More Missing at World Trade Center

N E W   Y O R K, Sept. 20, 2001 -- The number of people believed missing or dead in the attack on the World Trade Center swelled by more than 900, from 5,422 to 6,333, today largely because of new victim lists submitted from abroad, New York Mayor Rudolph Giuliani said.

Rescue workers today struggled with intermittent rain as they continued to search the rubble for survivors. But no one has been found alive since the day after Sept. 11, when two hijacked airplanes crashed into the Trade Center's twin towers, leaving thousands missing and believed dead.

So far, 241 bodies have been recovered, Giuliani said tonight. The number of injured stands at 6,291. Crews have removed 68,943 tons of debris from the site, but an estimated 1 million to 2 million tons remain, and officials have said it will take at least six months to clear it all.

New York Fire Lt. James Earl, coming off a rescue shift on "the pile," told ABCNEWS this afternoon the rain makes the work even harder than it already was.

"It makes everything slippery," Earl said. "It makes it hard to work, makes the tools wet. It just makes it much more hazardous for the workers that are in there."

Earlier, officials said they had identified 170 of the dead, including 37 police officers, 32 firefighters, two emergency medical technicians, two Port Authority employees and one New Jersey firefighter. According to city officials' estimates, at least 60 police officers and more than 300 firefighters are among the missing.

Horror and Diminishing Hopes

While maintaining hope, Giuliani in recent days has conceded the chances of finding any more survivors is growing increasingly slim.

But Earl said the remaining glimmer of hope keeps rescue workers going and prevents them from giving up.

"In earthquakes, they've pulled people out after 14 days, after two weeks, if someone's at a spot where there's some kind of availability of water, which is one way that the rain might help somebody if they're trapped in there," he said.

"Hopefully, there are signs of life, but realistically we're starting to lose hope for that," he said. "But we're forcing ourselves to still hope. We know that it's still a possibility."

As they dug, workers received encouragement from 40 U.S. senators led through the muck and wreckage by Giuliani.

"I'm from a part of the country that has been hit by hurricanes repeatedly," said Senate Minority Leader Trent Lott, R-Miss. "But I must say, I've never seen anything comparable to what we have seen here today, the magnitude of it and the horror of it."

Funerals and Memorials for Grief-Stricken City

As the rescue search continued, New York City firefighters attended separate services today for eight of their dead. At one funeral, a rain-soaked flag covered the casket of Bill "Buddy" Henry as bagpipes played. Hundreds of fellow firefighters stood by, their arms stiff in salute.

Tom Conroy, a retired former colleague, mourned the loss.

"I just retired in June," Conroy said. "Me and him were just talking the other day and he says to me, 'Tom, I'm going to retire too.' … We lost a lot of fine men. We lost fathers, sons, uncles, grandfathers, everything. And I feel just as sad for the public."

City officials announced that a weekend memorial originally planned in New York's Central Park for fallen firefighters and police officers will instead be held at Yankee Stadium in the Bronx at 3 p.m. on Sunday. Giuliani said additional mourners might be able to gather at minor league baseball stadiums in Brooklyn, Staten Island and Newark, N.J.

Giuliani said the memorial in Central Park, which was expected to draw up to 1 million people, was canceled due to security concerns. The ceremony at Yankee Stadium will only allow 60,000 mourners.

‘Hallowed Ground’

Officials mourned hundreds of dead at two other disaster sites today.

At the Pentagon, where a hijacked airplane crashed into the west side of the building, recovery crews continued to search for remains of the victims, but officials conceded today some may never be accounted for.

FBI agents have begun to collect criminal evidence from the rubble. That process is expected to take another two or three weeks, after which the evidence will be taken to a nearby deposit site for a closer examination that could last a month or longer, an FBI official in Washington said today.

An investigation also is proceeding at the site where hijacked United Airlines Flight 93 crashed in the hills of Western Pennsylvania, killing all 44 people aboard after passengers on the plane apparently fought the hijackers.

FBI Director Robert Mueller — visiting the Shanksville, Pa., site with Attorney General John Ashcroft today — said the FBI still is analyzing the plane's cockpit voice recorder, but it was clear the passengers on-board did everything they could to stop the hijackers from crashing into any buildings and killing any innocent people on the ground.

"We believe those passengers on this jet were absolute heroes and their actions during this flight were heroic," Mueller said.

Ashcroft said the site where so many died felt like "hallowed ground," and vowed to catch and punish everyone involved in the terror attacks.

"We will identify the parties responsible," Ashcroft said, "and we will provide a basis for punishing parties and organizations whose mission it was to disrupt America's life of freedom and liberty."