temporary memorial park, created in part to reassure victims' families that some significant memorial will be built, is expected to be in place by year's end; and certain important participants are pushing to have the rough outlines of an overall redevelopment plan that includes offices, cultural institutions and residential buildings settled upon within three months or so.
"The faster things happen, the more positive it is for downtown," said David Shulman, a real estate analyst at Lehman Brothers.
"Time is the great enemy of that whole area," he said. "If things go slowly, if there's a lot of foot-dragging, you'll lose downtown as a real financial center."
Actual construction on the biggest parts of a remade downtown could be three to five years off, most of the principals involved in the process agree. And there is no way to forecast precisely how litigation, insurance payments, environmental concerns, the economy or debate about the formal memorial might affect redevelopment.
Cities across the United States, including New York, have learned in recent decades that redevelopment plans typically take longer than expected to devise, and then years more than called for to build.
The redevelopment agency's board has met just once, with a second meeting set for today. It still has no staff or office of its own, not even an executive director. And even those close to Mr. Whitehead concede he knows little about the construction industry and is still being introduced to many of the important city government and civic leaders.
Gov. George E. Pataki, who appointed 7 of the 11 members to the development group, said through a spokesman last week that he had found the pace of the cleanup to be inspirational, but urged the public to be patient as plans for the rebirth of Lower Manhattan were devised.
"We need to let the process move forward naturally so we have the broadest consensus, not rush it," said Michael McKeon, a spokesman for Mr. Pataki.
And a spokesman for Mr. Bloomberg said that the mayor's visit to the site on Jan. 1 and the meetings he and his staff had held in his first week with Mr. Whitehead and others illustrated the high priority the administration would place on the rebuilding effort.
What no one disputes is the striking pace of progress at ground zero, as the removal of burned-out shells of buildings and twisted piles of steel and concrete has progressed so quickly that the landscape changes weekly. A job that some believed might take two years is now set to be complete within nine months.
Already, 962,725 tons of debris and steel have been carried from the site. As a result, almost nothing remains above ground across an area where the twin towers and five other World Trade Center buildings once stood. Most of the remaining work involves digging out debris that was compressed into the basement levels.
"There were piles of compacted, twisted steel eight stories high into the air at first," said Capt. Raymond Reilly, a Fire Department official who has worked at the site since Sept. 11. "It was just overwhelming. You wondered, `Where do you start?' Now it is a gaping hole four levels down into the ground. I just can't understand how they did it that quickly."
The Development Corporation, after hiring an executive director and naming committees from various constituencies - real-estate executives, downtown residents, bankers and victims' families - will hold public hearings to consider the various ideas. Then a conceptual plan will be drawn up, hopefully within three months, Mr. Whitehead said - a timetable that even in theory reflects a stark departure from the early thinking after the disaster.
By the end of this year, an interim memorial park, perhaps with trees, benches and flowers, would be built.
If there is sufficient market demand, the most frequently mentioned plan is to set aside at least four acres for a permanent memorial and then build an undetermined number of buildings each 50 or 60 stories tall, perhaps including a mix of office and retail space, apartments and a performing arts or cultural complex of some sorts.
Officials say that once the debris is gone it will still be at least two years before structural steel can start to go up for new buildings within the core of the site, because new subway tunnels, a new subway station and a PATH commuter rail station have to be built underground.
But they say there is still an urgent need to move ahead with planning, for the ultimate design of the new World Trade Center area - how many people will work or live there and where they will be concentrated - will heavily influence the rebuilding of the transit system, roadways and utilities.
Mr. Whitehead said he realized there would be pressure to move quickly, especially in light of the quick cleanup. The board has decided to meet every other week instead of once a month, as originally planned. "It is a combination of a desire for speed and a desire for quality," Mr. Whitehead said. "Things have to be built fast enough to change the psychology of this area, but not so fast as to not make it a great result in the end."
The first building to rise, various officials say, will most likely be a replacement for 7 World Trade Center, the 47-story former home to Salomon Smith Barney, as well as the mayor's emergency command center. The building, while considered part of the World Trade Center complex, was built separately and set off from the rest of the area, at its northern edge.
Larry Silverstein, the developer who built 7 World Trade Center and who in July had signed a $3.2 billion lease on the twin towers, said he hoped to start work on a replacement for 7 World Trade Center by the end of 2002, first by building a new underground substation for Consolidated Edison and then constructing a new 50-story office tower.
"It will be such a shot in the arm for all of Manhattan and the city at large to see new construction take place in Lower Manhattan," he said last week, adding that he had already chosen a lead architect, David M. Childs of Skidmore, Owings & Merrill, who designed the new AOL Time Warner Center at Columbus Circle.
Yet despite Mr. Silverstein's enthusiasm, some government officials said he would have a hard time meeting his end-of-the-year goal, because building plans need to be approved by the Port Authority and decisions about transit and utility systems may take longer than he expects.
Given how intertwined each aspect of the redevelopment plan will be, there will also be pressure to move quickly to decide on the location and size of the permanent memorial to those killed on Sept. 11. Nikki Stern of Princeton, N.J., whose husband, James E. Potorti, was killed in the attack, said that the work to clear the site had progressed so quickly that families who want their voices heard in the debate over the memorial's size and location must organize now.
"What do you do when on the one hand you have the economic necessity of moving Lower Manhattan forward and on the other a group of victim families that say, `You may not build on my loved one's head'?" said Mrs. Stern. "It will never be resolved. But it must be addressed, and the sooner it is addressed the better it is for all concerned."
One immediate benefit of the rapid pace of the work at the World Trade Center site is that the size of the restricted area has shrunk week by week, so much that now Church Street, which is on the eastern edge of the impact zone, was recently opened again to limited traffic. Con Edison reports that all its Lower Manhattan customers have had power restored, while Verizon puts the number at 99 percent. All this has meant that however haltingly, life is starting to return to the immediate neighborhood, though it still has a long way to go.
One Liberty Plaza, the adjacent 54-story office tower that had been falsely rumored to be at risk of collapse, reopened in late October. All but one of the 25 residential buildings at Battery Park City have reopened, the exception being 600 Gateway Plaza, which had many of its windows blown out when the towers collapsed.
And tenants, at least those who are returning, are gradually moving back into the World Financial Center, just west of the site. Six thousand Merrill Lynch employees have been back since December. American Express intends to start its return to its headquarters at 3 World Financial Center in April. Even Century 21, the department store across Church Street from the World Trade Center, is preparing to reopen soon.
Despite this progress, normalcy is still far off. The local multiplex and many restaurants remain closed. Battery Park City is still isolated. And memories of Sept. 11 are still fresh. But Mr. Whitehead said he understood how urgent it was to show the public that there was at least a real plan coming into place.
"There is still an outflow of people and companies and we have to reverse that," he said.
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/01/07/opinion/L07WTCC.html
The New York Times, January 7, 2002, Letters to the Editor
To the Editor:
Re "At Ground Zero, New Manager, New Machines, New Focus" (below):
The reason for reducing the number of construction companies at ground zero from four to one, Bovis Lend Lease, is the reduced amount of work that remains. Surrounding buildings have been secured, and a considerable portion of the 16-acre site is cleared or almost cleared of debris, necessitating a reduction in management firms at the site. The complex decisions regarding the future excavation of the site will continue to be made by the Department of Design and Construction.
Also, the 500-foot "temporary bridge," which is really a metal ramp, is only being considered and may not be installed.
The concerns guiding this project from Sept. 11 have been the dignified removal of the remains while expeditiously removing debris at the lowest possible cost to taxpayers.
KENNETH R. HOLDEN
Commissioner, Department of Design and Construction
New York, Jan. 3, 2002
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/01/03/nyregion/03SITE.html
The New York Times, January 3, 2002
What was once, at least in part, a demolition job focused on pulling down
shells of burned-out buildings and mountains of debris is now almost entirely
a matter of excavating subterranean concourses, into which hundreds of thousands
of tons of steel, glass and concrete were compressed.
But the shift at Ground Zero extends far beyond the focus of the work. Next
week, the city is turning over day-to- day management of what is considered
one of the largest excavation and cleanup jobs in United States history to
a private contractor, Bovis Lend Lease.
Hundreds of daily decisions, from minor matters like where to place backhoes,
to intricately complex ones like where next to focus the sprawling but still
delicate operation, will now be coordinated by Bovis, an Australian construction
company that has a major presence in New York City.
The shift to Bovis, which did hundreds of millions of dollars of work for
the city during the Giuliani administration, will take place in the early
days of the Bloomberg administration, perhaps as early as next week. But
it was clearly brokered by Rudolph W. Giuliani's administration, particularly
by officials at the Department of Design Construction and the Office of Emergency
Management, where the top officials have been retained, at least so far,
by Mr. Bloomberg.
Given the intensely emotional aspects of all the work at the World Trade
Center site — remains for fewer than 600 of the approximately 2,900
people who died there on Sept. 11 have been found and identified to date
— the city government will still monitor the work as no other job. But
the switch to a construction manager is clearly a significant transition,
moving one step further from disaster mode toward normalcy, city officials
said.
"Recovery of remains is still the highest priority," said Matthew Monahan,
a spokesman for the Department of Design and Construction, which remains
the lead governmental agency at the site. "But tremendous progress has been
made in clearing the site, the debris and the rubble. It is time to streamline
the management and removal operations."
The terms of the Bovis contract were not disclosed yesterday, but the company
and three other major contractors were originally hired with the expectation
they would each be paid as much as $250 million apiece.
The Fire Department is also adjusting its operations at the site. Some
underground smoldering continues at isolated spots, particularly below where
the north tower once stood, but almost all the fires are now extinguished
and active firefighting has all but come to a halt.
By the middle of January, the Fire Department's incident command center,
which had been in a former fire station at 100 Duane Street near City Hall,
will move to smaller quarters, in two construction trailers at the edge of
the site.
But the delicacy of the remaining work was illustrated once again yesterday
when the Fire Department revised its policy regarding who is invited down
to the site when the remains of firefighters are found.
The department had tried to enforce a policy that firefighters from neighborhood
companies would not be called each time a colleague's body is found, as this
might leave stations without the staff needed for emergencies.
But after protests, the Fire Department and its new commissioner, Nicholas
Scoppetta, settled on a new approach yesterday. Now, the local company from
which the deceased firefighter had been assigned will be invited down to
the site to escort the body. The firefighters, however, are being asked not
to call family members of the deceased, to avoid possible inaccurate reports
that a loved one has been identified, and they are allowed to leave their
posts only after supervisors have been notified, a department spokesman said.
Bovis's assumption of the role of construction manager comes as a host of
other major changes are about to occur at the site. Two of the largest cranes
there — towering devices capable of lifting 1,000 tons and 500 tons
apiece — are being dismantled and replaced by much smaller ones, because
workers can now get much heavier equipment into the center of the site.
To date, a total of 944,192 tons of debris have been removed from the site,
according to the city.
In fact, across the entire 16-acre landscape, only one tiny piece of building
structure remains above ground: the former escalator platform at the entrance
to the 1-9 subway line near the northeast corner of the site, where 5 World
Trade Center once stood. Except for that fragment, the two towers and five
other buildings — everything that had been above ground — is gone.
Much of the site has been blacktopped, and now resembles a parking lot.
The work below ground is farthest along in the area that was once the south
tower, where crews have dug a hole that is four or five stories deep, with
roadways that trucks can drive down.
But the debris under these makeshift roadways has to be removed, so one of
the biggest assignments will be to build a 500-foot temporary bridge from
the bottom of the pit up to the West Street highway.
Once that bridge is in place — probably by March — the makeshift
roads will be torn out and the compressed debris that supports them will
be cut down six levels as well.
Two 220-foot pedestrian bridges are also being constructed, which will reconnect
Battery Park City over a highway that now separates it from the rest of
Manhattan. These bridges should be completed by the end of next month, said
Andrew Boorman, a manager from Mabey & Johnson, which is building them.
The atmosphere at the site is still defined by urgency, as the city has set
May as the goal for completing the work. But as each week passes, while still
gruesome and grueling, it becomes somehow slightly more routine.
"It is less of an emergency situation," said Gary Panariello, a site manager
from LZA/Thornton-Tomasetti, an engineering company helping plan the work.
"Everyone is trying to put a management structure to reflect what everyone
does best."