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CNN Live Event/Special

America Under Attack: Bomb Scare Overnight At Empire State Building

Aired September 13, 2001 - 05:02   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
CAROL LIN, CNN ANCHOR: Helping us staff our 24-hour-a-day operation is Garrick Utley. He is standing by on the rooftop of our New York bureau with a great vantage point to the damage there -- good morning, Garrick.

GARRICK UTLEY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Carol and Vince.

What can we say about these early morning hours?

Well, first of all, quite different from what the last 24, nearly 48 hours have been like. If Tuesday was obviously a horrendous day for people in this metropolis, Wednesday wasn't that much easier. The shock of Tuesday, the numbness that that brought was starting to wear off. But in its place, came the awareness of the true cost and what had been lost, and the grieving really started. People are trying to digest it.

And so, although the city began to return to a more normal life or a pace here, the streets were still not filled to that extent as they are on normal workdays or weekdays here in New York City. And you can see it on people's faces. There was still that sense of how could this have happened, and where do we go from here?

For example, in the late-evening hours of Wednesday, there was a bomb scare here right next to our CNN office on 34th Street -- the bomb scare in the Empire State Building, which is at 5th Avenue and 34th Street. Police, fire department units raced in; people were pushed away.

Also a bomb scare emptied much of Penn Station nearby, one of the main transportation hubs. And people were even told to get off trains that were standing there at Penn Station. After about an hour of searching, there was no bomb, and the people were allowed to continue with their more or less normal lives in New York City.

But of course in the lower part of Manhattan, down there at the tip, where the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center used to stand, there is now, as we know, only rubble.

And Alessio Vinci of CNN is standing by to give us the latest there -- Alessio.

ALESSIO VINCI, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Garrick, the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center collapsed almost 48 hours ago, but as you can see from behind me here, a thick, white and high cloud of smoke still billowing on top of the wreckage of those two towers. Metal and iron parts of those two towers are still smoldering and rendering very difficult and indeed dangerous for the rescue workers there to be nearby to try to remove some of the debris and try to find out if perhaps some people may still be alive underneath those two 110-story buildings.

Some of the other buildings surrounding nearby are also unstable and indeed making the search-and-rescue operation extremely dangerous.

We saw earlier several refrigerator trucks arriving at the scene. Perhaps those trucks will be filled with some bodies or body parts to be brought to the morgue.

We also saw a long line of dumpster trucks. Those dumpster trucks will be filled with some of the debris and be taken away to a different location on some barges to make some room for the rescue operation to proceed. We understand that more than 3,000 tons of debris has already been removed.

The last official count of the casualties: 82 dead, 16 of them only so far have been identified. The rescuers with whom we have been able to speak on the phone earlier telling us that mainly they are recovering body parts, not full bodies. And, of course, the number of victims is expected to increase as the rescue operation continues.

Mayor Giuliani of New York said that the federal -- asked the Federal Emergency Management Agency here to send 6,000 body bags. So we still are expecting that body count will increase -- Garrick.

UTLEY: Alessio, rescue workers have said it may take 30 to 60 days to really get through that rubble looking for survivors if there are any significant numbers, otherwise the dead. And you just mentioned that out of the 82 dead, only 16 have been identified. Obviously, it's going to be a very difficult job.

To what extent do you believe or have you heard, indeed, that they're really going to have to rely on DNA and other kinds of records? And to what extent will that slow down the process of identification?

VINCI: Well, Garrick, they have been digging now for more than a day or almost a day, and they only found 82 bodies that they were able to -- 82 bodies and only 16 to be identified. This tells us the intensity of this crash -- the entire two stories (sic) collapsing within an hour of each other.

So certainly what the rescuers are telling us right now is that they only are finding bad body parts, and the only thing that they will be able to identify some of the victims -- just the dental records, perhaps some watches or some rings or wedding rings or wedding bands or even some documents. All of these kinds of things that will be able to tell the rescue officials who was, indeed, in that building at the moment that it collapsed. UTLEY: Alessio, thank you very much for that report. We'll be back to you for updates as we go into -- further into the early- morning hours.

And it should also be noted that officials -- city and state and even federal officials are still not even attempting to give any precise prediction or estimate as to how many are maybe dead in there. They simply speak, once again, of thousands -- horrendous numbers in the words of the mayor of New York City -- back now to you, Vince.

VINCE CELLINI, CNN ANCHOR: All right, thank you, Garrick. We'll be checking in with you throughout this morning.

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