Several days after waking from her coma, Lauren's then one-year-old son Tyler visited her for the first time since the attack. Lauren spent more than six months in hospital but her recovery - which involved several operations - took nearly 10 years. Lauren, whose second son Jagger was born in , still has contact numbers listed in her phone for many of her colleagues who died on 11 September The deputy commissioner at New York City's fire department had been due to attend a job interview on the 68th floor of the North Tower that morning - but her plans had been drastically changed by the terror attacks.
I was just thinking about their families. It was just horrific. Lynn had travelled to the scene with 12 firefighters from two different units - all of whom later died during the rescue effort. She walked into the lobby of the North Tower through a window after the exploding jet fuel had blown out the glass.
So we were fairly fortunate to be on the front. After finding a stairwell, they managed to get to the lobby where port authority officers and fire crews were trying to organise people to get them out of the building. They did not want to waste a minute so they found the east side of the building and headed into the courtyard and then over towards the street. We got knocked down to the floor and we were behind a desk when it blew in over the top of us. Once the dust had settled we made our way into one of the bathrooms and grabbed wet towels and wrapped them around our faces to avoid inhaling smoke.
When we hit the East River we found about a million other people. Andrew believes it was instinct that got him out of the tower in time.
I am deathly terrified of heights so that ironically might have saved my life. Later in the day Andrew helped work the phones with other employees who survived and by the end of the day they had an idea of who got out and who didn't. Derek, his Dundee friend, was one of the 2, who lost their lives in the Twin Towers attack.
The pair bonded over their Scottish roots on Andrew's first day in the job. When emergency operator recordings were released of distress calls that day, large numbers of victims had called for help from their mobile phones, only to be told to stay put and "defend-in-place". Professor Corbett believes that if information from survivors who had made it down the stairs had been relayed to those still in the building with a quick call to their phones, many more may have made it out alive.
The US approved 23 building and fire code modifications in , following investigations into the World Trade Centre disaster. They included measures to improve fire resistance in building materials, to reinforce structures against collapse, and add blast-resistant walls to elevator and stairwell shafts — all designed to help buildings stay intact long enough to get people out. High-rise buildings were required to improve radio coverage systems to ensure emergency crews can communicate with each other inside, and with personnel outside.
A requirement for an extra stairwell did get through, but only in buildings above metres, more than 40 storeys high. The width of stairways would be increased by 50 per cent, but only in a building code that does not cover most of the new high rise buildings being built across the United States today, including New York City.
While ICC codes are broadly adopted around the US, they are a minimum standard for building and fire codes and it's up to states and local jurisdictions to decide what to enforce. Karl Fippinger said the ICC will continue pushing the building industry to go above minimum safety codes. We acknowledge Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples as the First Australians and Traditional Custodians of the lands where we live, learn, and work.
The simplest of escape routes were the stairwells. More on:. Top Stories A former cop calls it 'the number one threat to society'. But it's a crime no-one talks about. Family stranded in Simpson Desert after campervan bogged on flooded roads. But disaster could strike come March.
This is why. Mr Clark shone his flashlight into the hole, and saw two eyes staring back at him. This was Stanley Praimnath , a Fuji Bank employee who had seen Flight approach and ducked under his desk just before the impact. Miraculously, the desk shielded him as his office collapsed.
Now Mr Praimnath was trapped behind a wall. Mr Clark grabbed his hands and pulled. After several tries, he managed to heave him over the top. The two men headed back to the staircase.
None of them would survive. Mr Clark and Mr Praimnath headed the other way, beginning the long journey down 80 floors to the bottom.
0コメント