World Trade Center environmental data report, 2001-2002

NYC 9/11 Public Portal Document

“Everyone knew it,” says Cahill. “It was burning insulation, plastics, in a plume that burned above the pile but also on numerous occasions rolled across the city.”

On the eve of the second anniversary of September 11, Dr. Cahill released the conclusions of his study of the fine aerosols sent up into the air during the catastrophic World Trade Center collapse and fires. In an article in the scientific journal Aerosol Science and Technology Cahill wrote that breathing the air around Ground Zero was much like that around a chemical factory. “The WTC plume resembled in many ways those seen from municipal waste incinerators and high temperatures processes in coal fired power plants,” he wrote.

Instead of the ordinary measurements they took, the agencies should have had more imagination to realize the health threats, Cahill says, adding, “and more common sense.”

People who moved away temporarily, he says, listening to their inner instincts, were the smart ones, adds Cahill.

Maijorie J. Clarke, a Scientist-in-Residence at Lehman College, and expert on waste incineration, argues that the synergistic mixtures of pollutants also need to be considered for the next terrorist event. “The environmental agencies at all levels need to become more expert in evaluating the health and environmental effects of various mixtures of pollutants,” she testified to the Senate Environment Committee. She argues that EPA should rewrite its air quality standards to assess the impacts of various combinations of pollutants. This way, she says, there will be standards in place “next time to know how to protect the public health.”

While scientists debated the fine points of particulates and their impacts on human health, New Yorkers simply registered great worries in widely publicized polls and surveys.

In a siuvey done by the Mellman Group in May 2002 regarding public health issues following September 11, residents of lower Manhattan expressed more concern about air quality than they did about another terrorist attack. Seventy-four percent (74%) said air pollution was “a big problem” in their community, with 29% saying it is a "very big" problem, according to the market research company, whose poll was based on a survey of 500 residents living south of Canal Street in Lower Manhattan.

Indeed, in a very real sense, dust still did lurk in school carpet, office air vents, and crevices of cars and trucks and people’s apartments—even after many previous cleanups.

At the same time, new grassroots community organizations formed to respond to local health concerns. But the 9/11 Environmental Action Group, calls EPA’s recent efforts to clean apartments “a complete joke.”

Kimberly Flynn, outreach coordinator for the group, says “First there was the buildup, which took forever, then there was the speedup, as they rushed to finish up apartments for the few that knew about it.” As a result, she says, less than 15 percent of eligible residences were actually served. “There’s still concern about the long term effects and residual dust,” adds Flynn, who still signs people up at block parties for the group’s information.

Unfortunately, EPA’s last-ditch efforts to “assuage public concern,” as they put it, says Flynn, have done the opposite. “If their communications to the public had been clear and truthful from the beginning, New Yorkers are very savvy and would have understood the need to weigh relative

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