World Trade Center environmental data report, 2001-2002

NYC 9/11 Public Portal Document

“Our greatest fear was that there could be a foodbome outbreak in the middle of the disaster,” she says. That, and a fear of intentionally adulterated food prompted her and her agency to carefully monitor the rapidly mounting pile of food to volunteer soup kitchens and other food service vendors that set up around the perimeter of the Pentagon after the attack.

At the Pentagon, as at Ground Zero, there was little to keep volimteers from throwing themselves into the fray to help rescue any remaining survivors.

One example is that of Pentagon Police Officer Michael Benedict, who was conducting a training class at the nearby Navy Annex Building on the morning of September 11, 2001, when he heard a plane fly closely overhead, and then ran to the window to witness the effects of the crash. His supervisor, Pete Donaldson, wrote: "Showing no concern for his own safety, Benedict successftilly escorted personnel to safety and retrieved wounded personnel in need of assistance to the triage area. After a short time, [he] became overwhelmed by the fire and smoke, and was forced to leave the building." (17)

But whereas firefighters who volunteered at Ground Zero weren’t taken off the site, at the Pentagon volimteers without sufficient respiratory protection were thrown offthe site, say officials in the Emergency Management division.

Nevertheless, according to the After-Action report, “Arlington County, like most other urisdictions, was not logistically prepared for an operation of the duration and magnitude of the ---------------------------- — ------------------------ - -------- Pentagon attack.” The county fire department was unequipped "9 logistically and did in fact lack enough stock of personal protective equipment (PPE), critical high-demand items (such as batteries ‘’hK and breathing apparatus), equipment for reserve vehicles, and medical supplies for EMS units.” (18)

Photo: Jocelyn Augustino/FEMA News Photo

The September 11 attacks spurred a crisis of unparalleled dimensions, striking America’s population in its most densely populated centers. Undoubtedly hundreds of thousands of people were present in Lower Manhattan that day from the tri-state area of New York, New Jersey and Connecticut, places all visible from the viewing platform of the World Trade Center before it fell. And none of the 20 million in that metropolitan area escaped breathing the air during the days that smoke and dust swirled around inevitably.

September 11th was the first time that New York City was physically shut down, with all of its bridges and tuimels closed and military troops mobilized. For the first time ever, signs read “New

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