20th anniversary of 9/11 Twin Towers atrocity

By Tom Gillespie

THIS Saturday, September 11, will mark the 20th anniversary of the Twin Towers disaster in New York, which resulted in the deaths of 2,996 people and injuries to more than 6,000 others.

No more that the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, everyone remembers where they were on that date.

In my case, I was in the editor’s chair of The Connaught Telegraph on Cavendish Lane when a newsflash interrupted the Marian Finucane lunchtime programme on RTÉ Radio One to announce that a plane had crashed into one of the Twin Towers.

My colleagues and I later made our way to Pat Moran’s Bourbon Bar (The Sunflower) to watch the harrowing scenes unfold.

The devastating images were beamed around the world as millions were glued to their TVs to witness the carnage.

Eighteen months later, while in New York for St. Patrick’s Day celebrations, I visited the Ground Zero site.

It was an eerie yet peaceful location, which we viewed from a nearby tower block.

While we were there recovery work ceased as some human remains had been located and were removed with great dignity.

Firefighters, led by chief fire officer Seamus Murphy from Mayo, were among a delegation from Mayo County Council to deliver a book of condolences to New York City officials.

The death toll on the day included 265 on the planes involved, from which there were no survivors, 2,606 people who were in the World Trade Center and the surrounding area, and a further 125 at the Pentagon, which was also targetted.

Most of those who perished were civilians, with the exception of 343 firefighters, 72 law enforcement officers, 55 military personnel, and the 19 terrorists who died in the attacks.

More than 90 countries lost citizens in the September 11 attacks. The attacks killed about 500 more people than the bombing of Pearl Harbour on December 7, 1941, and are the deadliest terrorist attacks in world history.

In Arlington County, Virginia, 125 Pentagon workers lost their lives when Flight 77 crashed into the western side of the building.

Of these, 70 were civilians and 55 were military personnel, many of whom worked for the US Army and Navy. The Army lost 47 civilian employees, six civilian contractors, and 22 soldiers, while the Navy lost six civilian employees, three civilian contractors, and 33 sailors.

In New York City, more than 90 per cent of the workers and visitors who died in the towers had been at or above the points of impact.

In the North Tower, 1,355 people at or above the point of impact were trapped and died of smoke inhalation, fell or jumped from the tower to escape the smoke and flames, or were killed in the building's eventual collapse.

The destruction of all three staircases in the tower when Flight 11 hit made it impossible for anyone above the impact zone to escape. Some 107 people below the point of impact died as well.

In the South Tower, one stairwell, Stairwell A, was left intact after Flight 175 hit, allowing 14 people located on the floors of impact, including one man who saw the plane coming at him, and four more from the floors above to escape. New York City 9-1-1 operators who received calls from people inside the tower were not well informed of the situation as it rapidly unfolded and, as a result, told callers not to descend the tower on their own.

In total, 630 people died in that tower, fewer than half the number killed in the North Tower.

Casualties in the South Tower were significantly reduced because some occupants decided to start evacuating as soon as the North Tower was struck. The failure to fully evacuate the South Tower after the first jet crash into the North Tower was described by USA Today as ‘one of the day's great tragedies’.

At least 200 people fell or jumped to their deaths from the burning towers, landing on the streets and rooftops of adjacent buildings hundreds of feet below.

Some occupants of each tower above the point of impact made their way toward the roof in the hope of helicopter rescue, but the roof access doors were locked.

No plan existed for helicopter rescues, and the combination of roof equipment, thick smoke and intense heat prevented helicopters from approaching.

A total of 411 emergency workers died as they tried to rescue people and fight fires. The New York City Fire Department (FDNY) lost 343 firefighters, including a chaplain and two paramedics.

The New York City Police Department (NYPD) lost 23 officers. The Port Authority Police Department (PAPD) lost 37 officers. Eight emergency medical technicians (EMTs) and paramedics from private emergency medical services units were killed.

Weeks after the attack, the death toll was estimated to be over 6,000, more than twice the number of deaths eventually confirmed. The city was only able to identify remains for about 1,600 of the World Trade Center victims.

The medical examiner's office collected ‘about 10,000 unidentified bone and tissue fragments that cannot be matched to the list of the dead’. Bone fragments were still being found in 2006 by workers who were preparing to demolish the damaged Deutsche Bank Building. In 2010, a team of anthropologists and archaeologists searched for human remains and personal items at the Fresh Kills Landfill, where 72 more human remains were recovered, bringing the total found to 1,845.

The Pentagon was severely damaged by the impact of American Airlines Flight 77 and ensuing fires, causing one section of the building to collapse.

As the airplane approached the Pentagon, its wings knocked down light poles and its right engine hit a power generator before crashing into the western side of the building.

The plane hit the Pentagon at first floor level. The front part of the fuselage disintegrated on impact, while the mid and tail sections kept moving for another fraction of a second.

Debris from the tail section penetrated furthest into the building, breaking through 310 feet of the three outermost of the building's five rings.