Volume 22, Number 19 | The Newspaper of Lower Manhattan | September 18 – 24, 2009
The first Downtown Express published after the 9/11 attack included:
An article about firefighter efforts at the World Trade Center. When Kevin Denkins of Ladder 8 arrived at Tower One, people were huddled in the lobby; most were injured, some dead. Four of their ladder company went missing, including Lt. Vincent Hakloran, who lived with his wife and 5 kids in Westchester. Three members of the first precinct were injured by falling debris, but all made it out alive.
Five surgeons at N.Y.U. Downtown Hospital worked on 30-year-old Deborah Mardenfield for six hours to keep her alive after the landing gear from one of the planes hit her
“When the towers collapsed…no one knew what was going on, no one knew if other buildings were going to come down or if there were gas leaks, other explosions,” said hospital director Leonard A. Aubrey.
Police officer Joseph Albert had been volunteering at the site for 48 hours without revealing he had asthma, and as soon as he was treated, wanted to get back out there, and went back on the front line. Two hours later, he stopped breathing and been taken to intensive care. He was later released.
Ninety percent of students at P.S. 234 showed up the following week at their new location P.S. 41 in the Village. P.S. 150 students who relocated to P.S. 3 also in the Village, and I.S. 89 students went to Lab school in Chelsea.
Linda Secondari-Black wanted just 15 minutes to grab her baby seat, stroller, some clothes, and birthing books before she gave birth to her son, Luca. The F.B.I. told her nobody was allowed to go in, yet her neighbor was allowed in the day before. Her husband was able to retrieve their pet cat days earlier.
A meeting called by City Councilmember Kathryn Freed on the matter of the frozen zone in Tribeca drew 1,000 people to N.Y.U.’s main building, on Sept 24, but the meeting erupted in anger and chaos after just ten minutes when an expected representative from the city Office of Emergency Management didn’t show up. Many residents vowed that a public demonstration would be staged.
