NATIONAL COMMISSION ON TERRORIST ATTACKS UPON THE UNITED STATES

Eleventh Public Hearing

Tuesday, May 18, 2004

New School University
New York City

CHAIRED BY: THOMAS H. KEAN

STAFF STATEMENT NO. 13: EMERGENCY PREPAREDNESS AND RESPONSE

PANEL I:

ALAN REISS, FORMER DIRECTOR, WORLD TRADE DEPARTMENT, PORT AUTHORITY OF NEW YORK AND NEW JERSEY

JOSEPH MORRIS, FORMER CHIEF, PORT AUTHORITY OF NEW YORK AND NEW JERSEY POLICE DEPARTMENT

PANEL II:

BERNARD B. KERIK, FORMER COMMISSIONER, NEW YORK POLICY DEPARTMENT (NYPD)

THOMAS VON ESSEN, FORMER COMMISSIONER, FIRE DEPARTMENT OF NEW YORK (FDNY)

RICHARD SHEIRER, FORMER DIRECTOR, NEW YORK CITY OFFICE OF EMERGENCY MANAGEMENT (OEM)

PANEL III:

RAYMOND W. KELLY, COMMISSIONER, NEW YORK POLICE DEPARTMENT (NYPD)

NICHOLAS SCOPPETTA, COMMISSIONER, FIRE DEPARTMENT OF NEW YORK (FDNY)

JOSEPH F. BRUNO, COMMISSIONER, NEW YORK CITY OFFICE OF EMERGENCY MANAGEMENT (OEM)

MR. THOMAS H. KEAN: Good morning.

As chair of the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks upon the United States, I hereby convene the eleventh public hearing of this commission. Today and tomorrow we will be examining how local, regional and federal authorities responded to attacks against the United States on September 11th, 2001. We will focus on what confronted civilians and first-responders during the attacks, how they made decisions under adverse conditions, and what first-responders communicated to civilians and to each other. We will also explore the state of emergency preparedness and response today. What steps have been taken since 9/11 to improve our preparedness against terrorist attacks and other emergencies, and whether we should establish national standards of preparedness.

In the course of this two day hearing we will hear from people who directed agencies who were in the front lines of the 9/11 attacks both in New York and in Arlington, Virginia. We will also hear from some who will help the Commission to look at emergency response issues nationwide. We intend to use what we learn in the course of the next two days to guide us as we consider recommendations to make our country safer and more secure.

Today's session will run until nearly 4 p.m. with a lunch break for one hour. Tomorrow we will reconvene at 8 a.m. and adjourn around 12:45.

I'd like to mention just one administrative matter. I'd like to ask all those who are present to refrain from public expression during the hearing. We would ask you to refrain from applause, or for the matter, the opposite of applause.

This is the second hearing we'll be holding in this great city of New York and the third in the New York region. We held our very first hearing at the Alexander Hamilton Custom House, not far from here, and our seventh at Drew University in Madison, New Jersey. So it's fitting that we return to the city that bore the greatest impact of the 9/11 attacks. New York City and all its vitality symbolizes everything that is great about our United States of America. That's why the terrorists singled out this city for attack. New Yorkers endured a terrible catastrophe and New Yorkers prevailed, with the resilience and determination we have come to expect from those who make their homes and livelihoods in this great city and its surrounding regions.

Before we begin, I want to thank the New School University and our fellow commissioner, New York University president Bob Kerrey, for inviting us to hold this hearing at the New School University. The New School bore witness to the 9/11 attacks and felt the heavy impact of that day. The New School provided solace and comfort, not only to its own students, faculty and staff, but to the wider community. Along with St. Vincent's Hospital, the New School ran a makeshift family information center from September 11th to 14th, 2001 where over 6,000 people came for help. This sense of service exhibited by the school during those very trying times was truly extraordinary. So on behalf of the Commission I want to say, thank you.

Today will be a very difficult day as we relive the loss and the terrible devastation. Some of what the staff will be presenting shortly will be graphic and vivid. Some may find it very difficult to watch. Our purpose in presenting this information is to obtain the perspective of those who responded to the attacks. We want to know how and why they made the decisions they made, and often in the absence of good information, and sometimes under the most adverse of conditions. We want to understand what happened that morning so that we can learn and that we as a nation can be better prepared. We honor the bravery and courage of civilians and the first-responders who saved so many lives that morning, and we honor all those who gave their own.

We will now hear from the staff, and I call on Dr. Philip Zelikow, the Commission's executive director, who will begin the first staff statement on emergency preparedness and response. He will be followed by John Farmer, Sam Caspersen and George Delgrosso.

MR. PHILIP ZELIKOW: Members of the Commission, with your help, your staff is prepared to report its preliminary findings regarding the emergency response in New York City on September 11, 2001. These initial findings may help frame some of the issues for this hearing and the development of your judgments and recommendations.

This report represents a summary of our work to date. We remain ready to revise our current understanding in light of new information as our work continues. We encourage those whose understanding differs from ours to come forward. Sam Caspersen, George Delgrosso, Jim Miller, Madeleine Blot, Cate Taylor, Joseph McBride, Emily Walker, and John Farmer conducted most of the investigative work reflected in this statement, and Allison Prince assisted with the audio-visual components.

Much of this work was conducted in conjunction with the National Institute of Standards and Technology, NIST, which is studying the building performance issues. We are indebted to NIST for its cooperation. We have also received cooperation from the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey and from the City of New York. We have spoken with hundreds of people about the most painful moments of their lives.

We thank them for their willingness to help us. As we have relived their stories, and the records left by those who no longer can help us, we have joined in the mourning for all those who were lost that day.

On the morning of September 11, 2001, the last best hope for the community of people working in or visiting the World Trade Center rested not with national policymakers but with private firms and local public servants, especially the first-responders: fire, police, and emergency medical service professionals.

As we therefore focus on the choices they made on the morning of 9/11, we will not offer much commentary. We will offer more analysis and suggest some lessons that emerge for the future in Staff Statement No. 14, which we will present tomorrow. Today we concentrate just on presenting a reliable summary of what happened, to explain the day in its complexity without replicating its chaos.

We wish to advise the public that the details we will be presenting may be painful for you to see and hear. Please consider whether you wish to continue viewing.

MR. JOHN FARMER: Building Preparedness on 9/11. Emergency response is a product of preparedness. We begin with a brief discussion of measures taken to enhance safety and security at the World Trade Center after the 1993 bombing.

The World Trade Center complex was built for the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey. Construction began in 1967, and tenants began to occupy its space in 1970. The Twin Towers came to occupy a unique and symbolic place in the culture of New York City and America.

The Trade Center actually consisted of seven buildings, including one hotel, spread across 16 acres. The buildings were connected by an underground mall one level below the plaza area. The Twin Towers were the signature structures, containing 10.4 million square feet of office space. On any given work day up to 50,000 office workers occupied the towers, and 40,000 visitors passed through the complex.

Both towers had 110 stories and were about 1,350 feet high. Both were square; each wall measured 208 feet in length. The outside of each tower was covered by a frame of 14-inch-wide steel columns; the centers of the steel columns were 40 inches apart. These exterior walls bore the majority of the weight of the building.

The interior core of the buildings was a hollow steel shaft, in which elevators and stairwells were grouped. Each tower contained three central stairwells, which ran essentially from top to bottom, and 99 elevators. Generally, elevators originating in the lobby ran to "Sky Lobbies" on upper floors, where further elevators carried passengers to the tops of the buildings.

Stairwells A and C ran from the 110th floor to the mezzanine level and Stairwell B ran from the 107th floor to level B6. All three stairwells ran essentially straight up and down, except for two deviations in Stairwells A and C where the staircase jutted out toward the perimeter of the building. These deviations were necessary because of the placement of heavy elevators and machine rooms. These areas were located between the 42nd and 48th floors and the 76th and 82nd floors in both towers.

On the upper and lower boundaries of these deviations were "transfer" hallways contained within the stairwell proper. Each hallway contained "smoke doors" to prevent smoke from rising from lower to upper portions of the building. Smoke doors were kept closed, but not locked. Other than these slight deviations in Stairwells A and C, the stairs ran straight up and down.

Doors leading to the roof were kept locked. The Port Authority told us that this was because of structural and radiation hazards, and for security reasons. To access the roof in either towers required passing through three doors: one leading from the stairwell onto the 110th floor, and two leading from the floor onto the roof itself. There was no rooftop evacuation plan. The roof was a cluttered surface that would be a challenging helipad, even in good conditions, and in a fire smoke from the building would travel upward.

Unlike most of America, both New York City and the World Trade Center had been the target of terrorist attacks before 9/11. On February 26, 1993, a 1,500-pound bomb stashed in a rental van was detonated on a parking garage ramp beneath the Twin Towers. The explosion killed six people, injured 1,000 more, and exposed vulnerabilities in the World Trade Center's and the City's emergency preparedness.

The towers lost power and communications capability. Generators had to be shut down to assure safety. Elevators stopped. The public address system and emergency lighting systems failed. The unlit stairwells filled with smoke and were so dark as to be impassable. Rescue efforts by the Fire Department of New York were hampered by the inability of its radios to function in buildings as large as the Twin Towers. The 9-1-1 emergency call system was overwhelmed. The explosion occurred at 12:17 p.m.; the last person was evacuated nearly ten hours later in a helicopter rescue by the New York Police Department. To address the problems encountered during the response to the 1993 bombing, the Port Authority implemented $100 million in physical, structural, and technological changes to the Trade Center. In addition, the Port Authority enhanced its fire safety plan. The Port Authority added battery-powered emergency lighting to the stairwells and back-up power to its alarm system. Other upgrades included glow-in-the-dark signs and markings. Upgrades to the elevator system included a redesign of each building's lobby command board to enable it to monitor all of the elevators.

To aid communications, the Port Authority installed a "repeater system" for use by the Fire Department of New York. The "repeater" used an antenna on the top of 5 World Trade Center to "repeat" and greatly amplify the wave strength of radio communications, so they could be heard more effectively by firefighters operating many floors apart. The Port Authority also sought to prepare civilians better for future emergencies. Deputy fire safety directors conducted bi-annual fire drills, with advance notice to tenants. During a fire drill, designated fire wardens were instructed to lead people, in their respective areas, to the center of the floor where they would use an emergency intercom phone to obtain specific information on how to proceed.

Civilians were taught basic procedures such as to evacuate by the stairs and to check doors for heat before proceeding. Civilians who evacuated in both 1993 and 2001 have told us that they were better prepared in 2001. Civilians were not, however, directed into the stairwells during these drills. Civilians were not provided with information about the configuration of the stairwells and the existence of transfer hallways or smoke doors. Neither full nor even partial evacuation drills were held. Participation in the drills that were held, moreover, varied greatly from tenant to tenant.

Civilians were never instructed not to evacuate up. The standard fire drill instructions advised participants that in the event of an actual emergency, they would be directed to descend to at least two floors below the fire. Most civilians recall simply being taught to await instructions which would be provided at the time of an emergency. Civilians were not informed that rooftop evacuations were not part of the Port Authority's evacuation plan. They were not informed that access to the roof required a key. The Port Authority acknowledges that it had no protocol for rescuing people trapped above a fire in the Towers.

Preparedness of First Responders on 9/11. On 9/11, the principal first-responders were in the Fire Department of New York, the New York Police Department, the Port Authority Police Department, and the Mayor's Office of Emergency Management. The 40,000-officer New York Police Department consisted of three primary divisions: operations, intelligence, and administration. The Special Operations Division supervised units critical in responding to a major event. This division included the aviation unit, which provided helicopters for the purpose of survey and/or rescue, and the Emergency Service Units, or rescue teams, which carried out specialized missions.

The NYPD had standard operating procedures for the dispatch of officers to an incident. Gradations in response were called "mobilization" levels and went from 1, the lowest, to 4, the highest. Level 3 and Level 4 mobilizations could not be ordered by someone below the rank of captain. The NYPD ran the City's 9-1-1 emergency call center. 9-1-1 operators were civilians trained in the rudiments of emergency response. Fire emergencies were transferred to the FDNY dispatch center.

The 11,000-member Fire Department of New York was headed by a Fire Commissioner, who, unlike the Police Commissioner, lacked operational authority. Operations were controlled by the Chief of Department. Basic operating units included ladder companies, to conduct standard rescue operations, and engine companies, to put out fires. The Department's Specialized Operations Command contained specialized units, including five rescue companies, to perform specialized and highly risky rescue operations, and one HAZMAT team.

The logistics of fire operations were coordinated by Fire Dispatch Operations division. 9-1-1 calls concerning fire emergencies were transferred to this division.

Alarm levels escalated from first, the lowest, to fifth, the highest, with a pre-established number of units associated with each. Prior to 9/11, it was common FDNY practice for units to arrive with extra personnel, and for off-duty firefighters to respond to major incidents.

The years leading up to 9/11 were successful ones for the FDNY. In 2000, fewer people died from fires in New York City, 107, than in any year since 1946. Firefighter deaths, 22 during the 1990s, compared favorably with the best periods in FDNY history. The FDNY had fought 153,000 fires in 1976; in 1999, that number had been reduced to 60,000.

In July 2001, Mayor Giuliani signed a directive entitled "Direction and Control of Emergencies in the City of New York." Its purpose was "to ensure the optimum use of agency resources while, eliminating potential conflict among responding agencies which may have areas of overlapping expertise and responsibility." The directive designated, for different types of emergencies, an appropriate agency as the "Incident Commander." The Incident Commander would be, quote, "responsible for the management of the City's response to the emergency," close quote. The role of the Mayor's Office of Emergency Management was supportive, to "coordinate the participation of all city agencies in resolving the event," and to "assist the Incident Commander in his/her efforts in the development and implementation of the strategy for resolving the event."

The Mayor's creation of the Office of Emergency Management and the issuance of his Incident Command Directive were attempts to address the long-standing rivalry between the NYPD and the FDNY. This rivalry has been acknowledged by every witness we have asked about it. Some characterized the more extreme manifestations of the rivalry--fistfights at the scenes of emergencies, for instance--as the actions of "a few knuckleheads." Some described the rivalry as the result of healthy organizational pride and competition. Others told us that the problem has escalated over time and has hampered the ability of the City to respond well in emergency situations.

The NYPD and the FDNY were two of the preeminent emergency response organizations in the United States. But each considered itself operationally autonomous. Each was accustomed to responding independently to emergencies. By September 11th neither had demonstrated the readiness to respond to an "Incident Commander" if that commander was an official outside of their Department. The Mayor's Office of Emergency Management had not overcome this problem.

As we turn to the events of September 11th, we will try to describe what happened in the following one hundred minutes: First, the 17 minutes from the crash of hijacked American Airlines Flight 11 into World Trade Center 1, the North Tower, at 8:46 a.m. until the South Tower was hit. Second, the 56 minutes from the crash of hijacked United Airlines Flight 175 into World Trade Center 2, the South Tower, at 9:03 a.m., until the collapse of the South Tower. Finally, the 27 minutes from the collapse of the South Tower at 9:59 a.m. until the collapse of the North Tower at 10:26 a.m.

From 8:46 until 9:03 a.m. At 8:46, the hijacked American Airlines Flight 11 flew into the upper portion of the North Tower.

(VIDEO PLAYS OF ATTACK ON NORTH TOWER)

MR. FARMER: The plane cut through floors 93 to 94 to 98 to 99 of the building. All three of the building's stairwells became impassable from the 92nd floor up. Hundreds of civilians were killed instantly by the impact. Hundreds more remained alive, but trapped. A jet fuel fireball erupted upon impact and shot down at least one bank of elevators. The fireball exploded onto numerous lower floors, including the 77th, 50th, 22nd, West Street lobby level, and the B4 level, four stories below ground. The burning jet fuel immediately created thick, black smoke which enveloped the upper floors and roof of the North Tower. The roof of the South Tower was also engulfed in smoke because of prevailing light winds from the north.

Within minutes, New York City's 9-1-1 system was flooded with eyewitness accounts of the event. Most callers correctly identified the target of the attack. Some identified the plane as a commercial airliner. The first response came from private firms and individuals, the people and companies in the building. Everything that would happen to them during the next few minutes would turn on their circumstances and their preparedness, assisted by building personnel on site.

Because all of the building's stairwells were destroyed in the impact zone, the hundreds of survivors trapped on or above the 92nd floor gathered in large and small groups, primarily between the 103rd and 106th floors. A large group was reported on the 92nd floor, technically below the impact, but trapped by debris. Civilians were also reported trapped below the impact zone, mostly on floors in the eighties, though also on at least the 47th and 22nd floors, as well as in a number of elevators. Because of damage to the building's systems, civilians did not receive instructions on how to proceed over the public address system. Many were unable to use the emergency intercom phones as instructed in fire drills. Many called 9-1-1.

9-1-1 operators and FDNY dispatchers had no information about either the location or magnitude of the impact zone and were, therefore, unable to provide information as fundamental as whether callers were above or below the fire. 9-1-1 operators were also not given any information about the feasibility of rooftop rescues. In most instances, 9-1-1 operators and FDNY dispatchers, to whom the 9-1-1 calls were transferred, therefore relied on standard operating procedure for high-rise fires. Those procedures are to advise civilians to stay low, remain where they are, and wait for emergency personnel to reach them. This advice was given to callers from the North Tower for locations both above and below the impact.

The protocol of advising against evacuation, of telling people to stay where they were, was one of the lessons learned from the 1993 bombing. Fire chiefs told us that the evacuation of tens of thousands of people from skyscrapers can create many new problems, especially for disabled individuals or those in poor health. Many of the injuries after the 1993 bombing occurred during the evacuation. Evacuees also may complicate the movements and work of firefighters and other emergency workers.

Although the default guidance to stay in place may seem understandable in cases of conventional high-rise fires, all the emergency officials that morning quickly judged that the North Tower should be evacuated. The acting fire safety director in the North Tower immediately ordered everyone to evacuate that building, but the public address system was damaged and no one apparently heard the announcement. Hence, one of the few ways to communicate to people in the building was through calls to the 9-1-1 or other emergency operators. We found no protocol for communicating updated evacuation guidance to the 9-1-1 operators who were receiving calls for help. Improvising as they learned information from callers, some operators advised callers that they could break windows. Some operators were advising callers to evacuate, if they could.

Below the impact zone in the North Tower, those civilians who could began evacuating down the stairs almost immediately.

(VIDEO BEGINS)

MS. CLAIRE MCINTYRE (Manager, Administrative Services, American Bureau of Shipping): After going out into the hallway and yelling down that everyone get out, I went back into my office to get my pocketbook, and also I grabbed the flashlight and my whistle. The flashlight was useful for the first couple of flights going down because it was completely dark, and there was water flowing down, so it was dangerous too, and there was some debris, even on the landings. The air quality wasn't too bad. There was some smoke--light--it was never heavy smoke, where you couldn't breathe. And the lights in the stairwells worked all the way down except for the first two or three flights.

(VIDEO ENDS)

MR. FARMER: Civilians who called the Port Authority police desk at 5 World Trade Center were advised to leave if they could. Most civilians began evacuating without waiting to obtain instructions over the intercom system. Some had trouble reaching the exits because of damage caused by the impact. While evacuating, they were confused by deviations in the increasingly crowded stairwells and impeded by doors which were locked or jammed as a result of the impact. Despite these obstacles, the evacuation was relatively calm and orderly.

(VIDEO BEGINS)

MS. MCINTYRE: We never really heard any announcements or received any information all the way down. It got more and more congested as we went further down. For some reason we had to go down a long hallway and then when we got to the end of it, it was a locked door. So, we couldn't go any further; so we went back and went back up to 78 because we knew that that was a Sky Lobby.

(VIDEO ENDS)

MR. FARMER: Within ten minutes of impact, smoke was beginning to rise to the upper floors in debilitating volumes, and isolated fires were reported, although there were some pockets of refuge. Faced with insufferable heat, smoke, and fire, and no prospect for relief, some jumped or fell from the building.

Many civilians in the South Tower were unaware initially of what happened in the other tower:

(VIDEO BEGINS)

MR. BRIAN CLARK (President, Euro Brokers Relief Fund): I heard a loud boom. The lights in my office buzzed and I glanced up at them, and then my peripheral vision, behind me, caught something and I spun in my chair, and just two yards from me outside the glass, 84 floors in the air, was swirling flames. I assumed that there had been an explosion upstairs.

MR. RICHARD FERN (Vice President, Facilities, Euro Brokers): When I was entering the trading floor, I noticed all of the brokers clamoring on the building side where One World Trade Center is. And they were just screaming that a bomb went off.

(VIDEO ENDS)

MR. FARMER: Many people in the South Tower decided to leave. Some were advised to do so by fire wardens. In addition, some entire companies, including Morgan Stanley, which occupied over 20 floors of the South Tower, were evacuated by company security officials. The evacuation standard operating procedures did not provide a specific protocol for when to evacuate one tower in the event of a major explosion in the other. At 8:49 a.m. the deputy fire safety director in the North Tower spoke with his counterpart in the South Tower. They agreed to wait for the FDNY to arrive before determining whether to evacuate the South Tower. According to one fire chief, it was unimaginable, "beyond our consciousness," that another plane might hit the adjacent tower.

In the meantime, an announcement came over the public address system in the South Tower urging people to stay in place:

(VIDEO BEGINS)

MR. CLARK: Strobe lights flashed, the siren gave its little "whoop whoop." And I heard a familiar voice say, "Your attention please, ladies and gentlemen, Building 2 is secure. There is no need to evacuate Building 2. If you are in the midst of evacuation, you may use the re-entry doors and the elevators to return to your office. Repeat, Building 2 is secure." And the announcement was repeated.

(VIDEO ENDS)

MR. FARMER: Indeed, evacuees in the Sky Lobbies and the main lobby were advised by building personnel to return to their offices. The Port Authority told us that the advice may have been prompted by the safety hazard posed by falling debris and victims outside the building. Similar advice was given by security officials in the Sky Lobby of the South Tower. We do not know the reason for this advice, in part because the on-duty deputy fire safety director in charge of the South Tower perished in the tower's collapse.

As a result of the announcement, many civilians in the South Tower remained on their floors. Others reversed their evacuation and went back up:

(VIDEO BEGINS)

MR. FERN: After the first announcement, for the Port Authority or the PA system not to evacuate the floor, I guess I kinda felt comfortable to stay on the floor.

MR. CLARK: At three minutes after 9:00, at the time of impact, I was talking to a gentleman who said he had gone down half a dozen or ten floors and had come back up because of that announcement.

MR. STANLEY PRAIMNATH (Assistant Vice President, Administration, Mizvho Corporation Bank): As we were about to exit the building through the turnstile first, the security guard looks at me and says, "Where are you guys going?" I said, "Well, I am going home." "Why?" "I saw fireballs coming down." "No, your building is safe and secure. Go back to your office."

(VIDEO ENDS)

MR. FARMER: The Port Authority Police desk in 5 World Trade Center gave conflicting advice to people in the South Tower about whether to evacuate.

We have been fortunate, in learning about the FDNY's emergency response, to have had the cooperation of two of the principal commanders in the North Tower on 9/11, Joseph Pfeifer and Peter Hayden. The chiefs were filmed throughout the morning by Jules Naudet, a French filmmaker preparing a documentary about firefighters. We have reviewed Naudet's unedited footage and also filmed Chiefs Pfeifer and Hayden as they viewed the footage, commenting on events as they relived them.

The FDNY response began immediately after the crash.

(VIDEO BEGINS)

CHIEF JOSEPH PFEIFER (Deputy Assistant Chief, FDNY): Right from the beginning, before we even arrived at the Trade Center, what you see is the beginning of an Incident Command System where things are placed in order, and command is taken immediately.

(VIDEO SHOT BY JULES NAUDET ON 9/11 PLAYS)

(CHIEF PFEIFER (On Naudet video): We have a number of floors on fire, it looks like the plane was aiming towards the building. Transmit a Third Alarm. We will have a staging area at Vesey and West Street. Have the Third Alarm assignment go into that area, Second Alarm assignment report to the building."

CHIEF PFEIFER: So from the bullet point, where the plane hit the building, we started our Incident Command System.

(VIDEO ENDS)

MR. FARMER: Chief Pfeifer and four companies arrived at about 8:52 a.m. As they entered the lobby, they immediately encountered badly burned civilians who had been caught in the path of the fireball. The initial FDNY incident commanders were briefed on building systems by building personnel:

(VIDEO BEGINS)

CHIEF PETER HAYDEN (Assistant Chief, FDNY): When I entered the lobby here, Joe had already assumed command, and I came in and I was receiving a briefing from Chief Pfeifer here. He was giving me a status of what was the building's system. He was informing me that the elevators were not working at the time and that they had the report from the Fire Safety Director that the plane had crashed in around the 78th floor and Joe had started units up and had them report to the 78th floor.

Here we're convening with the Fire Safety Director and the Port Authority personnel. Our main concern at this time was evacuation of the building. And we wanted to get everyone out of the building.

MR. FARMER: Units began mobilizing in the increasingly crowded lobby.

CHIEF PFEIFER: You have to understand that in the Trade Center that we had ninety-nine elevators in each of the towers, and those had to be checked to see if they were operating. Without elevators, it meant that the firefighters, carrying a hundred pounds of equipment, would have to climb some ninety floors just to get to where we could start a rescue operation for people trapped above the damaged area.

CHIEF HAYDEN: These are units coming in and they're awaiting assignment and, as I said, we're trying to get elevators working. We are conferring with the Port Authority personnel there--and this took a period of time for them to come back to and confirm to us that we had no elevators operating. Once we realized that we didn't have elevators operating, we began giving instruction to members to start ascending the stairs by way of the B Stairwell.

It was challenging for the chiefs to keep track of arriving units. They were frustrated by the absence of working building systems and elevators.

MR. HAYDEN: My aide had arrived and he was setting up the Command Board--as you can see him in the background--he was setting up the Board, which accounts for the units as they come in. Once they are given an assignment they are entered in on the Command Board and that's the way we keep track of the individuals.

I am walking down off to the right here--now waving my radio trying to get the Port Authority personnel and the chief fire to come with me off a little bit to have a private discussion regarding the building systems and particularly the elevators. That was a primary concern of ours at the time, that we didn't have the elevators available to us.

You can see the damage that the planes caused. You can see the tiles on the floor there. Right now we are seeing more units come in.

(VIDEO ENDS)

MR. FARMER: Shortly before 9:00 a.m., FDNY chiefs advised building personnel and a Port Authority Police Department officer to evacuate the adjacent South Tower. Impressed by the magnitude of the catastrophe, fire chiefs had decided to clear the whole complex, including the South Tower.

By 9:00 a.m., many senior FDNY leaders, including seven of the eleven most highly ranked chiefs in the department, had begun responding from headquarters in Brooklyn. The Chief of Department and the Chief of Operations called a 5th alarm, which would bring additional engine and ladder companies; they also called two more FDNY Rescue teams. The Chief of Department arrived at approximately 9:00 a.m. He established an overall Incident Command Post on the median of the West Side Highway.

Emergency Medical Service personnel were directed to one of four triage areas around the perimeter of the Trade Center. In addition, many private hospital ambulances were rushing to the Trade Center complex. In the North Tower lobby, the chiefs quickly made the decision that the fire in the North Tower could not be fought.

(VIDEO BEGINS)

CHIEF HAYDEN: Well, we realized that, because of the impact of the plane, that there was some structural damage to the building, and most likely that the fire suppression systems within the building were probably damaged and possibly inoperable. We made that conclusion. We knew that at the height of the day there was as many as fifty thousand people in this building. We had a large volume of fire on the upper floors. Each floor was approximately an acre in size.

Several floors of fire would have been beyond the fire extinguishing capability of the forces that we had on hand. So we determined, very early on, that this was going to be strictly a rescue mission. We were going to evacuate the building, get everybody out, and then we were going to get out.

(VIDEO ENDS)

MR. FARMER: The chiefs decided to concentrate on evacuating civilians from the North Tower, although they held various views about whether anyone at or above the impact zone could be saved. As of 9:00 a.m., if only those units dispatched had responded, and if those dispatched units were not "riding heavy" with extra men, 235 firefighters would be at the scene or en route. The vast majority of these would be expected to enter the North Tower.

(VIDEO BEGINS)

CHIEF HAYDEN: This is Rescue One entering the lobby now. And at this time we were starting to get a number of distress calls coming in, particularly from the 9-1-1 and from the Port Authority personnel of people in distress on various floors. As we got the information coming in, we would give the assignments out to the companies. If we had a report of people trapped in elevators, we would send a company up to that specific floor. If we had reports--at one point in time, of people in wheelchairs and we gave out assignments to the companies to go up and get the people out of whatever particular floor they were calling from.

These were difficult assignments. I had a strong inner sense, throughout this entire operation, that we were going to lose people this day.

CHIEF PFEIFER: What we did know was that thousands of people, tens of thousands of people, were in their greatest moment of need and the firefighters came in and they received orders from our Command staff, and they turned around and they picked up their hose, and they picked up their tools, and they went up the stairs.

And what you see here is--this footage is actually my brother going upstairs. As so many other firefighters, that was the last time we saw them.

(VIDEO ENDS)

MR. FARMER: The NYPD response also began seconds after the crash. At 8:47 a.m. the NYPD ordered a Level 3 Mobilization. An initial mobilization point for patrol officers was established on the west side of the intersection of West and Liberty Streets. NYPD rescue teams were directed to mobilize at the intersection of Church and Vesey Streets. The first of these officers arrived at Church and Vesey at 8:56 a.m. At 8:50 a.m., the aviation unit of the NYPD dispatched two helicopters to the Trade Center to report on conditions and assess the feasibility of a rooftop landing or special rescue operations. Within ten minutes of the crash, NYPD and Port Authority Police personnel were assisting with the evacuation of civilians. At 8:58 a.m., a helicopter pilot reported on rooftop conditions:

(VIDEO BEGINS)

OFFICER JAMES CICCONE (Police Officer, NYPD Aviation Unit): On the morning of September 11th, as I arrived at World Trade Tower 1, I was accessing the damage on the north side of the building and the rooftop area for the possibility of rooftop extraction from one of our heavier lift helicopters. And at that point, a few passes, and slow passes, we made a determination that we didn't see anybody up on the roof, but more so, we had problems with the heat and the smoke from the building. The heat actually made it difficult for us to hold the helicopter because it would interfere with the rotor system.

(VIDEO ENDS)

MR. FARMER: At 8:58 a.m., while en route, the Chief of the NYPD raised the department's mobilization to Level 4, its highest level, which would result in the dispatch of approximately 30 lieutenants, 100 sergeants and 800 police officers, in addition to rescue teams, which were already at the scene. The Chief of Department arrived at Church and Vesey at 9:00 a.m. At 9:01 a.m., the NYPD patrol mobilization point at West and Liberty was moved to West and Vesey, in order to handle the greater number of patrol officers who would be responding to the Level 4 mobilization. These officers would be stationed around the perimeter of the complex to assist with evacuation and crowd control.

Around the city, the NYPD cleared routes along major thoroughfares for emergency vehicles responding to the Trade Center. The NYPD and Port Authority police coordinated the closing of bridges, subways, PATH trains, and tunnels into Manhattan. The Port Authority's on-site commanding police officer was standing in the concourse when a fireball exploded out of the North Tower lobby, causing him to dive for cover. Within minutes of impact Port Authority police from bridge, tunnel, and airport commands began responding to the Trade Center. Officers from the Trade Center command began assisting in evacuating civilians.

The Port Authority Police Department lacked clear standard operating procedures to guide personnel responding, from one command to another, during a major incident. The fire safety director in charge of the complex arrived in the North Tower lobby at approximately 8:52 a.m. and was informed by the deputy fire safety director there that evacuation instructions had been announced over the public address system within one minute of impact. As mentioned earlier, to our knowledge, because the public address system had been damaged upon impact, no civilians heard that announcement.

At 9:00 a.m., the Port Authority Police commanding officer ordered an evacuation of civilians in the World Trade Center complex because of the danger posed by highly flammable jet fuel from Flight 11. The order was issued, however, over a radio channel which could be heard only by officers on the Port Authority-Trade Center command channel. There is no evidence that this order was communicated to officers in other Port Authority Police commands or to members of other responding agencies.

At 9:00 a.m., the Port Authority Police Superintendent and Chief of Department arrived together at the Trade Center complex, and made their way to the North Tower lobby. Some Port Authority officers immediately began climbing the stairs and assisting civilians.

(VIDEO BEGINS)

OFFICER DAVID LIM (Port Authority Police Department): I went up the B Staircase now, and so I proceeded up on that one. While people were coming down on that staircase, there were some people that were burnt and injured--required assistance. So, I could have taken one person and brought that person down, I guess, but I thought the greater good would be to get to the 44th floor and assist more people. So I assigned the people that were uninjured to help carry this person down. There is a triage area downstairs, and that seemed to work out. People were more than happy to help each other out.

(VIDEO ENDS)

MR. FARMER: Officials in the Office of Emergency Management's headquarters at 7 World Trade Center began to activate its emergency operation center immediately after the North Tower was hit. At approximately 8:50 a.m. a senior representative from that office arrived in the lobby of the North Tower and began to act as its field responder.

Summary. In the 17-minute period between 8:46 a.m. and 9:03 a.m. on September 11, New York City and the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey had mobilized the largest rescue operation in the City's history. Well over one thousand first-responders had been deployed, evacuations had begun, and the critical decision, that the fire could not be fought, had been made. The decision was made to evacuate the South Tower as well.

At 9:02 a.m., a further announcement on the South Tower advised civilians to begin an orderly evacuation if conditions warranted. One minute later United 175 hit the South Tower.

MR. CASPERSEN: From 9:03 until 9:59 a.m.: At 9: 03 a.m., the hijacked United Airlines Flight 175 hit 2 WTC, the South Tower, from the south, crashing through the 78th to 84th floors.

(VIDEO PLAYS OF ATTACK ON SOUTH TOWER)

MR. CASPERSEN: What had been the largest and most complicated rescue operation in city history instantly doubled in magnitude. The plane banked as it hit the building, leaving portions of the building undamaged on impact-floors. As a consequence, and in contrast to the situation in the North Tower, one of the stairwells, Stairwell A, initially remained passable from top to bottom.

(VIDEO BEGINS)

MR. PRAIMNATH: I am looking to the direction of the Statue of Liberty, and I am looking at an airplane coming, eye-level, eye contact, towards me, giant gray airplane. I am still seeing the letter "U" on its tail, and the plane is bearing down on me. I dropped the phone and I screamed and I dove under my desk. It was the most ear-shattering sound ever. The plane just crashed into the building. The bottom wing sliced right through the office and it stuck in my office door twenty feet from where I am huddled under my desk.

(VIDEO ENDS)

MR. CASPERSEN: At the lowest point of impact, the 78th floor Sky Lobby, hundreds had been waiting to evacuate when the plane hit. Many were killed or injured severely; others were relatively unaffected. We know of at least one civilian who seized the initiative and shouted that anyone who could walk should walk to the stairs, and anyone who could help should help others in need of assistance. At least two small groups of civilians descended from that floor. Others remained alive in the impact zone above the 78th floor, though conditions on these floors began to deteriorate within ten minutes.

(VIDEO BEGINS)

MR. PRAIMNATH: Upon impact, the ceiling caved in, part of the 82nd floor collapsed. I am trapped under a steel desk. The only desk that stood firm, everything else is broken up. It looked like a demolition crew came and just knocked everything. Every wall was broken up. Computers were broken up-- everything.

(VIDEO ENDS)

MR. CASPERSEN: As in the North Tower, civilians became first-responders.

(VIDEO BEGINS)

MR. CLARK: We went down the hallway from the 84th floor, and I happened to turn left to Stairway A. We descended only three floors, to the 81st floor, a group of seven of us, when we met a very heavy-set woman and she just emphatically told our group, "Stop, stop! We have just come off a floor in flames and we've got to get above the flames and the smoke." That's about all I heard of her conversation because I heard somebody inside the 81st floor banging on the wall and screaming, "Help, help! I am buried. Is anyone there? Help, I can't breathe!" And, I noticed that my workmates, the heavy-set woman and her traveling companion were starting to go up the stairs. And that day they all perished, unfortunately. But they were dealing with the information they had. None of us really had known what had happened or what was about to happen.

MR. PRAIMNATH: I am watching the plane, I am watching the floor, and somebody heard me scream on the other end. The person had a flashlight.

MR. CLARK: This person was directing me. This person who was trapped, saying, "Left, right," and I kept moving with my flashlight.

MR. PRAIMNATH: The man says," Knock on the wall and I will know exactly where you are."

MR. CLARK: Somehow I grabbed him under the arms, or around the neck, pulled him up and over this, and -- what, as I say later, I learned was a wall. I didn't know what it was at the time. And we fell in a heap on the floor.

MR. PRAIMNATH: And Brian put his hand around my neck and said, "Come on, let's go home."

(VIDEO ENDS)

MR. CASPERSEN: Some civilians ascended the stairs and others remained on affected floors to assist colleagues. Although Stairwell A in the South Tower remained passable from above the impact zone to the lobby, conditions were difficult and deteriorating.

(VIDEO BEGINS)

MR. FERN: Upon entering Stairway A, I started to run down the stairs. The conditions in the stairs were smoky. There was no lights in the stairway. There was a glow strip on the floor in the center of the stairs. There was also a glow strip on the handrail.

MR. PRAIMNATH: Brian knew we had to take the Stairwell A, but there was so much rubble--I don't remember much--I think we just slid right from the 81st floor to the 80th floor because of all that sheet rock and ceiling tiles that was on there. We actually tried to walk and we slid right down.

MR. CLARK: There was smoke, there was a lot of water flowing under foot. And in a couple of places--I'm guessing, around the 78th, 77th floor--there was only one layer of dry wall left that was cracked and the flames were licking up the other side of the wall.

(VIDEO ENDS)

MR. CASPERSEN: Many ascended in search of clearer air or to attempt to reach the roof. Those attempting to reach the roof were thwarted by locked doors. Others attempting to descend were frustrated by jammed or locked doors in stairwells or confused by the structure of the stairwell deviations.

(VIDEO BEGINS)

MR. CLARK: As we descended the stairways, one strange thing that I recalled happening is that the Stairway A, at least--and I learned later that Stairway C is the same--the stairway just doesn't go back and forth all the way down. As you descend a few floors, you come to a situation where you must traverse down a hallway. You go down a hallway, you make a turn, the stairway continues, there's another transition later--a bit of confusion, especially in the darkness, and especially when that was the distress area.

(VIDEO ENDS)

MR. CASPERSEN: By 9:35 a.m., the West Street lobby level of the South Tower was becoming overwhelmed by injured who had descended to the lobby, but were having difficulty continuing. Within 15 minutes after the impact, debilitating smoke had reached at least one location on the 100th floor and severe smoke conditions were reported throughout floors in the nineties and hundreds over the course of the following half-an-hour. By 9:30 a.m. a number of civilians who had failed to reach the roof and could not descend because of intensifying smoke became trapped on the 105th floor. There were reports of tremendous smoke in most areas of that floor, but at least one area remained less affected until shortly before the building collapsed.

Still, there were several areas between the impact zone and the uppermost floors where conditions were better. At least one hundred people remained alive on the 88th and 89th floors, in some cases calling 9-1-1 for direction. The 9-1-1 system remained plagued by the operators' lack of awareness of what was occurring and by the sheer volume of emergency calls.

(VIDEO BEGINS)

MR. CLARK: I had a very frustrating experience calling 9-1-1. It was, I am sure, over three minutes in duration--my conversation with them, not five minutes, but certainly over three minutes--where I told them, when they answered the phone, where I was, that I had passed somebody on the 44th floor, injured--they need to get a medic and a stretcher to this floor, and described the situation in brief. And the person then asked for my phone number, or something, and they said--they put me on hold. "You gotta talk to one of my supervisors"--and suddenly I was on hold. And so I waited a considerable amount of time. Somebody else came back on the phone, I repeated the story. And then it happened again. I was on hold a second time and needed to repeat the story for a third time. But I told the third person that I am only telling you once. I am getting out of the building. Here are the details. Write it down, and do what you should do, and put the phone down. Stanley and I went back to the stairs, we continued all the way down to the plaza level.

(VIDEO ENDS)

MR. CASPERSEN: No one in the first-responder community knew that Stairwell A remained potentially passable. No callers were advised that helicopter rescues were not feasible. Civilians below the impact were also generally advised to remain where they were by 9-1-1 or FDNY dispatch operators. Back in the North Tower, evacuation generally continued. Thousands of civilians continued to descend in an orderly manner. On the 91st floor, the highest floor with stairway access, all but one were uninjured and able to descend.

At 9:11 a.m., Port Authority workers at the 64th floor of the North Tower were told by the Port Authority Police desk in Jersey City to stay near the stairwells and wait for assistance. These workers eventually began to descend anyway, but most of them died in the collapse of the North Tower. Those who descended Stairwell B of the North Tower exited between the elevator banks in the lobby. Those who descended the Stairwells A and C exited at the raised mezzanine level, where the smoky air was causing respiratory problems. All civilians were directed into the concourse at lobby level. Officers from the Port Authority and New York Police Departments continued to assist with the evacuation of civilians, for example, guiding them through the concourse in order to shelter the evacuees from falling debris and victims.

(VIDEO BEGINS)

MS. MCINTYRE: When we went down into the concourse, it was just people trying to get out. The security or rescue people just still directing us to keep moving and go out towards Borders and then go out.

(VIDEO ENDS)

MR. CASPERSEN: By 9:55 a.m., those few civilians who were still evacuating in the North Tower consisted primarily of injured, handicapped, elderly or severely overweight individuals. Calls to 9-1-1 reflect that others remained alive above and below the impact zone, reporting increasingly desperate conditions.

Immediately after the second plane hit, the FDNY Chief of Department called a second 5th alarm. While nine Brooklyn units had been staged on the Brooklyn side of the Brooklyn Battery tunnel at 8:53 a.m., these units were not dispatched to the scene at this time. Instead, units from further away were dispatched. Just after the South Tower impact, chiefs in the North Tower lobby huddled to discuss strategy for the operations and communication in the two towers.

At 9:05 a.m., two FDNY chiefs tested the World Trade Center complex's repeater system.

This was the system installed after the 1993 bombing in order to enable firefighters operating on upper floors to maintain consistent radio communication with the lobby command. The system had been activated for use on portable radios at 8:54 a.m., but a second button which would have enabled the master hand-set was not activated at that time. The chief testing the master handset at 9:05 a.m. did not realize that the master handset had not been activated. When he could not communicate, he concluded that the system was down. The system was working, however, and was used subsequently by firefighters in the South Tower.

The FDNY Chief of Safety agreed with the consensus that the only choice was to let the fires, "burn up and out." The chiefs in the North Tower were forced to make decisions based on little or no information.

(VIDEO BEGINS)

CHIEF PFEIFER: One of the most critical things in a major operation like this is to have information. We didn't have a lot of information coming in. We didn't receive any reports of what was seen from the helicopters. It was impossible to know how much damage was done on the upper floors, whether the stairwells were intact or not. A matter of fact, what you saw on TV, we didn't have that information.

CHIEF HAYDEN: People watching on TV certainly had more knowledge of what was happening a hundred floors above us than we did in the lobby. Certainly without any information, without critical information coming in, the cumulative effect of the information coming in, it's very difficult to make informed and critical decisions without that information. And it didn't exist that day. Our communication systems were down. Our building suppression systems were down, the elevators, we had no video capability throughout the entire operation.

(VIDEO ENDS)

MR. CASPERSEN: Climbing up the stairwells carrying heavy equipment was a laborious task, even for physically fit firefighters. Though the lobby command post did not know it, one battalion chief in the North Tower found a working elevator, which he took to the 16th floor before beginning to climb. Just prior to 10:00 a.m., about an hour after firefighters first began streaming into the North Tower, at least two companies of firefighters had climbed to the Sky Lobby on the 44th floor of the North Tower. Numerous units were located between the 5th and 37th floors in the North Tower.

At approximately 9:07 a.m., two chiefs commenced operations in the South Tower lobby. Almost immediately they were joined by an Office of Emergency Management field responder. They were not immediately joined by a sizable number of fire companies, as most, if not all units which had been in the North Tower lobby, remained there. One chief and a ladder company found a working elevator to the 40th floor. From there they proceeded to climb Stairwell B. One member of the ladder company stayed behind to operate the elevator.

Unlike the commanders in the North Tower lobby, these chiefs in the South Tower kept their radios on the repeater channel. For the first 15 minutes of the operations in the South Tower, communications among them and the ladder company which ascended with the chief, worked well. Upon learning from a company security official that the impact zone began at the 78th floor, a ladder company transmitted this information and the chief directed an engine company on the 40th floor to attempt to find an elevator to reach that upper level. Unfortunately, no FDNY chiefs outside the South Tower realized that the repeater channel was functioning and being used by units in the South Tower. Chiefs in the North Tower lobby and outside were unable to reach the South Tower lobby command post initially.

Communications also began to break down within the South Tower. Those units responding to the South Tower were advised to use tactical channel 3. From approximately 9:21 a.m. on, the ascending chief was unable to reach the South Tower lobby command post. The lobby chief ceased to transmit on the repeater channel at that time.

The first FDNY fatality of the day occurred at approximately 9:25 a.m. when a civilian landed on a fireman on West Street.

By 9:30 a.m., few of the units dispatched to the South Tower had arrived at their staging area. Many units were unfamiliar with the complex and could not enter the South Tower because of the danger of victims and debris falling on Liberty Street. Some units entered the Marriott Hotel and were given assignments there; others mistakenly responded to the North Tower. An additional 2nd alarm was requested at 9:37 a.m. because so few units had reported. At this time, units which had been staged on the Brooklyn side of the Brooklyn Battery Tunnel were sent and many of them arrived at the World Trade Center by 9:55 a.m.

At 9:50 a.m., a ladder company had made its way up to the 70th floor of the South Tower. There they encountered many seriously injured people. At 9:53 a.m. a group of civilians were found trapped in an elevator on the 78th floor Sky Lobby. By 9:58 a.m., the ascending chief had reached the 78th floor on Stairwell A, and reported that it looked open to the 79th floor. He reported numerous civilian fatalities in the area. A ladder company on the 78th floor was preparing to use hoses to fight the fire when the South Tower collapsed.

So far, we have concentrated on the Fire Department's command set-up in the North and South Towers. The overall incident command was just outside the World Trade Center complex. At approximately 9:10 a.m., because of the danger of falling debris, this command post was moved from the middle of West Street to its western edge by the parking garage in front of 2 World Financial Center. The overall command post's ability to track all FDNY units was extremely limited.

At approximately 9:20 a.m., the Mayor and the NYPD Commissioner reached the FDNY overall command post. The FDNY Chief of Department briefed the Mayor on operations and stated that this was a rescue mission of civilians. He stated that he believed they could save everyone below the impact zones. He also advised that, in his opinion, rooftop rescue operations would be impossible. None of the chiefs present believed a total collapse of either tower was possible. Later, after the Mayor had left, one senior chief present did articulate his concern that upper floors could begin to collapse in a few hours, and so he said that firefighters, thus, should not ascend above floors in the sixties.

By 9:20 a.m., significantly more firemen then were dispatched were at the World Trade Center complex or en route. Many off-duty firemen were given permission by company officers to "ride heavy." Others found alternative transportation and responded. In one case an entire company of off-duty firefighters managed to congregate and come to the World Trade Center as a complete team, in addition to the on-duty team which already had been dispatched to the scene.

MR. CASPERSEN: Numerous fire marshals also reported to the scene. At 9:46 a.m., the FDNY Chief of Department called a third 5th alarm. This meant that over one-third of all of the FDNY units in New York City were now committed to the World Trade Center.

The Police Department was also responding massively after the attack on the South Tower. Almost 2,000 officers had been called to the scene. In addition, the Chief of the Department called for Operation OMEGA, to evacuate and secure sensitive locations around the city. At 9:06 a.m. the NYPD Chief of Department instructed that no units were to land on the roof of either tower.

An NYPD rescue team in the North Tower lobby prepared to climb at approximately 9:15 a.m. They attempted to check in with the FDNY chiefs present, but were rebuffed. Office of Emergency Management personnel present did not intercede. The team went to work anyway, climbing Stairwell B in order to set up a triage center on upper floors for victims who could not walk. Later, a second NYPD rescue team arrived in the North Tower and did not attempt to check-in with the FDNY command post. NYPD rescue teams also entered the South Tower. The Office of Emergency Management field responder present there ensured that they check-in with the lobby chief. In this case, it was agreed that the rescue team would ascend in support of FDNY personnel. By 9:15 a.m., a third and fourth NYPD team were preparing to leave the Church and Vesey mobilization point in order to enter the towers.

At approximately 9:30 a.m. one of the helicopters present advised that a rooftop evacuation still would not be possible.

(VIDEO BEGINS)

OFFICER CICCONE: After the second Tower was hit, we tried to make our way towards that area, but the smoke from the first building, Tower 1, obscured the rooftop of Tower 2. It was the first hour-and-a-half that was critical for these observations for rooftop rescue. We flew a horseshoe pattern, in that horseshoe pattern for over a pattern of about an hour-and-a-half before the buildings collapsed. That, the same observations were made. There was no one on the roof. Our ability to get in that type position was still factored in by the heat, and made it difficult to even, to make it plausible, to get on the roof.

(VIDEO ENDS)

MR. CASPERSEN: At 9:37 a.m., a civilian on the 106th floor of the South Tower reported to a 9-1-1 operator that a lower floor, quote, "90-something floor," end quote, was collapsing. This information was conveyed incorrectly by the 9-1-1 operator to an NYPD dispatcher. The NYPD dispatcher further confused the substance of the 9-1-1 call in conveying at 9:52 a.m. to NYPD officers on the scene, "the 106th floor is crumbling." By 9:58 a.m., there were two NYPD rescue teams in each of the two towers, another approaching the North Tower, and approximately ten other NYPD officers climbing in the towers.

(VIDEO BEGINS)

OFFICER DAVID NORMAN (Police Officer, NYPD Emergency Service Unit): We went up to the 31st floor where we triaged, probably, somewhere around six to a half-dozen to a dozen firefighters for a random number of things: chest pains, difficulty breathing, things like that. Prior to that, we would notice that the amount of civilians had dwindled down to almost none.

(VIDEO ENDS)

MR. CASPERSEN: In addition, there were numerous NYPD officers on the ground floors throughout the complex, assisting with evacuation, and patrolling and securing the World Trade Center perimeter. A greater number of NYPD officers were staged throughout lower Manhattan, assisting in civilian evacuation, keeping roads clear, and conducting other operations in response to the attacks.

Prior to 9:59 a.m., no NYPD helicopter transmission predicted that either tower would collapse.

Initial responders from outside Port Authority police commands proceeded to the police desk in 5 World Trade Center or to the fire safety desk in the North Tower. Officers were assigned to assist in stairwell evacuations and to expedite evacuation in the plaza, concourse, and PATH station. As reports of trapped civilians were received, Port Authority Police officers also started climbing stairs for specific rescue efforts. Others, including the Port Authority Police Superintendent, began climbing toward the impact zone in the North Tower. The Port Authority Police Chief and senior officers began climbing in the North Tower with the purpose of reaching the "Windows of the World" restaurant on the 106th floor, where there were at least 100 people trapped.

The Port Authority Police Department lacked clear standard operating procedures for coordinating a multi-command response to the same incident. It also lacked a radio channel that all commands could access. Many officers remained on their local command channels, which did not work once they were outside the immediate geographic area of their respective commands.

Many Port Authority Police officers from different commands responded on their own initiative. By 9:30 a.m. the Port Authority's central police desk requested that responding officers meet at West and Vesey and await further instructions. In the absence of pre-determined leadership roles for an incident of this magnitude, a number of Port Authority inspectors, captains and lieutenants stepped forward at the West and Vesey Street location to formulate an on-site response plan. They were hampered by not knowing how many officers were responding to the site and where those officers were operating. Many of the officers who responded to the command post lacked suitable protective equipment to enter the complex.

By 9:58 a.m., one Port Authority police officer had reached the Sky Lobby on the 44th floor of the North Tower. Also in the North Tower, two Port Authority police teams had reached floors in the upper and lower twenties. Numerous officers also were climbing in the South Tower, including the Port Authority's elite rescue team. Many also were on the ground floor of the complex assisting with evacuation, manning the Port Authority Police desk at 5 World Trade Center or supporting lobby command posts.

(VIDEO BEGINS)

OFFICER SUE KEANE (Port Authority Police Department): When I got up to Stairwell C in the mezzanine area, I was the only Port Authority police officer there at the time. There were two civilians there, one Port Authority employee, and there was a Secret Service Agent there. Afterwards, some NYPD officers showed up, and at that time everybody just basically worked together. There was no standard operating procedure. We just did whatever we had to do to guide people out of the stairwell.

(VIDEO ENDS)

MR. CASPERSEN: Summary. The emergency response effort escalated with the crash of United 175 into the South Tower. With that escalation, communications and command-and-control became increasingly critical and increasingly difficult. First-responders assisted thousands of civilians in evacuating the towers, even as incident commanders from responding agencies lacked knowledge of what other agencies and, in some cases, their own responders were doing.

Then the South Tower collapsed.

MR. DELGROSSO: 9:59 until 10:26 a.m. At 9:59 a.m., the South Tower collapsed in ten seconds.

(VIDEO PLAYS OF SOUTH TOWER COLLAPSE)

MR. DELGROSSO: We believe that all of the people still inside the tower were killed, as well as a number of individuals, both first-responders and civilians, in the concourse, the Marriott and on neighboring streets.

The next emergency issue was to decide what to do in the North Tower, once the South Tower had collapsed. In the North Tower, 9-1-1 calls placed from above the impact zone grew increasingly desperate. The only civilians still evacuating above the 10th floor were those who were injured or handicapped. First-responders were assisting those people in evacuating. Every FDNY command post ceased to operate upon the collapse of the South Tower.

(VIDEO BEGINS)

CHIEF PFEIFER: We were in the North Tower communicating with some of our people, and all of a sudden we hear this loud roar. And, we were able to go into a small alcove, immediately to our left, just adjacent to the passageway to 6 World Trade Center. And as you see, everything goes black. And what we thought at this point is that we were the ones in trouble, that we in the lobby--something happened, something fell off of the building and crashed into the lobby or maybe the elevators had blown out--but we thought we were the guys in trouble. And when we couldn't maintain our command post in the lobby, we made a decision that we needed to regroup and pull people out of the building.

CHIEF HAYDEN: We were completely unaware that the South Tower had collapsed. I don't ever think it was in our realm of thought. We knew some significant event had occurred, whether it was another plane or a bomb or one of the elevators crashing into the lobby, but certainly it was not in our thought process that the South Tower had collapsed.

(VIDEO ENDS)

MR. DELGROSSO: An FDNY marine unit radioed immediately that the South Tower--excuse me. Lacking awareness of the South Tower's collapse, the chiefs in the North Tower, nonetheless, ordered an evacuation of the building.

(VIDEO BEGINS)

CHIEF PFEIFER: "All units in Tower 1, evacuate the building." And I heard that message relayed up. And then a little later I repeated it, "Evacuate the building." At that point, we had firefighters many floors above, and it takes some time to come down. What we didn't know, at that point, was that we were running out of time.

(VIDEO ENDS)

MR. DELGROSSO: An FDNY marine unit radioed immediately that the South Tower had collapsed. To our knowledge, this information did not reach the chiefs at the scene. Within minutes some firefighters began to hear evacuation orders over Tactical 1, the channel being used in the North Tower. Some FDNY personnel also gave the evacuation instruction on Command Channel 2, which was much less crowded, as only chiefs were using it. Two battalion chiefs on upper floors heard the instruction on Command 2 and repeated it to everyone they encountered. At least one of them also repeated the evacuation order on Tactical 1.

Other firefighters did not receive the transmissions. The reasons varied. Some FDNY radios may have not picked up the transmissions in the difficult high-rise environment. The difficulty of that environment was compounded by the numerous communications all attempted on the Tactical 1 after the South Tower collapsed. That channel was overwhelmed and evacuation orders may have been lost. Some of the firefighters in the North Tower were among those who responded, even though they were off-duty and they did not have their radios.

Finally, some of the firefighters in the North Tower were supposed to have gone to the South Tower and were using the Tactical Channel assigned to that Tower. Many firefighters who did receive the evacuation order delayed their evacuation in order to assist victims who could not move on their own. Many perished.

Many chiefs on the scene were unaware that the South Tower collapsed. To our knowledge, none of the evacuation orders given in the North Tower followed the specific protocols, which would include stating, "mayday, mayday, mayday," to be given for the most urgent building evacuation. To our knowledge none of the evacuation orders mentioned that the South Tower had collapsed. Firefighters who received these orders lacked a uniform sense of urgency in their evacuation.

(VIDEO BEGINS)

CHIEF HAYDEN: Even with the order to evacuate, the firefighters themselves on the upper floors were not aware that the building had collapsed. They didn't realize the tremendous amount of danger they were in at that time.

CHIEF PFEIFER: I didn't know, even at this point, that the entire South Tower collapsed. What we were doing here was regrouping, and the firefighters were coming down, and they were coming down with people. And they were helping more people to get out of the building. Like us, they didn't know the building fell down.

(VIDEO ENDS)

MR. DELGROSSO: The Police Department had a better understanding of the situation. The South Tower's collapse disrupted the NYPD rescue team command post at Church and Vesey. Nonetheless, the NYPD command structure gave vital help to its units.

(VIDEO BEGINS)

OFFICER KENNETH WINKLER (Detective, NYPD Emergency Service Unit): There was this tremendous roar, tremendous. I looked up and the South Tower was imploding. I got behind a vehicle and it went from white to gray to black, and then back again. As this was happening, I was calling units out of the North Tower. The units in the North Tower did not know that the South Tower had collapsed.

OFFICER NORMAN: We at that point--because we were in an area where there were no windows--didn't exactly know what was going on. Our building, obviously, violently shook. The noise from the collapse was heard by us, but we didn't know exactly what we were going through.

OFFICER WINKLER: The building was shaking, the ceiling tiles were falling, but we did not know why--this was as a result of the South Tower collapsing.

OFFICER NORMAN: As soon as that subsided somewhat, we were communicated from Officer Winkler, who was our command post operator, that the South Tower had completely collapsed and we were being called out of the building. At first, we kinda didn't understand that transmission. We clearly understood it, but to think that a building of hundred and some stories would be completed collapsed, was kind of, you know, almost not believable at that moment. So we asked for him to confirm that and to repeat his message. He then explained that there was no South Tower and that it was absolutely gone and that our building was in imminent danger of collapse and that we should come out of the building immediately.

OFFICER WINKLER: They descended down in a controlled manner, still checking the floors on the way down. They didn't rush out. As they got down and they got across West Street, the North Tower collapsed.

(VIDEO ENDS)

MR. DELGROSSO: Many NYPD radio frequencies became overwhelmed with transmissions relating to injured, trapped or missing officers. By 10:10 a.m., the NYPD rescue team advised that they were moving their command post north and began moving vehicles in that direction.

NYPD Aviation radioed in immediately that the South Tower had collapsed. At 10:08 a.m., an aviation helicopter pilot advised that he did not believe the North Tower would last much longer. There was no ready way to relay this information to the fire chiefs in the North Tower. Both the NYPD rescue teams in the North Tower knew that the South Tower had collapsed and evacuated the building. One remained in the complex near 5 and 6 World Trade Center in order to keep searching for people who needed help. A majority of these officers died.

At the time of the South Tower's collapse, a number of NYPD, Port Authority Police officers, as well as some FDNY personnel, were operating in different groups in the North Tower mezzanine, the World Trade Center plaza and the concourse, as well as on the neighboring streets. Many of these officers were thrown into the air and were enveloped in the total darkness of the debris cloud. Within minutes of the South Tower's collapse, these officers began to regroup in darkness and to lead the remaining civilians and injured officers out of the complex. Many of these officers continued rescue operations in the immediate vicinity of the North Tower and remained there until the North Tower collapsed. Many lost their lives.

The collapse of the South Tower also forced the evacuation of the Port Authority Police command post on West and Vesey Streets, forcing its officers to move north. There is no evidence that Port Authority Police officers from outside the World Trade Center command ever heard an evacuation order on their radios. Some of these officers in the North Tower determined to evacuate, either on their own, or in consultation with other first-responders they came across. One Port Authority Police officer from the World Trade Center command reported that he had heard an urgent evacuation instruction on his radio soon after the South Tower collapsed.

(VIDEO BEGINS)

OFFICER LIM: I remember stopping on the floors now, from 44 down, to check the floors to see if there was anybody left behind. There were some people that were, I guess, elderly, or that required assistance, that were just starting to come down now, so I just gathered them--there was no time to wait anymore. I felt that time was of essence. And I collected them, and with my party we started going down.

(VIDEO ENDS)

MR. DELGROSSO: Other Port Authority police stayed in the World Trade Center complex, assisting with the evacuation.

(VIDEO BEGINS)

OFFICER KEANE: You can see into the plaza, but it's almost like an alley-way between Tower One, and I believe it was 6--the Immigrations Department, because I could see the Immigrations sign still.

So I knew at that point where I was and that we could actually follow that wall down and go into 5. I had a clearer view to look up and I would look up to see whether or not things were falling. You couldn't see too high up. It wasn't like I could--you could hear things--it was strange. You could hear whistling. You could almost tell when things were coming down. And if things were kinda quiet, then I would holler, "send two over," and they would come across. And we probably got like another ten or so people out. I honestly don't know what the count was.

(VIDEO ENDS)

MR. ZELIKOW: The North Tower collapsed at 10:26 a.m.

The FDNY Chief of Department and the Port Authority Police Department Superintendent and many of their senior staff were killed. The Fire Department of New York suffered the largest loss of life of any emergency response agency in U.S. history. The Port Authority Police Department suffered the largest loss of life of any American police force in history. The New York Police Department suffered the second largest loss of life of any police force in U.S. history, exceeded only by the loss of Port Authority police the same day. The nation suffered the largest loss of civilian life on its soil as a result of a domestic attack in its history.

(VIDEO BEGINS)

CHIEF PFEIFER: At this point, we heard a load roar, again, and someone yelled that the building was collapsing. And, we started to run. And with bunker gear, you can't run too far, especially when a building is a quarter mile high. And what happened inside the building now happened outside. This beautiful sunny day now turned completely black. We were unable to see the hand in front of our face. And there was an eerie sound of silence.

That day we lost 2,752 people at the World Trade Center, and 343 were firefighters. But we also saved 25,000 people. And that's what people should remember because firefighters and rescuers went in and they knew it was dangerous, but they went in to save people. And they saved many.

(VIDEO ENDS)

MR. KEAN: If I could ask now for a--please, I think we ought to have a moment of silence.

(Silence.)

MR. KEAN: Our first panel consists of Alan Reiss, former director of the World Trade Department of the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey and Joseph Morris, former chief of the Port Authority's Police Department.

Gentlemen, will you please stand and raise your right hands when we place you under oath. Do you swear or affirm to tell the whole truth, the truth and nothing but the truth?.

(Witnesses sworn in.).

Mr. Reiss, if you would like to begin, sir.

MR. ALAN REISS: Thank you, Chairman Kean, Vice Chairman Hamilton and distinguished members of the Commission for the opportunity to testify before you today.

My name is Alan Reiss, I was the director of the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey's World Trade Department which operated the World Trade Center until it was net leased. The people of the Port Authority who also operate the region's major airports, bridges and tunnels, maritime ports and the PATH rail system will always remember September 11th as the worst day in our long and proud history.

This was a profound personal loss for us at the Port Authority. The World Trade Center was our headquarters and 84 members of the Port Authority family died that day. Most of them were my dear friends including 16 who were civilian building management staff who reported directly to me and responded to their emergency posts that day, helping to direct the greatest rescue ever on American soil, saving tens of thousands of lives, but losing their own lives in the process.

I grieve the loss of my friends every day and not a day passes that I do not think of them all. My heart continues to go out to their families and to the families of all the victims who died that day. I also grieve with the families of the firefighters, police officers, rescue workers and military personnel who made the ultimate sacrifice to keep our country safe, and I know the same is true for everyone in the Port Authority family. Though our losses are still unimaginable, we remain unbowed in our determination to move forward.

Commissioners, the Port Authority adopted the Incident Command System in the 1980s as a way of managing all incidents at its facilities, such as the World Trade Center and the metropolitan area airports. Port Authority and New Jersey State Police trained all the World Trade Department operations staff and the majority of senior staff--more than 26 people in the World Trade Department alone--in the use of the Incident Command System so we could work with uniformed responders as an effective team. The World Trade Center had a written emergency procedure manual that dealt with numerous types of emergencies. This manual was updated and revised every year as a joint effort between the World Trade Center operations staff and the Port Authority Police. And as the world changed over the last decade, so did the emergency manual and its training.

The Port Authority Police held annual table-top drills that involved both the police and the civilian management at the World Trade Center to exercise these plans and their decision-making capability. The Port Authority Police and the World Trade Department staff enjoyed a close working relationship with the New York City Fire Department. Port Authority police radios were given to Engine 10, Ladder 10 and Battalion 1 in the 1980s to improve the communications between the Port Authority Police and the Fire Department located at the World Trade Center. Port Authority staff and the Fire Department even drilled together at the World Trade Center. This included a simulated five-alarm, full-floor fire on the 92nd floor of 2 World Trade Center on June 6, 1999. In addition, the Fire Department high-rise unit would perform annual inspections.

Six weeks prior to the September 11th attacks, the World Trade Center was net leased to a private developer, Silverstein Properties, which began managing the facility with its own executives. I and a select group of Port Authority employees assisted the Silverstein staff during a planned three-month transition period. Nevertheless, Port Authority employees, even those not on the Silverstein transition team, immediately responded to their former battle stations--as they had been trained to do over the years--on 9/11.

The Port Authority filed with the Bureau of Fire Prevention a fire safety plan for the World Trade Center buildings in accordance with the bureau's guidelines, and the Port Authority operations supervisors were certified by FDNY as fire safety directors. The floor wardens and their fire safety team members received specific training on their responsibilities including a video-taped presentation to ensure consistency in training, red hats, flashlights, whistles, all above and beyond what local law required.

The 1993 terrorist bombing was a wake-up call to the nation. I was 150 feet away from the van when it exploded on the B2 level--entering my office--and killing my co-workers back then. The 1993 terrorist attack disclosed various issues such as the loss of the fire alarm/public address system due to damage from the explosion, the failure of the emergency generator cooling systems, loss of all lighting in the stairwells when Con Edison power was turned off to allow the fire to be fought, confusion in the transfer floor exit passageways, and difficulties with the FDNY radio communications within the complex.

To address those issues, the Port Authority Board of Commissioners authorized more than $200 million in the various upgrades to the complex over the last decade. These included the installation of a two million-watt tertiary backup-power system fed from New Jersey Public Service Electric and Gas; battery packs for every other fluorescent light fixture in the exit stairwells; the elevator cab lighting; and also for the fire alarm system. We added photo-luminescent paint to the stairwells and to the handrails to guide evacuees in an emergency, and we added "glow-in-the-dark" floor signs and "trailblazing" signs at the horizontal crossovers. The Port Authority even purchased evacuation chair stretchers for any mobility restricted person working at the World Trade Center, and the Port Authority installed new decentralized fire alarm systems with redundant communication circuits and control panels.

Following a multi-agency critique, at One Police Plaza, of the response to the 1993 terrorist attack--that I attended--it was evidence that the FDNY had communication problems at the World Trade Center. I worked with the New York City Fire Department on its needs, secured Port Authority funding, and the Port Authority installed a repeater system on the FDNY's VHF citywide radio channel. This system was tested by the fire department and found to provide excellent communication throughout the complex. It was normally left off and activated by the fire department when required. And in light of the transmissions recorded on the Dictaphone tapes recovered from the site that day, it appears that the repeater system functioned as intended for those who utilized it on September 11th.

When requested by Commissioner Scoppetta, we have provided detailed information to the fire department on the World Trade Center repeater system, since it may serve as a model for future systems required in high-rise buildings in New York City.

Mr. Chairman, the employees of the Port Authority have a long history of distinguished public service. September 11th, 2001, subjected Port Authority staff to a most difficult test. During a time of compelling need, these men and women performed extraordinary acts of heroism and service. And their unerring devotion to the agency highlighted their shared values of duty, loyalty and commitment to the public. Staff from all Port Authority units, not just the World Trade Department, rose to the challenge that day, assisting in the evacuation. Eighty-four members of our Port Authority family perished that day, both civilian and Port Authority Police. There were many acts of valor that day.

Mr. Chairman, the world has significantly changed for everyone as a result of 9/11, and I believe there are still lessons to be learned. However, due to time constraints, they are in my written statement to the Commission.

No building or fire safety code can cover every potential terrorist act, some which we can't even imagine today. I have been told that the energy from one of the planes hitting the tower was equal to the energy released by a tactical nuclear weapon. The forces were just incredible, slicing through the steel columns as if they were butter. The towers actually experienced three separate events: the initial impact, the fuel-air explosion and resulting overpressures, and finally a raging fire. If the World Trade Center complex did not exceed codes in so many ways, the 9/11 losses would surely have been much more horrific. The evacuation of the towers took more than four hours alone in 1993.

Therefore, the Port Authority fully supports the 21 recommendations from the New York City Department of Buildings' World Trade Center Building Code Task Force. Thirteen were introduced as recent legislation in the New York City Council. Many of these recommendations come out of the extraordinary improvements that the Port Authority implemented at the World Trade Center, as the New York City building commissioner testified when she introduced the legislation.

Port Authority staff, including myself, have spent a great deal of time in the last year-and-a-half working with the National Institute of Science and Technology, and this commission, to make sure that what happened that day never happens again. Fortifying the buildings is a last resort. We must do everything we can to prevent other Americans from suffering the pain and anguish that the 1993 and 9/11 families suffered.

But we also cannot forget that pain and anguish. I have not. And we continue to deal with the families of staff lost in both events. They're forever in my thoughts and prayers.

Thank you.

MR. KEAN: Thank you, Mr. Reiss.

Chief Morris, we'd be glad to hear from you.

CHIEF JOSEPH MORRIS: Thank you, Chairman Kean, Vice Chairman Hamilton and distinguished members of the Commission for the opportunity to share with you my experiences on September 11, 2001, when I responded in the rescue efforts following the attacks upon the World Trade Center.

My name is Joseph Morris and I served over 31 years with the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey Police Department. I was appointed to the Department on May 8, 1972, and rose through the ranks to eventually become Chief of the Department on September 26, 2001. This past January, I retired from the Port Authority Police to join ManTech Security Technologies Corporation.

Let me start by saying that what transpired on September 11, 2001, is forever etched in my mind. I can only imagine the depth of anguish that family members of those lost that day must live through, and I want to express a heart-felt sympathy to them. The Port Authority Police Department was created in 1928 and provides police services at those facilities under Port Authority jurisdiction. These facilities include John F. Kennedy International Airport, LaGuardia Airport, Newark Liberty International Airport, Teterboro Airport, the Downtown Manhattan Heliport, the George Washington Bridge, the Lincoln Tunnel, the Holland Tunnel, three bridges linking New Jersey to Staten Island, the Teleport, New York and New Jersey Marine Terminals, the PATH rail system, the Port Authority Bus Terminal and the World Trade Center.

Our Police Department maintains a central desk that historically was located at the Department's Headquarters. One of the primary functions of the Central Police Desk is to monitor and provide the communications link for the intra-department communications as well as the inter-agency communications. It is designated as the Level One Emergency Operations Center as part of the Incident Command System. The Central Police Desk serves as an additional communications resource to the different facilities during incidents, making many of the notifications and providing information.

Alan Reiss had spoken of the Port Authority having constructed three incident command centers in the World Trade Center: one on the Sixty-Fourth floor of the North Tower, one on the 22nd floor of the North Tower, and one on the B1 sub-level of the complex. The agency also had an alternate Incident Command Center on the first floor of the Journal Square Transportation Center.

The Port Authority Police is unique to law enforcement in several ways. First, all members of the department have police powers in the states of New York and New Jersey. Second, a majority of the department is cross-trained in fighting fires. At the three major airports, personnel are trained and FAA-certified in aircraft rescue firefighters, a specialty that entails responding to an aircraft disaster with the express purpose of providing an avenue of escape for passengers and crew and to rescue persons who need assistance. After that objective is accomplished, the aircraft becomes a structural fire and the local firefighting agency extinguishes the fire.

Police officers assigned to the World Trade Center Command were also trained and certified as structural firefighters. They would be the first to respond to fire alarms in the World Trade Center complex and report the fire and need to respond to the Fire Department of New York City.

Our Police Department also is unique in that it interacts with numerous other local, state and federal governmental agencies on a daily basis as part of our operations. These jurisdictions are located in the two states that encompass ten counties within eleven cities and municipalities. The Port Authority as an agency does business within three federal court jurisdictions. The federal agencies have, for the most part, independent offices in both states. The Department is an active member on many interagency task forces, including the FBI Joint Terrorist Task Force out of the New York and Newark offices, and Drug Enforcement Administration Task forces and U.S. Customs Task forces at John F. Kennedy Airport and Newark Liberty International Airport.

On the morning of September 11, 2001, there were 1,301 sworn members on the Police Department. They were performing their duties and responsibilities, to ensure the safety of the public and passage of commerce, at some of the busiest and most vital transportation facilities in the country. September 11, 2001, is, without doubt, the most tragic day in the long history of the Port Authority. The agency lost 84 members of its family, which included 37 police officers and supervisors. This remains the largest single-day loss of police staff by any force in the history of law enforcement.

On the morning of September 11, I held the rank of Police Inspector and was assigned to LaGuardia Airport as its Commanding Officer. In the blink of an eye that morning, my life, as well as everyone else's life, changed forever. While sitting in my office, I was informed that an aircraft had flown into the World Trade Center. I turned on my television set and observed the North Tower's upper floors engulfed in fire.

I initiated a mobilization of personnel following long-held Department plans and procedures for response to the World Trade Center for aircraft disasters and high-rise fires. The Command assembled 17 sworn personnel which included police officers, detectives and supervisors. The assembled contingent included personnel who had worked at the World Trade Center. Those responding, as well as myself, had in our possession our Aircraft Rescue Firefighter proximity gear. Seven vehicles, including marked and unmarked sedans and the Emergency Service Unit Truck, were utilized for transportation. The mobilization of the LaGuardia Command personnel was reported to the Central Police Desk.

Our police caravan used the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway and it provided me a panoramic view of the World Trade Center Towers fully engulfed in flames. At that point, I realized the buildings were under a coordinated attack. I was unable to make contact with the Central Police Desk via the All-Facility Channel. The LaGuardia Command heard me, but I received no response from the Central Desk.

The Williamsburg Bridge provided our access to Manhattan; traffic was restricted to emergency response vehicles only. While crossing the bridge, I realized that this day was completely different than the 1993 World Trade Center bombing and response that I had taken part in. That day I had responded from our police headquarters with James Nachstein, the Police Department's Chief of Operations. I remember his words early during that February afternoon, he spoke of that we were involved in a tidal wave and it is our job not to drown and to bring order to chaos. He also spoke, at one point, about communications being chaotic and that one must rely on the responders' experience, training and initiative using the equipment available. Those words rang clear that day. I also had served as the Western Zone Commander. The Zone included the World Trade Center Command, so I knew its geography and operations. I instructed the LaGuardia Command to contact and instruct all the afternoon shift police personnel to immediately respond to the airport, realizing there would be a great demand for officers at the World Trade Center and also at the airport, to meet the extra security demands that I anticipated would be put in place by the Federal Aviation Administration.

As we entered Manhattan and approached the World Trade Center on the downtown streets, I observed the conditions. We made our way to the World Trade Center Barclay Street Entrance-Exit Ramp and left our sedan vehicles in that area. I instructed all to bring their proximity gear and to use Barclay Street to respond to West Street where the Department's Mobile Command Post would have responded, as directed in response plans. Our Emergency Service Vehicle also responded to West Street.

At West Street, just north of Vesey Street, the Department's Mobile Command Post had set up. At that location there were approximately 40 to 50 officers, sergeants and lieutenants. I was the highest-ranking commander at that location and conferred with NYPD First Deputy Commissioner Joseph Dunne for a short period as he was responding to the NYPD Command Center at One Police Plaza. Communications, both radio and cell phone, were not working from the Mobile Command Post. The radio service was out on both Channel A and the 800 system after being damaged by the falling debris and fire at the World Trade Center buildings.

I spoke to personnel who had responded from headquarters, and knew Public Safety Director Fred Morrone, Chief James Romito and Inspector Anthony Infante had entered and gone up Tower One with the purpose of making contact with Port Authority Executive Director Neil Levin at the Operations Center on the 64th floor. I also was informed the other responding chief, William Hall, had responded to the World Trade Center Police Desk. I spoke with Port Authority Emergency Services Sergeant John Flynn, who informed me of what he knew of the situation.

I had the police personnel break up into groups of three to four officers to be teamed up with a sergeant or lieutenant. Other Port Authority employees were present at the location, and I informed them they should stay at that location until more information was gathered for responses. I also observed a number of emergency responders and vehicles, but relatively few civilians, moving north on West Street.

After being at that location for about four or five minutes with no radio and little phone communications and receiving information from personnel, I decided to respond to World Trade Center Tower One with the purpose of meeting at the Incident Command Post, that would have been set up with the Fire Department, Port Authority World Trade Center Command police supervisor and World Trade Center Operations personnel, in the lobby. I responded with a Lieutenant who had nine years of experience at the complex as a police officer and sergeant, including the 1993 bombing. I informed the supervisors at the Incident Command Post that I was going to that location, and not to move until I returned with a plan.

While walking south on West Street in the area of the Northern Bridge, I observed many dark objects above in the air coming from Building Two and the tower itself, then, started to collapse. I turned and ran from the avalanche of debris and dove into our Mobile Command Post to escape from being inundated by the dust cloud.

MR. KEAN: Chief, if you could summarize.

CHIEF MORRIS: Okay.

MR. KEAN: You're a bit over your time.

CHIEF MORRIS: After that, it was just a series of regrouping. The collapse of the South Tower was like being in a blizzard--the best way I can describe it, a warm, white blizzard. We assisted people on the street, pulling them into the command bus. And as the cloud passed and light came, we started to regroup and see who was alive and who was still available. At that point, I met up with--Alan Reiss responded to that location told us he was going to assess what was going on.

And also met with Chief Tony Whitaker, who is the commanding officer of the World Trade Center. At that point he told me he felt that Building 1 was going to collapse, very soon, based on what he had seen. At that point we were able to get the command bus, which had stalled because of all of the dust, were able to move it back two blocks. While we were conferring over our engine's down and what we were going to do, Building 1 collapsed. At that point, it was again like the blizzard, people again knocking to come in for cover, any place you would go to protect yourself and hope that you could get through that cloud.

After the collapse of One, again we re-gathered to see what personnel we had, and what people had seen. The rest of the day was a matter of meeting with--setting up with the other departments and making sure that we had people at the 1 Police Plaza and whatever command post we set up at the scene. At the end of the day, it was bringing order to chaos, very slowly. We relied for that day on individual people, just as Chief Nachstein said, using their training and experience to solve what problems were at hand. And to do what had to be done to rescue people.

That night we found, in the debris, Officer Will Jimeno and John McLoughlin. Will was pulled out that evening, and the next morning John McLoughlin was the last person pulled out of the debris alive.

MR. KEAN: Thank you very much, Chief. Questioning this morning will begin with Commissioner Lehman, followed by Commissioner Roemer.

MR. JOHN F. LEHMAN: Thank you, Mr. Reiss, Mr. Morris. We very much appreciate your appearance here this morning and the help that you've already given to our staff in this effort. The purpose of these hearings and the purpose of our commission, most importantly, is to draw the lessons from what happened and to see that they're applied immediately to make changes that will make us all more secure. And your role in this is essential, given the experience you've had, both before 9/11 and working since then to apply these lessons.

This is a very different period that we have. Every intelligence person inside and outside the government has told us that they are coming again. They are going to attack again here in the United States, and very likely New York is where it will happen again. We know that New York is at the top, still, of the priority list, because we're facing an enemy whose principal goal is to create massive civilian casualties in the highest profile environment that they can. And so I'd like you to keep these factors in mind as you answer the questions here, because it is--it's necessary to face up to difficult issues to see that we can make the changes, to be ready when they come the next time.

In a sense, New York is what we in the Pentagon used to call the "forward edge" of the battle area, and we have institutions that evolved very successfully, really, over many decades of dealing with civil disturbances, civil catastrophes and civil threats. Now, for the first time, this city has to deal with a determined, organized and relatively well-funded enemy that's targeted on this city.

So I'd like to pursue two lines of questioning with you both. One is the issue of command and control and the other is the issue of strategy. Let's start with strategy. The underlying strategy that the Port Authority and that all of the institutions of first-responders have as the foundation of their policies is "fight in place." And that made sense when we were dealing with fires, with other kinds of domestic disturbances. But there is good reason to believe that that is not a sufficient paradigm going forward for the planning of our crisis response, if for no other reason than every major incident that we've had since 9/11, no one will stay in place. They leave.

And I wonder whether some of our basic assumptions that follow from that are legitimate. For instance, why were there no plans to deal with survivors above the level of a fire in a high-rise? And why were there no--particularly after the '93 incident, where more than a dozen people were rescued by helicopters from the roofs of the World Trade Center--was there no contingency planning for using helicopters to rescue people? Could you address those two questions?

MR. REISS: I'll start. Thank you, Commissioner. Let's take the last one first. On the helicopter rescues, the Port Authority Fire Safety Directorate attended a number of meetings between the New York City Police Department and the New York City Fire Department, subsequent to the 1993 incident. And there was a lot of discussion about having a rooftop rescue protocol at that time. But the end result of those two emergency agencies was that rooftop rescue was not practical in a major emergency.

1993 was a rare day. Normally the rooftop of the World Trade Center, 1,368 feet up in the air, always had strong winds blowing across it. That day, in 1993, it was a snowy day and there were no winds and somehow, amazingly, the helicopter pilots from New York City were able to land. They repelled down, from what I understand, and knocked away a lot of the land mobile whip antennas that clutter the entire roof of One. The roof of One World Trade Center, was basically an antenna farm. Every three or four feet, there was another whip antenna sticking up besides the 360 foot TV mast and two 60 foot auxiliary TV masts.

The roof of Two was a little less cluttered but it still had an outside promenade deck and the Port Authority's 800 megahertz radio system, U.S. Coast Guard antennas and FM broadcasters. And basically, we didn't have this protocol because we don't have the assets to remove people from the roof. So I accept the staff report that we didn't tell people that the root was not a viable option. People may have had a false sense of security because a couple of people and, from what I've been able to find out, it was a total of 12 that were lifted off the roofs of One and Two World Trade Center in 1993.

MR. LEHMAN: But what about going forward, should there be a major helicopter vertical rescue for people caught above fires?

MR. REISS: Well, I think that's best answered by the aviation experts and the fire prevention experts. I've done a lot of reflection, a lot of investigation since this incident. Los Angeles requires a helipad on all the roofs of their new buildings. Basically, it was enacted into their code in the '90s. But even in Los Angeles, from talking to a very good friend, who writes the fire safety plan for most of the skyscrapers around the United States, it's not meant for helicopter evacuation in a fire emergency. It's meant for earthquakes to get the firemen into the building to do search and rescue. I'm concerned if you try and get people up to the roof of the building that we may have a scene like when the embassy was evacuated in Vietnam.

MR. LEHMAN: So what contingency--by the way, many people got out that way.

MR. REISS: That's true.

MR. LEHMAN: But what about--what other alternatives do you have for people trapped above the fire? I mean, all the fighting in place is not going to be sufficient.

MR. REISS: As the Commission knows, the building code task force here in New York City has recommended the hardening of all the elevator shaft ways and all the fire stairwells. I don't know that you can fully protect against a major bomb or, God forbid, if the new Airbus A380 ever attacks a building. What we followed was the protocol from the Fire Department of the City of New York that day. The floor wardens were told that if the stairways servicing the fire floor were compromised or they were unusable due to fire or smoke, they could use the elevators in accordance with very strict procedures. If they didn't service the fire floor, they could use those elevators. But we know that the elevators were also compromised and all knocked out.

This was such an incredible event. We believe, but we don't know, that a lot of the elevators were knocked out because the building moved in excess of ten feet and we think that caused most of the safeties on the elevators to drop underneath, the safety devices that are meant in case an elevator rope breaks or something, that these shoes drop and lock all the elevators in place. So the elevators were not able to be used.

I don't have a lot of good answers. If you had another attack on the World Trade Center like this, what would you do if all the stairwells were compromised? The helicopters can only handle a few people at a time. Even if they were able to land and we heard the brave pilots on the tape earlier, I don't know how many people would get up.

MR. LEHMAN: Well, the Port Authority operates perhaps the most likely lucrative targets for the next attack from all reports we have. Are you satisfied and I ask this of both of you, gentlemen, with the lessons learned that are being applied to deal with--which I still assume is defend in place rather than evacuation--and in the airline terminals, in the tunnels, in the bus terminals? What has been changed that doesn't lead us to think the same chaos will ensue?

For instance, we're told that Mr. Rescorla, who died, the Morgan Stanley security agent, had bitter differences with the Port Authority's policy of "defend in place" and let the Port Authority know this in advance of the 9/11. And he, of course, disregarded totally the instructions to stay in place and evacuated virtually everyone in Morgan Stanley. And then, following that, what disturbs us is to learn that, less than a year ago, Morgan Stanley in its new headquarters in Time Square wanted to evacuate, have a practice drill to evacuate rather than defend in place and they had every obstacle put in-they were denied permission. They finally, after three months of trying, were able to get permission to do it, only after they agreed to pay for the insurance for the building. This does not sound like applying lessons learned.

MR. REISS: Well, Commissioner, I can't speak for Morgan Stanley's current landlord, but I think you've hit on a very important point on the lessons learned. The model codes that are used throughout the country, not only the New York City but Chicago and Los Angeles and other major target cities, they haven't changed. They don't recognize the paradigm shift that took place that you spoke about, that this defend in place, the order to only evacuate the fire floors and a couple of floors above-below, everyone is going to leave that building. No one is going to listen to a fire safety director making an announcement that says "stay and let the other people evacuate first." Everyone, including myself, and we've had a couple of fires in the building that I am now attendant in, that fire alarm goes off and you smell smoke, everyone is down the stairs instantaneously. And that's a major change and the codes need to recognize it. The stairwell capacities have to be made wider. They have to recognize the fact that you're going to have this massive evacuation which only complicates the fire department's command and control at the scene. I don't think a lot of people even recognize--and I think we need to do a better job in communicating not only to the floor wardens but the tenants in the buildings that, when the fire department gets there and begins to fight a normal fire, let alone a terrorist attack, that one of those fire stairs is going to be used as an attack stair. That means that all the heat and the smoke and the toxic carbon monoxide is going to rise above that stairwell as a chimney going up. That stairwell essentially becomes non useable above the fire floor, which leaves you only the other two stairwells to evacuate down.

So there are a lot of changes that need to be made and I really support what Columbia University is doing in NIST. There has to be a relationship between the communication and evacuation behavior. And I think perhaps many of the people at the World Trade Center did not know what happened. They did not have that situational awareness that the public did. If they knew what was going on, they may have actually panicked more. We were able to successfully get the people out in an hour, which is actually amazing to me. As I said in my written testimony, I really expected that people would have been trampled to death. It is a credit to the floor wardens and to the individuals that day.

MR. LEHMAN: I'm sorry I'm out of time. So you get off easy, Mr. Morris. But I would--I'm sure we'll get into command and control in separate issues. And I would only close by saying I really get the impression that it's not exactly business as usual, but we're working within the old paradigms to fix things, rather than recognizing that this is a very special situation that we're going to be in for a long time in this war against terror and that we, particularly in command and control, are not even beginning to deal with the issues.

MR. KEAN: Commissioner Roemer.

MR. TIMOTHY J. ROEMER: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Reiss, Mr. Morris, I am always struck by people's reactions to the gaping hole at Ground Zero and how overwhelming that is. Whenever I'm in New York City, I am staggered by the loss of souls, the people, the fathers, the mothers, the brothers and the sisters that were lost on that day. Nobody experienced that loss probably more than the two of you did with one of the greatest losses in American history of policemen from Port Authority, 37; and over 40 civilians that worked directly for both of you. I can't help but being struck by the words of Brian Clark to Stanley Praimnath who said when he found him in the rubble, "Let's go home."

This commission would like to go home at the appropriate point. But we've got a job to do and that is what are the lessons learned, what's been fixed and what still needs to be fixed. It is in that light that I want to ask you some probing and, I hope, respectful and fair questions so that when this commission does go home and tries to work with Congress and the White House in a bipartisan way to fix these problems, you have best informed us as to what we can do better and how to get this job done at the end of the day.

Let me start, Mr. Reiss, if I may, with you, sir. Let me ask you the questions of lessons learned. In 1993, you were 150 feet away from the bomb that exploded and went off, set by terrorists. New York City was struck twice, in '93 and 2001. You implemented a $100 million plan to do certain things that accomplished a great deal. There are also some criticisms of what that plan did not accomplish. Let me mention two of them and have you fairly respond.

One was drilling, that we did not see the appropriate drilling by the people in the towers to actually participate in going down the stairwells and get out through the smoke doors or be familiar with the staggered stairs. And two, we have learned and we've said in the staff statements that there were problems with advice to some of the callers on 911 calls. Could you respond to both criticisms?

MR. REISS: The World Trade Department staff conducted fire drills twice a year for the occupants in the towers. It conducted them more frequently for places like "Windows of the World" and the day-care center and the observation deck staff where there was a lot of transient public staff and we did those basically monthly. Any time a tenant moved in, a full floor tenant, as soon as that tenant moved in, we gave them a drill, typically within a week or two of moving in. We tried to stage the drills in the morning, say between nine and 11, enough time that people had come in to work but before people started leaving for lunch.

But your criticism is well taken that these drills basically had the strobe lights go off and the evac tone and people would come out into the hallways, not everyone because some people thought a fax was more important than participating in a drill. And we actually trained the floor wardens, don't get into an argument with your co-workers, just tell us who didn't respond. And we'll try and deal with that through the office managers. But you're right. We did not have people walk down. We did not have them walk down 50 flight of stairs. We did, subsequent to 1993, as you heard, paint a glow-in-the-dark stripe down the center of the stairs and all the way around these transfer corridors and put glow-in-the-dark signage in and the battery backed up lights. But no, we did not do that and I've reflected on that and that may be something that we need to do. People need to understand what they're going to encounter and that there will be these various doors in a very high-rise building that try and block the chimney effect and smoke from a fire down below from contaminating the entire building.

That's another whole lesson learned, that the building codes today don't really recognize the difference between a 20-story building and a 110-story building. And just the physics and the stack effect are quite different and the codes need to recognize this. And they need to recognize that it's going to take a lot longer to get the people out of a 110-story building. I gave a speech to the building owners and managers that said that I almost think that the stairwell should almost be like a tree trunk and grow wider as you head down rather than remain at this constant width, assuming that only a few floors evacuate at the same time.

MR. ROEMER: Mr. Reiss, with respect to instructions, on our staff statement, we say that the civilians were never instructed not to evacuate up. Do you think this has been fixed now that we don't send confusing signs to people, that there might be some type of hope at the top or rooftop evacuation, that we tell them they have to go down?

MR. REISS: I don't think it's been fixed. Again, we are a tenant in a private building on Park Avenue South and we have fire drills. And that fire safety director goes through almost a canned speech that's basically laid out as a template from the Bureau of Fire Prevention explaining to us that you only evacuate two floors down and then wait for further instructions. And then he goes, I know you're the Port Authority staff, you're going to be out of the building if anything happens.

We made no mention and the fire safety director in my building continues to make no mention of whether the roof doors are accessible, if there's even a roof door. The New York City building code does not even require roof stairs for a roof that has over a 20-degree slope. The Trade Center roof was not flat, if you look at some of the pictures I've submitted to the Commission staff. It actually sloped up in the middle to support the TV tower. And there was actually the capability to have a second TV tower on Two World Trade Center.

So, no, I don't think it's changed and I spoke to a good friend, Curtis Massey who writes most of the fire safety plans. He's written them for the Time Warner Tower, the AEON Tower, the Sears Tower, the Hancock Tower. There's no instructions not to go up. There's no instruction that rooftop evacuation is not a feasible alternative if you can't get down. So that has to change.

MR. ROEMER: We need to change that. That must be fixed to save more lives in New York City and more lives in Chicago and across the country. I would strongly urge you to continue to speak out on that and I hope this commission will make some recommendations on that line.

With respect to 9-1-1 operators, too many times, the advice given to callers above and below the fire line, sometimes a few floors below the fire line, were, "stay low, remain where you are and wait for emergency personnel."

Has this been fixed?

MR. REISS: I have no personal knowledge if it has been. I have no contact with the 911 operators. That was basically the city's defend in place, you know, that the building are fireproof.

MR. ROEMER: Going back to the previous set of questions, we need to fix that as well. Let me ask, Mr. Morris, both of you, Mr. Reiss and Mr. Morris, this question about incident command. We have gone back to 1996 where Governor Pataki issued an executive order to try and get better communication and coordination between the police and fire departments. We even saw that Mayor Giuliani, in July of 2001, issued a direction in control of emergencies in the City of New York. Still the unified approach in incident commander policy fell by the wayside prior to 9/11. We understand that some new orders have been issued as of Friday, maybe to try to qualify for federal funds through Homeland Security Department recommendations.

In your opinion, Mr. Morris and Mr. Reiss, do these new issued orders by the mayor, do they cut the mustard? Do they implement these changes that we need to see take place to save lives or do they institutionalize this system that has gone on too long in the past, with even the most qualified and preeminent people in the world in both Police and Fire Department in New York City that we don't see this unified command and incident command enough?

Your opinion, Mr. Morris?

CHIEF MORRIS: Well the Port Authority Police, we're the third party involved with them, between the New York City Fire Department and the New York City Police Department.

MR. ROEMER: Probably a good judge of this question then.

CHIEF MORRIS: In the past there was rivalry. Since the 11th and since I became chief, I know there was a--between the chiefs and both departments to cross that span, to meet and to speak better and to have it go down to ground level, that there has been a movement to do that. And it's starting to be formulated now by what came out on Friday.

MR. ROEMER: So you're saying this is a good start but you're not there.

CHIEF MORRIS: It's a start.

MR. ROEMER: Mr. Reiss?