NY Times & Victims Family FOIA Request making Suppressed Firemen
Statements public:
A rich vein of city records from Sept. 11, including
more than 12,000 pages of oral histories rendered in the voices
of
503 firefighters, paramedics, and emergency medical technicians, was made
public
The city has announced that it will also release today a written log of
calls to the 911 system, many from trapped
office
workers, as well as tapes of fire dispatchers. Other records, including tapes
of 911 operators, are being assembled
and
are not yet ready for release, city officials said.
The New York Times sought the records under the freedom of information
law in February 2002, but the Bloomberg
administration
refused to make them public and the newspaper sued the city. Earlier this year,
the Court of Appeals,
Over the last three and half years, The Times has obtained some of
these records through unofficial channels, and they
can
be found on the Web at www.nytimes.com/sept11
These include the dispatch tapes, nearly 100 of the
Fire Department oral histories, and a log of calls to Emergency Medical
Service dispatchers
that were channeled through the 911 system.
lhttp://www.nytimes.com/pages/nyregion/nyregionspecial3/
N.Y. Police Statements released under FOIA
http://www.flcv.com/nypolice.html
Audio Dispatches: NYFD and
http://graphics8.nytimes.com/packages/html/nyregion/2005081
2_WTC_GRAPHIC/met_WTC_histories_full_05.html
FIREFIGHTER PATRICK MARTIN
WTC2
My lieutenant said he looked down at the
first floor, and he could see the first
floor of the south tower
like exploding out. I looked up. I looked up, and the sky was
filled with that debris cloud.
Stephen Gregory
, Assistant Commissioner (F.D.N.Y.)
flashes, explosions p 14
I know I was with an officer from Ladder 146,
a Lieutenant Evangelista, who ultimately called me up a couple of days later
just to find out how I was. We both for whatever reason -- again, I don't know
how valid this is with everything that was going on at that particular point in
time, but for some reason I thought that when I looked in the direction of the
Trade Center before it came down, before No. 2 came down, that I saw low-level flashes. In my conversation
with Lieutenant Evangelista, never mentioning this to him, he questioned me and
asked me if I saw low-level flashes in
front of the building, and I agreed with him because I thought -- at that time
I didn't know what it was. I mean, it could have been as a result of the
building collapsing, things exploding, but I saw a flash flash flash
and then it looked like the building came down.
Q. Was that on the lower level of the building or up where the fire was?
A. No, the lower level of the building. You know like when they demolish a
building, how when they blow up a building,
when it falls down? That's what I thought I saw. And I didn't broach the topic
to him, but he asked me. He said I don't know if I'm crazy,
(Strangely, he talks about
page 20 Q. Clearly not building
material?
A. No. The building material was sort of gray and you could see it, you know,
how it differed from the plane. I was listening to the tape this morning of the
people calling up and they were describing the plane that hit the building.
Actually, so many people saw it. They actually described the plane as it came in.
They said it was a military-type plane
and it was green and it was this. I mean, I never saw the color of the
plane.
FATHER JOHN DELENDICK FDNY
bombs & explosions before WTC2 fell
The top of the building kind of started to
rumble, and we all looked up. So his
original thought was that he thought it was a bomb up there as well.
I remember asking Ray Downey was it the jet
fuel that blew up. He said at that point he thought there were bombs up there because it was too
even. We didn't know the building came
down. We just knew the top of the
building exploded and didn't know what happened to the rest of the
building.
CHIEF STEVE GRABHER-FDNY WTC2 poof,poof,
windows pop out, explosion
Just as I go out of the building, one of my
men says hey Captain, the building is coming down. I looked over my shoulder
and you could see the whole top of south
tower leaning towards us. It looked like coming over. You could see the
windows pop out just like in the picture, looked like a movie. I saw one floor of windows pop out, like
poof, poof. I saw one and a half floors pop out. It looked almost like an
explosion. The whole top was teetering, and I really thought just the top
of the building was falling off. I didn't think there was any way we were going
to make it out because just being this close, it looked
like it's leaning right on top of us. So we ran.
It wasn't that far. I guess You could see over the top
of the building from where we were standing, the whole building was coming on
top of us this other building. At this time I thought just the top of the
building fell down. I really wasn't sure that the whole tower was going to come
down. It turns out I was looking at the
FIREFIGHTER ROBERT NORRIS
WTC2
I HEARD WHAT SOUNDED LIKE A THIRD
PLANE COMING IN. I HEARD THE PROPULSION OF AN ENGINE
SUPERVISING
WTC2
As I'm looking up at the building, I hear a loud noise and I see the south side of
the building collapse. I see the south upper
third of the tower start to pitch in my direction. At that point I yelled
to Mike Kane, Mike, it's coming down. I turned around
and I ran south on
WTC2 falls
WHEN THAT
LIEUTENANT
All of a sudden you
heard the rumble and people yelling and screaming. You look and I didn't see
the top of the building. I didn't see
the top of tower two. The collapse started. You felt like the ground -- it was like a deep sound, rumble; like you're
laying on the platform and the D train is coming. You look and you see what -- I best describe it as a wave coming.
RONALD COYNE
At that point I just heard a THUNDEROUS SOUND
I was already covered with soot and
all sorts of particles that were coming out of the building. I dived into the
truck, and that’s when pieces of the BUILDING LIFTED THE TRUCK
Several blanked out paragraphs
WTC2
I think it was the lobby of the building behind us blew out. Everybody started running, I didn't see him again that day. He got thrown one way, I got thrown the other way. There was smoke, there was debris, there was everything flying around. The cops that were in there were telling everybody get out, get out, get out. Stuffs blowing up.
FIREFIGHTER MICHAEL MACKO
WCT2
WE
LIEUTENANT PATRICK SCARINGELLO
WTC2
I heard the explosion
from up above. I looked up, I saw smoke and flame and then I saw the top
tower tilt, start to twist and lean.
We did go past -- we went
up Church, we went up Vesey, past 7 Trade, which at
the time didn't look like it was involved
We
started to look up and we could see what looked like the top of this tower coming down at us, and then like a roller
coaster, like a wooden roller coaster sound
FIREFIGHTER RICHARD BOERI WTC2
explosion before collapse
We had our backs to the tower and under that
pedestrian bridge walking south, myself, Eddie Kennedy and the officer, when
you heard the crackling. You looked
up and you saw the one floor explode on
itself and the top start to slide.
FIREFIGHTER DEAN COUTSOUROS
WTC2, crackling
sound, like a million firecrackers
I
was directly in the middle
of the street on
FIREFIGHTER WILLIAM REYNOLDS
WTC2- large explosion below plane impact area before the collapse
After a while, I was distracted by a large explosion from the south tower
and it seemed like fire was shooting out a couple of hundred feet in each
direction, then all of a sudden the top of the tower started coming down in a
pancake. I remember my jaw dropping and just staring at it and Richard Banaciski, one of the firemen that was
there, yelled "Run" and I turned and I started running into the
parking garage of the
Q. Bill, just one question. The fire that you
saw, where was the fire? Like up at the upper levels where it started
collapsing?
A. It appeared somewhere below that. Maybe twenty floors below the impact area of the plane. I
saw it as fire and when I looked at it on television afterwards, it doesn't
appear to show the fire. It shows a rush of smoke coming out below the area of
the plane impact.
The reason why I think the cameras didn't get
that image is because they were a far distance away and maybe I saw the bottom
side where the plane was and the smoke was up above it.
FIREFIGHTER TIMOTHY BURKE WTC2
WTC2 Explosion before collapse
Then the building popped lower than the fire level which I guess was the aviation
fuel fell into the pit and whatever floor it fell on heated up really bad and
that’s why it popped at that floor.
That’s the rumor I heard, but it seemed like Oh My God There is secondary device that the way the building popped I
thought it was an explosion.
When that
happened they all started fading into the garage- masses of people. I’m thinking this building is coming down. So
with the amount of people rushing me, we ran through the garage. We kept
running through. All of a sudden the noises stopped ,
the sound of the building falling stopped. We all turned around and it was dark
now. We really couldn’t see.
FIREFIGHTER KEVIN DUGGAN WTC2
we just heard this real loud roar. We looked up and we could see the south tower. Looked like the middle of it was just exploding out, and at that point, one
of the officers just said, "Run," and we were just turned and started
running into the garage.
FIREFIGHTER CHRISTOPHER FENYO FDNY
WTC2
explosions before collapse
Port Authority transcripts:
About a couple minutes after George came back
to me is when the south tower from our perspective exploded from about midway up the building. We all turned and ran
into the garage. At that point a debate
began to rage because the perception was that the building looked like it had
been taken out with charges.
FIREFIGHTER HOWIE SCOTT
WTC2
We just made our turn to go in towards the
lobby of tower two.
For whatever reason, I just happened to look
up and saw the whole thing coming down, pancaking
down, and the explosion, blowing out
about halfway up. I remember looking
back and noticing that big mushroom cloud just roaring at us like a freight
train.
Edward Cachia FDNY
WTC2 explosions before collapse
As
my officer and I were looking at the south tower, it just gave. It actually
gave at a
lower floor, not the floor where the plane hit, because we originally had
thought there was like an internal detonation explosives because it went in
succession, boom, boom, boom, boom, and then the tower came down.
FIREFIGHTER KENNETH ROGERS
WTC2
Meanwhile we were standing there with about
five companies and we were just waiting for our assignment and then there was
an explosion in the south tower,
this exposure just blew out in flames. A lot of guys left at that point. I kept watching. Floor
after floor after floor. One floor under another after another and when
it hit about the fifth floor, I figured it was a bomb, because it looked like a
synchronized deliberate kind of thing. I was there in '93.
Then we heard a rumble, some twisting metal, we looked up in the air, and to be
totally honest, at first, I don’t know exactly…but it looked to me just like an explosion. It
didn’t look like the building was coming down, it looked like just one floor had blown
completely outside of it. I was sitting there
looking at it. I just never thought they would around and saw the debris coming
down.
FIREFIGHTER RICHARD BANACISKI WTC2 explosions
On
We were there I don't know, maybe 10, 15
minutes and then I just remember there
was just an explosion. It seemed like on television they blow up these
buildings. It seemed like it was going all the way around like a belt, all these explosions. Everybody just
said run and we all turned around and we ran into the parking garage because
that's basically where we were. Running forward would be running towards it.
Not thinking that this building is coming down. We just thought there was going
to be a big explosion and stuff was going to come down.
There was just a tremendous cloud that came
into the parking garage. Somebody actually laid out a search rope.
FIREFIGHTER
CRAIG MONAHAN
WCT2
Then
all of a sudden you heard something, and it sounded like a harrier jet was landing right over top of us. Sure
enough that second tower was just coming straight down. When it sounded like the explosion
stopped, the steel hitting, when it all seemed to stop, this just like a fire
storm of wind and material, a sandstorm kind of, just came and wailed by,
really flew past us quick.
FIREFIGHTER KEVIN MCCABE
WTC2
WE WERE READY TO GO STRAIGHT AHEAD
YOU HEARD A ROAR SOME
MY FIRST THOUGHT TO MYSELF, O
LIVE DOWN IN ROCKAWAY SO HAVE HEARD PLANES COMING OVERHEAD FOR
YEARS, IT SOUNDED LIKE A PLANE GETTING CLOSER
SHORTLY AFTER AS IM WALKING YOU
PARAMEDIC JOEL PIERCE
WTC2
THATS WHEN WE HEARD THAT SOUND AGAIN
WTC2
At that time we were looking at the top of
the towers and all the rubble and people coming off, and all of a sudden you
heard – it sounded like another
airplane, or a missile. It was like a slow shake. The whole ground just
vibrated and shook. We just told everybody to run, run into a building, let's
go, run, run, run.
PARAMEDIC ROBERT RUIZ
WTC2
The next thing you know, you
hear a loud thundering noise. It sounded like a jet, a big rumble. I start
looking around and I'm like, what is that? The next thing I know, I see the cop
just take off. I'm like, where's he going?
Then I see the things on the floor, like
I look up and I was saying,
oh, no, the building's going to fall down.
So I turn around. Right where I'm standing I turn around. I'm
in
the center of the building. I
turn around, and I try to go inside the building, but that door happens to be
locked. So I run towards the
corner where the cop was, and I
keep trying all the doors.
CHARLES WELLS Division Chief
WTC2
We felt a loud -- a very
strong vibration, shaking, and a loud noise like a subway train coming through
a station at speed, like a jet engine
at full throttle. It was a roaring sound, and he wanted to continue down
WTC2
I
made it about halfway across
and I saw the
WCT2
Then
as I looked up, I saw this helicopter hovering from in front of one of the buildings, it was the first one that was hit. Then all of a
sudden I heard this huge explosion,
I didn’t know what it was because nobody was telling me anything. I didn’t know
until we were called back to Chambers and something, Chambers and
firemen, PD, everyone is running away from the
This
is North End, we was running around Vessey and around
North end to get away
from the first smoke. After the first building, I guess, I
didn’t know at the time that the
building fell. After the smoke cleared, I went back, I was
helping some people that were
covered in dust and stuff like that.
FIREFIGHTER JOSEPH MEOLA
WCT2
As we are looking up at the building, what I
saw was, it looked like the building was
blowing out on all four sides. We actually heard the pops. Didn't realize it was the falling -- you know, you heard the pops
of the building. You thought it was just blowing out.
FIREFIGHTER KEITH MURPHY FDNY
WCT2
I HAD HEARD A DISTANT
FIREFIGHTER THOMAS TURILLI
WTC2
All of a sudden you just heard like it almost
actually that day sounded like bombs
going off, like boom, boom, boom, like seven or eight, and then just a huge
wind gust just came. My officer knew
how to actually get out and and we just walked out of
there.
At that point we were kind of standing on the
street and I looked to my left and actually I noticed the tower was down. I
didn't even know what it was when we were in there. It just seemed like a huge
explosion.
WTC2
In that process of him trying to explain to
me to pull my ambulance over, I heard a loud
bang. We looked up, and we just saw the building starting to collapse. I was screaming from the top of my lungs, and
I must have been about ten feet away from her and she couldn't even hear me,
because the building was so loud, the explosion,
that she couldn't even hear me.
WCT2
I HEARD LIKE A BIG EXPLOSION, TREMENDOUS EXPLOSION, LET
ME PUT IT THAT WAY,
His conclusions were blanked out
LT. THOMAS PIAMBINO FDNY
WTC2
The south tower had fallen, but at that time I didn't know
what it was. All I heard was a tremendous
explosion.
LIEUTENANT JOSEPH PATRICIELLO FDNY
WTC2
As my men went to obtain some extinguishers,
I happened to be looking up and saw the explosion
or the building fail with the ensuing fireball and cloud. It didn't appear to
me at that moment the building was coming down.
But when the noise level began to pick up, it
was obvious that something wrong was going on. We all proceeded to run
southwesterly towards
FIREFIGHTER CRAIG CARLSEN -explosions (or
pancakes) when buildings fell
File No. 9110505 WTC2
I guess about three minutes later you just heard explosions coming from building two,
the south tower. It seemed like it took forever, but there were about ten explosions. At the time I
didn't realize what it was. We realized later after talking and finding out
that it was the
floors collapsing to where the plane had hit.
We
then realized the building started to come down. At that point everybody at the
command post took off into -- there were two garages across. I guess it was by
I made it in about 20 feet inside the door,
and I tripped over an
started to come down , and you could see the force
of air coming towards you. I was just trying to drag the
We made it to approximately Vesey and West, which is just north of the bridge. Then the
second building started to come down. At
that point everybody just took off in all different directions. As far as I
know, we just went north up
FIREFIGHTER FERNANDO CAMACHO WTC2 Explosions
We went across the lobby of the hotel, going
north, and we exited and made a right going towards the second tower, the south tower. We must have walked about
100-200 feet to revolving doors, which led into a hallway to where the mall
was. I could see maybe 20, civilians and I believe
Ladder 25, which was about another 100 to 150 feet ahead of us. As we came in
through the revolving doors, the lights went out. A second or two later
everything started to shake. You could hear explosions. We
didn't know what it was. We thought it was just a small collapse.
As I looked straight ahead of me, I saw total
darkness. Everything was coming our way like a wave. The
firefighters that were ahead of us and the civilians that were ahead of us
totally disappeared.
We turned around. We were all pretty much
within ten feet of each other: lieutenant,chauffeur,
roof, OV, can. As we turned around, I ran probably maybe ten feet and that's
when the body of the building or body of the collapse hit, and we were flying
through the air basically. I must have flown 30, 40 feet through the air. Then
total quiet. You couldn't breathe. You couldn't see anything.
****************************************
CAPTAIN
KARIN DESHORE
WTC2
I had no clue what was going on. I never turned around because a sound came
from somewhere that I never heard before.
Some people compared it to an airplane.
It was the worst sound of a rolling sound, not a thunder. All I know is
–and a force started to come hit me in my back.
You had to be there. All I know is that I had to run because I thought
there was an explosion. I thought it
was a major explosion.
I THOUGHT IT WAS EXPLODING ACTUALLY THATS WHAT I
THOUGHT FOR HOURS AFTERWARDS THAT IT HAD EXPLODED OR THE PLANE OR THERE HAD BEEN
SOME DEVICE ON THE PLANE THAT HAD EXPLODED BECAUSE THE DEBRIS FROM THE TOWER
HAD SHOT OUT FAR OVER OUR HEADS IT WAS RAINING DOWN
(blanked out paragraph)
FINALLY
WTC2
THERES AN EXPLOSION.
WTC2
I was
hooking up the regulator to the O-2, when I hear people screaming and a loud explosion,
and I heard like “sssssssss…” the dust like “sssssssss…” So I come out of the bus, and I look and I see
a big cloud of dust and debris coming from the glass… through the condominium,
the other building, and like, glass falling. So I just started to run,
everybody ran, so I just ran. Our bus, it got totaled.
FIREFIGHTER ANGEL RIVERA
WTC2
the chief told us go to the Marriott Hotel, go
from the 14th floor up, search and evacuate all the floors. So we walk all the
way up, no problem. Then we hear the explosion and debris falling. We were
looking out of the windows and see body parts all over the place.
PARAMEDIC DANIEL RIVERA
WTC2
Q. WHAT DID YOU
When
I saw the first building collapse I noticed that the first three or four floors , they were pretty good, that was on my mind. Wow,
they were pretty good. THEN THEY SAID THERE WAS A
CHIEF ALBERT TURI
FDNY
WTC2 plane
I turned around to
assess the situation, and the fireball had pretty much dissipated, and what I
actually thought at that time, and mistakenly so, was it's not as bad as it
looks; most of the fuel was expended on
the exterior of the building. So we
ran back to the car and laying right in back of my car
was a large object which I thought was probably part of one of the aircraft
turbines.
FIREFIGHTER EDWARD SHEEHEY
(My comments in parentheses: Sheehey heard an explosion
before the
http://www.nytimes.com/packages/html/nyregion/20050812_...
"Q. Where exactly were you when the south tower collapsed?
A. We were proceeding across
Q. South of the command post?
A. Straight across from it, going in towards the south tower. We were probably
just at
We dropped all our tools and gear, and we turned around. There was a parking
garage to the right of the command post, so we ran down into the parking
garage."
(Mayday distress calls just before the collapses---why? Could this be due to
more complications from unexpected explosions going off? That could be a
possibility but not conclusive.)
"Q. Did you hear any emergency transmissions on the handy talky? Did you
have a handy talky?
A. No, I didn¹t have a handy talky.
Q. Did you hear anything being next to
anybody?
A. I heard maydays. As we were at the command post, we heard maydays. I
couldn¹t make out what they were for.
Q. Was this before the collapse or after?
A. Before the collapse. Then after the collapse I heard -‹ we looked for
someone with a radio, and we found a captain from another engine company. I
couldn¹t tell you what company he was from. He was looking for the rest of his
men, and he had a handy talky. He said if he heard them calling for us he would
let us know. I heard a couple of maydays on his handy talky but couldn¹t make
out who was giving them or where they were."
So I said, let me take him
to the hospital. So as I was pulling off, I’d say about half a block away,
we heard a big boom, and we seen a whole bunch of ashes, everything just
started coming towards us.
BATTALION CHIEF BRIAN DIXON WTC2
I got just a little ways back and it was just
like -- you hear the noise, a boom,
and then a blast of air. It just
kind of threw me against the wall. That's where I decided to stay. Since it blew me there.
PARAMEDIC NEIL SWEETING
WTC2
We
were probably about half a block away from t h e complex at this point . You heard a big boom, it was quiet for about t e
n seconds. Then you could hear another
one.
CAPTAIN JAY SWITHERS
WTC2
At that point I looked back and most of the
people who were triaged in that area with the triage tags on them got up and
ran. I took a quick glance at the building and while I didn't see it falling, I
saw a large section of it blasting out,
which led me to believe it was just an explosion.
I thought it was a secondary device,
but I knew that we had to go.
BATTALION CHIEF THOMAS VALLEBUONA
WTC2
I HEARD
I REALIZED THAT WE WERENT FAR ENOUGH AWAY FROM THIS BUILDING
FIREFIGHTER JOSEPH RAE
WTC2
We started walking north to
just about the second footbridge, which would be 6 World Trade, and all of a
sudden we heard the explosion and
the building started to come down and I ran
I HEARD SIX
FIREFIGHTER KENNETH ESCOFFRY FDNY
WTC2
incoming missile before collapse
“On the way out between tower one and six, we
heard something like an incoming missile,
and we started to run. That's when the second tower came down. I was knocked
down.”
WTC2
The next thing I heard was a loud like an
engine roar. I looked up, and the next thing I knew I just saw -- I don't know
if it was the tail end of the plane
or what, but I saw something. When I looked up, I heard "boom." Now, when the explosion hit I don't know if -- it actually took me off my feet,
because I fell. I actually got cuts and stuff
like that all over my hands and whatnot
FIREFIGHTER THOMAS ORLANDO FDNY
I would say on the 18th
floor when we took a little break. At the time the building was shaking. It was
hit with something. At that time we thought it was another missile attack, so
we all just ran into the stairway and just helped cover us and other civilians
and firemen until it stopped shaking. We didn't know what it was at the time.
We were told that there's been a collapse -- they didn't say what collapsed –
and to start working your way out.
Jody Bell
WTC2
I had her sit in the chair and I put some
oxygen on her, because she wasn't breathing right, she was hyperventilating. I
was just trying to calm her down.
I was strapping her onto the stair chair, and
that's when the building comes down. So I strapped her on. As I this tidal wave, it's like a tidal wave of soot and ash coming in my
direction, my life flashed before my eyes. I made a U turn, and I started to run -- I took about ten steps, and the
lady started screaming, "Don't
leave me! Don't leave me!" That's when I gathered myself. I got a hold
of myself, wait, what the hell am I doing?
I turned back around. I got her out of the chair. I said,
"Ma'am, can you run?" She said, "Yes." She took off. I
immediately made a U turn, and I've
never moved so fast in my life.
Then shortly after that -- the building came down. It's like snow fall. The cars are covered. The streets are covered. I'm covered and breathing in mouthfuls. You couldn't see. The scene was totally blacked out. You're just running in the directio