Deutsche transcripts detail fatal swirl of smoke, radio chatter and terror
Thursday, August 21st 2008, 8:31 PM
Chaos reigned - and killed.
Even as panicked firefighters cried for help as they ran out of air in the smoky, maze-like upper floors of the Deutsche Bank tower, building supervisors assured their colleagues on the ground that its standpipe could deliver, an FDNY internal review says.
Little did they know the standpipe was severed - and that it was just part of a lethal combination of neglect and error that led to the deaths of two firefighters last Aug. 18.
"I'm lost. I'm trying to exit on the charged hoseline, running out of air," said one unidentified firefighter in the radio transcripts released as part of the FDNY's long-awaited report.
That cry for help came at 4:48 p.m., followed 30 seconds later with a panicked, "I'm in the stairwell, I need help."
Minutes later, the radio calls - some of which were not immediately heard because of unauthorized continued radio chatter - grew more urgent.
"Mayday! Mayday! Mayday! Engine...Mayday!Mayday!" yelled one firefighter at 5:10 p.m. "Engine 3 with a Mayday. I have an unconscious fireman."
That unconscious fireman was Joseph Graffagnino who, as he succumbed to the building's deadly smoke minutes earlier, groggily tried to fight off a fellow firefighter who tried to give him air, a FDNY source said.
A second firefighter, Robert Beddia, had taken off his mask and was only taking "hits of air" in order to conserve the oxygen in his tank, Fire Commissioner Nicholas Scoppetta said.
"He knew he was on the only line charged [with water] at the time and he thought he could stay in," Scoppetta said. "I think it was an act of enormous courage."
The deaths of Graffagnino and Beddia triggered the FDNY's comprehensive review of the fire, which the Manhattan district attorney's office also is probing.
Scoppetta admitted the FDNY had not been conducting mandatory 15-day inspections of the Deutsche Bank building, which was heavily damaged in the Sept. 11 attacks and was being dismantled.
"The key here is that were no inspections," said Scoppetta, who said he could not address the lack of inspections because it is central to the DA's probe. He reiterated that the 176-page report was a training tool that was not meant to "affix blame."
The report, in its 49 findings and 32 recommendations, was highly critical of conditions left inside the building by John Galt, the contractor that turned the condemned skyscraper into a deathtrap.
Sealed stairwells, broken sprinklers, plastic tarps and a negative air pressure machine that pushed the fire down, rather than up, combined to create an inferno made only worse when firefighters couldn't immediately put water on it.
The report said three construction workers - including one who identified himself as the building manager - mistakenly told firefighters the standpipe was working when, in reality, a 40-foot-piece had been removed.
"The fireman didn't know what the hell they were getting into - they had no knowledge of the situation," said Joseph Graffagnino Sr., the dead fireman's father.
"My wound is constantly open - [the report] is like pouring salt inside," he said.
A carelessly discarded cigarette sparked the deadly blaze, which construction workers did not report to firefighters for 13 minutes, according to the report.
The FDNY review also reported that the Department of Buildings did not issue a demolition permit for the building but rather a series of alteration permits.
The Uniformed Fire Officers Association said Thursday that the absence of a demolition permit explained the lack of FDNY inspections at the site.
With Adam Lisberg