What firefighters didn't know on 9/11
Christopher Hagedorn (7/18/02)*
The number of firefighters who lost their lives, 343, is
numbing; the knowledge that they could not be contacted because of the
failure of the communications system is unpardonable.
Sept. 11 may be the date of an act of unspeakable
negligence for which nobody will accept responsibility. The issue, just
emerging, is how the police and fire departments responded, coordinated
their efforts and communicated with their respective forces; the question
is why the city's leaders have refused to accept responsibility and
apparently want to secrete the facts of just what happened.
In a front-page article, The New York Times revealed a
devastating picture of incompetence and petty rivalry between the Fire
Department and the NYPD during the rescue efforts on Sept. 11. Its report
charged that deaths of police officers were considerably less than the
firefighters because of clear warnings to the officers that were never
transmitted to the firefighters. According to NYPD tapes during the rescue
efforts, police officers were alerted to the imminent collapse of the
World Trade Center's north tower some 21 minutes before it occurred.
In the case of the firefighters, communications failed as
they had in the 1993 bombing of the WTC.
As the Times reported: "No other agency lost communications
on Sept. 11 as broadly, or to such a devastating effect, as the Fire
Department. Throughout the crisis, the two largest emergency departments,
fire and police, barely spoke to coordinate strategy or to share
intelligence about the buildings' conditions.
"During those final minutes, most firefighters inside the
north tower did not know the other building had crumbled, and how urgent
it was for them to get out. Instead, dozens of firefighters were catching
their breath on the 11th floor of the tower, witnesses say. Others were
awaiting orders in the lobby. Still others were evacuating disabled and
the frightened.
"Although Mayor Rudolph Giuliani created the Office of
Emergency Management in 1996 and spent nearly $25 million to coordinate
emergency response, Trade Center officials said the agency had not
conducted an emergency exercise there that included the Fire Department,
the police and the Port Authority's emergency staff."
There was testimony of many persons escaping from the north
tower on stairways that firefighters were running up, without hesitation.
In each statement by survivors, one heard of the courage of the
firefighters who were unknowingly climbing to their death that morning,
despite NYPD warnings to its officers.
Yes, the firefighters were incredibly brave, entering the
towering inferno in an effort to save lives. That the police were
admonishing their personnel of the "imminent collapse" of the north tower,
while firefighters were ignorant of the dangers, is a tragedy of
unspeakable proportions.
The number of firefighters who lost their lives, 343, is
numbing; the knowledge that they could not be contacted because of the
failure of the communications system is unpardonable. If the police
officers were indeed, warned on the imminent collapse some 21 minutes
before it occurred, as reported by the Times, the negligence is
unmentionable in its magnitude.
In military operations, the generals calculate projected
losses on the field of battle. Gen. Eisenhower well understood that the
estimated casualties of the glider squadron and paratroopers on D-Day
would most probably approach 70 percent.
When Eisenhower visited the paratroopers on the early
morning of June 6, 1944, he was grim, knowing the dangers they would
encounter. Earlier that morning he has written a statement that he carried
in his pocket, to deliver if the invasion failed and our troops were force
off the beaches of Normandy and back into the sea.
The statement in Eisenhower's pocket said: He accepted full
responsibility for the failed landing and the deaths of our brave
soldiers.
There were no Eisenhowers, it seems, in the city after
Sept. 11 to accept responsibility for the tragic events involving the
firefighters.
To date, nobody from the city administration has stepped
forward; former Police Commissioner Bernard Kerik, and Fire Commissioner
Thomas Von have been silent. Equally, and heretical to say, Mayor
Giuliani, now proclaimed America's Mayor, has never mentioned the other
tragedy of Sept. 11.
Yes, human failure may have played a part in the horrific
drama of that morning, but honesty about what really happened demands a
higher integrity owed to those brave men and women in uniform who so
openly responded to the call to service to attempt to save lives. Their
memory, if for no other reason, requires a thorough accounting and
accepting responsibility.
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Source: Greenwich Post, Town & Village News, City, Bronx, and Parkchester News
* Christopher Hagedorn is the Publisher of Hagedorn Communications, Inc.
© Copyright 2002 Hagedorn Communications, Inc.
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