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CNN Saturday Morning News

Authorities Continue Clearing Rubble in New York

Aired September 22, 2001 - 08:09   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.
BILL HEMMER, CNN ANCHOR: Michael Okwu down on the streets again watching the rescue effort 24-7, 24 hours a day, seven days a week that operation continues. Again, now, day 11 here in New York City -- Michael, good morning again to you.

MICHAEL OKWU, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Bill.

It's funny you say that. You know, when you live in New York City you sometimes walk down here and you'd see the World Trade Center and, you know, there are more than one time I said to myself wow, I live in New York. And there was something about seeing the twin towers that I think really crystallized that.

But as we stand here, as we cover what's been going on just south of us, it is a cruel twist of fate, perhaps, I think that as the number of the missing continues to rise, the level of the hope continues to diminish. That number, as you put it, is 6,333 at this point. And the officials at this site, police officers and other officials here are becoming increasingly sensitive about ground zero, the site around ground zero, what we call ground zero and what so many people here are now referring to simply as the ruins.

I'm going to ask our cameraman Joe here to continue to pan down below me. You can see that we were about three or four blocks south of here many days ago. We have now been moved overnight north of the site. The police have erected barricades along Canal Street that potentially separates lower Manhattan from the rest of Manhattan.

It's a reminder, I think, that this is, in fact, not only the site of a devastation, but the site of a crime scene.

There's also the fact, perhaps, that tons of gold and silver are buried underneath the rubble. This was gold and silver that was stored at Four World Trade Center at a division of the Bank of Nova Scotia for companies and individual investors. And apparently it is worth in excess of $253 million. But on a much more human level, cranes were brought in last night. They cleared some of the areas around ground zero to continue doing some heavy lifting.

The New York City police commissioner told CNN that rescue workers recovered the body of John O'Neill (ph). He's a retired FBI agent who was a security expert and he was on his second or first day of work actually when he, when the attack happened and he went to tower number two to rescue some people and, in fact, was killed in doing that.

We talked to a rescue worker who said that they're working along what is apparently a 60 acre site and they have pulled out now more than 76,000 tons of rubble and he feels, he says, that they've only scratched the surface. It's only one or two percent of what is there -- Bill.

HEMMER: All right, Michael, we'll be checking in throughout the morning down there. And Michael, as you well know, heavy machinery brought in there. A crane has been set up over the past few days that can lift 700 tons at one time and they anticipate over the next couple of days another crane to come in even larger, able to lift 1,000 tons in one lift.

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