- NEW YORK (Reuters)
-- The burning ruins of the World Trade Center spewed toxic gases "like
a chemical factory" for at least six weeks after the Sept. 11, 2001,
attacks despite government assurances the air was safe, according to a
study released on Wednesday.
-
- The gases of toxic metals, acids and organics could penetrate
deeply into the lungs of workers at Ground Zero, said the study by scientists
at the University of California at Davis and released at a meeting of the
American Chemical Society in New York.
-
- Lead study author Thomas Cahill, a professor of physics
and engineering, said conditions would have been "brutal" for
workers at Ground Zero without respirators and slightly less so for those
working or living in adjacent buildings.
-
- "The debris pile acted like a chemical factory,"
Cahill said. "It cooked together the components and the buildings
and their contents, including enormous numbers of computers, and gave off
gases of toxic metals, acids and organics for at least six weeks."
-
- The report comes amid questions about air quality at
Ground Zero and what the public was told by the government.
-
- Last month, an internal report by Environmental ProtectionAgency
(news - web sites) Inspector General Nikki Tinsley said the White House
pressured the agency to make premature statements that the air was safe
to breathe.
-
- The EPA issued an air quality statement on Sept. 18,
2001, even though it "did not have sufficient data and analyzes to
make the statement," the report said.
-
- The White House "convinced the EPA to add reassuring
statements and delete cautionary ones," Tinsley said. Among the information
withheld was the potential health hazards of breathing asbestos, lead,
concrete and pulverized glass, the report said.
-
- New York leaders including Sen. Hillary Clinton have
called on the Justice Department to investigate.
-
- EPA acting administrator Marianne Horinko has defended
the agency, saying it used the best information it had available.
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- According to the newly released UC-Davis study, after
the towers collapsed, tons of concrete, glass, furniture, carpets, insulation,
computers and papers burned until Dec. 19, 2001.
-
- Some elements of the debris combined with organic matter
and chlorine from papers and plastics and escaped to the surface as metal-rich
gases that either burned or chemically decomposed into very fine particles
that could easily penetrate deep into human lungs, it said.
-
- Specifically, the study said samples from Ground Zero
found four types of particles listed by the EPA as likely to harm human
health -- fine metals that can damage lungs, sulfuric acid that attacks
lung cells, fine undissolvable particles of glass that can travel through
the lungs to the bloodstream and heart and high-temperature carcinogenic
organic matter.
-
- Measurements made at Ground Zero in May 2002, months
after the fires were out, showed levels of nearly all the fine components
had declined more than 90 percent, the study said.
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- http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=1896&
ncid=1896&e=1&u=/nm/20030910/us_nm/sept11_air_dc_3
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