Ten Years Ago Today in New York City

[Lionel Mandrake]

Following are excerpts from an article in Fire Engineering.

"The terrorist attack on the World Trade Center (WTC) on September 11, 2001, resulted in the loss of 2,819 lives. ... In their efforts to save civilian lives at risk in the Trade Center, 343 firefighters and many other emergency personnel died. It was a 90-minute operation that ended in catastrophe. ...

"The elevators in the buildings contained recall and firefighter service features ... On 9-11, elevators in the North Tower were ... nonoperational because the recall feature was not working—they were not returning to the lobby for firefighter use. ...

"Public address speakers ... were used in the South Tower immediately following the first plane crash into the North Tower to direct occupants to remain in their offices and not evacuate."

Fortunately, common sense prevailed in the South Tower (if not at the Port Authority), and

"Most people in the South Tower began evacuating the building as soon as the North Tower was hit, ignoring taped Port Authority messages broadcast over the building's intercom system to stay where they were ... "

"So many factors combined to result in the 343 firefighter deaths on 9-11. The most fundamental and prominent are readily apparent.

•The breathtakingly high towers were able to sustain the impact of a 767 jet plane but not the ensuing fires, denying firefighters that critical period of time needed to save all of the savable.

•The radio system, under the prevailing conditions, made critical fire department communications difficult to impossible. Vital messages and orders were lost or went unheard.

•Elevators were unusable for fire department operations in both towers, removing a critical—and swift—means of access and egress.

•Interagency communications and a coordinated, interagency command structure were practically absent at a time when they were most needed."

Read more:
http://www.fireengineering.com/articles/print/volume-155/issue-9/world-trade-center-disaster/volume-i-initial-response/world-trade-center-disaster-initial-response.html

[Lionel Mandrake]

1. 10 Years, 6,200 Military Deaths, and 46,000 Purple Hearts Later ...

Demands of war take toll on troops, families

By Tony Perry, Los Angeles Times
Sat Sep 10 2011 8:17 PM

"There have been more U.S. combat fatalities, more grievous wounds, more amputations, more cases of post-traumatic stress disorder than were imagined when President George W. Bush launched the war on terror.

"More than 6,200 uniformed Americans have returned home in flag-draped coffins to the mortuary at Dover Air Force Base in Delaware; nearly 46,000 have received Purple Hearts.

"For those who have made it home, suicide and divorce rates have been higher as veterans have struggled to deal with the memories of war and the pressures of civilian life.

"More than 200,000 personnel remain deployed in or near the war zone. And even with a planned U.S. drawdown, the Marines have been told to expect deployments to Afghanistan through 2014, maybe longer."

Read more:
http://mobile.latimes.com/p.p?m=b&a=rp&id=827129&postId=827129&postUserId=7&sessionToken=&catId=6978&curAbsIndex=1&resultsUrl=DID%3D6%26DFCL%3D1000%26DSB%3Drank%2523desc%26DBFQ%3DuserId%253A7%26DL.w%3D%26DL.d%3D10%26DQ%3DsectionId%253A6978%26DPS%3D0%26DPL%3D3

[CaliforniaPeggy]

2. It is very refreshing to see this discussion.

I especially appreciate learning the technical details of how the buildings were built and how their construction performed during the attack.

Thank you for the great link!

[Lionel Mandrake]

3. My dear CP,

You're very welcome.

Not being a civil engineer, architect, or firefighter, I didn't understand a lot of the technical details.