On Sept. 11, 2001, a New York City police helicopter hovered above the World Trade Center.
Two minutes earlier, the first of the twin towers had collapsed. It would be twenty-one minutes before the second tower was to collapse.
“About 15 floors down from the top, it looks like it’s glowing red,” the pilot of one helicopter radioed. “It’s inevitable.”
Seconds later a second pilot radioed, “I don’t think (the second tower) has too much longer to go. I would evacuate all people within the area of that second building.”
New York City police received the call to evacuate the buildings. Fire and rescue personnel did not because they operated on a different radio system.
As a result, dozens of police officers and several hundred fire and rescue personnel perished in the collapse.
At the Pentagon, where emergency personnel from 50 different public safety agencies in Maryland, Virginia and the District of Columbia responded, no communication was possible between fire companies of different jurisdictions, or to the Arlington County, Virginia, fire chief who had overall command at the scene.
These failures bubbled back into people’s consciousness again four years after that fateful day with the release of thousands of pages of oral histories recorded by survivors and victims. The gut-wrenching tapes were obtained from the New York City Fire Department after The New York Times sued the city under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), passed over forty years ago to give citizens greater access to government documents.
Why did communications systems fail so totally in a country renowned for its technological prowess?
Public safety agencies including first responders, such as firefighters, police officers, and ambulance services, are heavily dependent on wireless radios.
Wireless technology requires radio frequency capacity, known as spectrum, in order to function, and existing wireless technology is designed to work within specified frequency ranges. On 9/11 there was no spectrum allocated to public safety — and there still isn’t.
Different operations, different applications, different rules and standards, and different radio frequencies are among the problems first responders faced in trying to communicate with each other. Interoperability, also referred to as compatibility or connectivity, refers to the capability for these different systems to readily contact each other.
As a result, there was little communication between New York City Police Department and fire department commands even though an Office of Emergency Management (OEM) had been set up after the 1993 World Trade Center bombings. The OEM’s command center was located on the 23rd floor of 7 World Trade Center, a building near the twin towers.
When police officials concluded the twin towers were in danger of collapsing and ordered police to leave the complex, fire officials were not notified.
Four years on, families of victims, policy— makers, and ordinary citizens are asking: “Could it happen again”?
And, according to virtually every expert, the answer is “yes”.
Though literally scores of legislative proposals have been introduced in Congress, funding for the first steps in design of a robust architecture for emergency communications and allocation of essential radio spectrum was not signed into law until 2003. And neither job is completed as yet.
In fiscal 2006, the DHS plans to spend $1.7 billion on state and local preparedness, but only $20 million for radio interoperability funding for police, fire and medical first responders.
Experts cite reluctance by local governments and states to have Washington “mandate” a solution from the top, especially one that would require more local spending for updated equipment. Unfortunately, neighboring communities often started out with requirements for systems with vastly different capabilities with interoperability being low on the list.
“We don’t have another 20 years,” says Congressman Bart Stupak, co-chairman of the House of Representatives Law Enforcement Caucus and a 12-year police veteran from Michigan.
“There has been a serious lack of commitment from this administration and from Congress,” he says.
The 9-11 Commission Report said there is “strong evidence that compatible and adequate communications among public safety organizations at the local, state and federal levels remains an important problem...Federal funding of such (interagency communication) units should be given high priority...”
That some progress is now being made, albeit at a pace many consider glacial, may provide little comfort to 9/11 families.
