It undoubtedly will take years to sort out why some first-responder communications worked and why some did not after terrorists navigated jet planes into the World Trade Center on Sept. 11, 2001. But it appears one suspected culprit has been exonerated.
The National Institute of Standards and Technology last week said that while communications and information sharing were lacking shortly after the two skyscrapers were struck and human life inside wantonly violated, damaged repeaters and/or improper operation of them were not to blame as some initially suspected. It was only after the second towering inferno collapsed that the operable repeater ceased to relay radio transmissions, according to investigators.
While NIST characterized its analysis of the World Trade Center disintegration as “the most detailed examination of a building failure ever conducted,” it will not be the final word on the matter. Persistent probing and further finger-pointing will continue.
If policy-makers are truly interested in honoring those who lost lives and in ensuring that their deaths were not in vain, they will get serious about improving first-responder communications and eliminating weak links in systems. This means interoperability, funding, enhanced 911, spectrum and lots more.
“Like most building collapses, these events were the result of a combination of factors,” said Shyam Sunder, lead investigator for the agency’s building and fire safety investigation into the WTC disaster. “While the buildings were able to withstand the initial impact of the aircraft, the resulting fires that spread through the towers weakened support columns and floors that had fireproofing dislodged by the impacts. This eventually led to collapse as the perimeter columns were pulled inward by the sagging floors and buckled.”
Substitute communications collapse for building collapse, and I believe the same explanation holds: There likely are multiple reasons why public-safety wireless transmissions did not perform under circumstances arguably beyond comprehension at that moment in time. Some might argue that is the point: Someone should have foreseen the possibility of reality terrorism on American soil.
The ripple effect continues.
Attorney General Alberto Gonzales and FBI Director Robert Mueller were on Capitol Hill last week asking lawmakers to renew a USA Patriot Act that some critics-left and right-fear will lead to a world of perpetual- on-demand-free-and-easy wiretaps and other more inspired modes of surveillance.
Meantime, in a distant land called Iraq, the focus is not on how to boost radio signals but rather how to jam them. The problem is deadly serious: remotely detonated IEDs (improvised explosive devices). Cell phones set off these roadside bombs. Not enough U.S. tanks are equipped with jammers, frustrated lawmakers say. It makes wanting to rid the ether of those annoying cell-phone conversations seem rather trivial.
