New Yorkers lied to...

[ticklebutton]

EPA Misled Public on 9/11 Pollution
White House ordered false assurances on air quality, report says.

NEW YORK -- In the aftermath of the Sept. 11, 2001, attack on the World Trade Center, the White House instructed the Environmental Protection Agency to give the public misleading information, telling New Yorkers it was safe to breathe when reliable information on air quality was not available.

That finding is included in a report released Friday by the Office of the Inspector General of the EPA. It noted that some of the agency's news releases in the weeks after the attack were softened before being released to the public: Reassuring information was added, while cautionary information was deleted.

"When the EPA made a September 18 announcement that the air was 'safe' to breathe, it did not have sufficient data and analyses to make such a blanket statement," the report says. "Furthermore, the White House Council on Environmental Quality influenced . . . the information that EPA communicated to the public through its early press releases when it convinced EPA to add reassuring statements and delete cautionary ones."

LEVELS OF ASBESTOS

A statement about discovery of asbestos at higher than safe levels in dust samples from lower Manhattan was changed to state that "samples confirm previous reports that ambient air quality meets OSHA (Occupational Safety and Health Administration) standards and consequently is not a cause for public concern."

Language in an EPA draft stating that asbestos levels in some areas were three times higher than national standards was changed to "slightly above the 1 percent trigger for defining asbestos material."

This sentence was added to a Sept. 16 news release: "Our tests show that it is safe for New Yorkers to go back to work in New York's financial district." It replaced a statement that initial monitors failed to turn up dangerous samples.

A warning on the importance of safely handling ground zero cleanup, due to lead and asbestos exposure, was changed to say that some contaminants had been noted downtown but "the general public should be very reassured by initial sampling."

The report also notes examples when EPA officials claimed that conditions were safe when no scientific support was available.

New York's leaders responded with dismay.

Rep. Jerry Nadler, a Manhattan Democrat, called for a Justice Department investigation. "That the White House instructed EPA officials to downplay the health impact of the World Trade Center contaminants due to 'competing considerations' at the expense of the health and lives of New York City residents is an abomination," he said in a news release.

Sen. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., said in an interview it was "understandable that in the midst of a crisis the White House did not want the EPA to sound alarmist." But, he warned, "If the public loses faith that things are safe when the government says so, we'll have done more damage than a pointed statement the week after 9/11 would have."

The White House did not respond to requests for comment.



Published on Saturday, August 23, 2003 by the Long Island, NY Newsday
by Laurie Garrett

 

[Neutron]

Does It Matter?

Had the people known the air was above national standards would they have stopped breathing it? Sort of makes it kind of hard to stay alive wouldn't you think?

By the way, National Standards do not imply any safety. Being above them just triggers looking for the source. It in NO WAY means the air is unsafe to breath or that there would be any health affects.


Tron

 

[sole seeker]

Re: Does It Matter?

Had the people known the air was above national standards would they have stopped breathing it? Sort of makes it kind of hard to stay alive wouldn't you think?

Good point, Tron.

A politician that lied!?! Will wonders never cease?! 🙄

 

[ticklebutton]

So...that's just fine with you?

A politician that lied!?! Will wonders never cease?!

 

[sole seeker]

Yep.

In my opinion:

1. More often than not "THE TRUTH" is relative. For instance, that which is perceived historical fact is a the point of view cited by those who wrote the history.
2. Most issues have radically different points of view. The one you guage to be most accurate ("THE TRUTH"), will be determined by your own point of view.
3. Even when it can be readily identified, sometimes "THE TRUTH" would only serve to put people into a panic. Panic generally only makes a bad situation worse.

As I said this is only my opinion of "THE TRUTH". It's given from my point of view. Yours may be different, because it will be from your point of view.

 

[ticklebutton]

I expect we'll find out the truth about this

issue in the next few years.

"We don't frankly know what the longer-term health consequences will be," said Dr. Robin Herbert, co-director of Mount Sinai Medical Center's screening program, which last week released a study blaming 9/11 for low birth weights among babies exposed in utero.

Nobody is enforcing federal cleanup laws on the WTC site, which the EPA could have declared a federal Superfund site and subject to rigorous hazardous waste cleanup regulations, but did not.

The Occupational Safety and Health Administration has not performed tests whose results could compel employers to make workers use respiratory protection. Indeed, OSHA has claimed status as an advisory agency, rather than an enforcement agency.

Joel Kupferman of the New York Environmental Law & Justice Project is pressing the EPA to release information on substances, including dioxins, PCBs and other toxins which may be released from burning wood, paper, plastics, vinyl-coated wiring and cable, urethane foam upholstery, vinyl floor tile, synthetic fiber carpets, or oils from old fluorescent light ballasts; and carbon monoxide and sulfur oxides, which may be released with the smoke and gases.

In addition, a report from the project points out that while some scientists believe that the freon from the Trade Center's air conditioning system escaped during the initial explosions, others say that pockets of freon remain and may have converted to phosgene, also known as nerve gas.

 

[Neutron]

Re: I expect we'll find out the truth about this

issue in the next few years.

"We don't frankly know what the longer-term health consequences will be," said Dr. Robin Herbert, co-director of Mount Sinai Medical Center's screening program, which last week released a study blaming 9/11 for low birth weights among babies exposed in utero.

Nobody is enforcing federal cleanup laws on the WTC site, which the EPA could have declared a federal Superfund site and subject to rigorous hazardous waste cleanup regulations, but did not.

The Occupational Safety and Health Administration has not performed tests whose results could compel employers to make workers use respiratory protection. Indeed, OSHA has claimed status as an advisory agency, rather than an enforcement agency.

Joel Kupferman of the New York Environmental Law & Justice Project is pressing the EPA to release information on substances, including dioxins, PCBs and other toxins which may be released from burning wood, paper, plastics, vinyl-coated wiring and cable, urethane foam upholstery, vinyl floor tile, synthetic fiber carpets, or oils from old fluorescent light ballasts; and carbon monoxide and sulfur oxides, which may be released with the smoke and gases.

In addition, a report from the project points out that while some scientists believe that the freon from the Trade Center's air conditioning system escaped during the initial explosions, others say that pockets of freon remain and may have converted to phosgene, also known as nerve gas.

LOL What a bunch of fucking horseshit!!. If you believe that I have an excellent bridge I'm interested in selling you.

the EPA can't ENFORCE a regulation until it's determined WHO is responsible for the cleanup. It's like arresting someone for a crime that hasn't been commited yet.
And Freon DOES NOT break down into phosgene. F ing idiots.

Tron

 

[TickledToDeath]

The Government Lied????

This is news? What would be news would be a block buster breaking story of when the Govenment tells or has told the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth.
Now THAT would be news.

I am sure the culprits did it for the "good of the people and general public" "for their own saftey and well being so as to not start a panic...". Etc Etc Etc


TTD

 

[Roseblossom]

I don't think it's strange

that the govt lied to us.

What I think is really strange is that you guys are totally missing the point that if the govt had not lied, perhaps the cleanup could have been done properly, minimizing further health risks.

"...the EPA could have DECLARED a federal Superfund site and subject to rigorous HAZARDOUS WASTE cleanup regulations, but did not".


And Neutron, you need to learn to read.

 

[MrPartickler]

Re: Re: I expect we'll find out the truth about this

...And Freon DOES NOT break down into phosgene. F ing idiots.

The blacksmithing community might disagree with this statement.

http://www.reil1.net/minifor1.shtml

The exact quote is towards the bottom:
<i>
...the burning of any residual Freon will create deadly phosgene gas. Wear a carbon cartridge respirator, or it may lay you low with just one breath! Be very careful.
</i>
I spent a few minutes on Google checking this out. I found a few other chemistry and welding-related links and a bunch of WTC ones. The facts are out there.

 

[Neutron]

For It To Be Declared...

A Superfund site there HAS TO BE SOMEONE RESPONSIBLE FOR THE CLEANUP!!!. There, simple plain English.

Now as to Freon, Freon is like any gas. Play with it's temperature and you play with it's chemical properties. Heat it slowly and to a given temp it'll change in a certain way, heat it very quickly to a much hotter temp (ie like what happened at the WTC) it'll incinerate because it goes past it's flammable limit. Change the pressure (as in an explosion) this will drive the incineration process even further and faster. In other words in the conditions present at the WTC any freon was heated so fast it simply "disappeared" . It's much like sublimating water.
It's the same process the military uses to dispose of nerve gas.

Shaking my head.

Tron

 

[Knox The Hatter]

A good friend of mine who died in a car accident back in February would've been amused by all of this. He talked endlessly about the environmental hazards of what had been sent into the air as a result of the tragedy, and he didn't trust the government's clean bill of health either.
Governments lie every day about everything you could possibly imagine. We as American citizens can't handle the truth, and wouldn't know what to do with it anyway, we'd just panic like chickens with their heads cut off. The government has always lied about everything, but you know what's most dangerous of all? Clinton lying about the Bravo Juliet he got in the oval office. That lie, if unexposed, could've brought down the walls of the Republic. Oh, My God! WHAT WOULD WE DO!!!! 😛

 

[BigJim]

3. Even when it can be readily identified, sometimes "THE TRUTH" would only serve to put people into a panic. Panic generally only makes a bad situation worse.

Sorry SS, but that sounds like you're making a case for everyone having freedom of choice being taken away from them by force.

 

[Neutron]

No...

He said nothing about Freedom of choice. If a panic is caused because the normal public is a bunch of IDIOTS, then the public will blame the government for giving a warning. In fact, most studies of evacuation plans show more people will die during an evacuation of an area than if the people were just told to stay put.
Look at Americans, we blamed the government for 9/11, then when the government says Here are new standards for getting on an airplane.
What do Americans do? We bith about these standards violating our right to privacy and freedom of speech.
I suggest EVERY American here read the Constitution to see WHAT it really says...

Oh about Superfund, Superfund was created as a means to get industries to clean up their old sites. To be eligible you need to show how contaminated the site is. AND you have to agree to return it to a Non industrial site. In other words a park or something like that,.

The WTC doesn't qualify for the following reasons.

1: No one has stepped forward to say they're responsible for the clean up
2: It's not an industrial site and never was one
3: It'll either be a memorial or another business. It won't be turned over for general public use.
4: It doesn't have the hazardous materials in the right concentrations to be classified as such.
5: There are far more hazardous ares in the US that really need cleaning up.

In fact in the stuff thats looked for by the EPA the WTC doesn't have much of anything that the EPA looks at. Asbestos is potentially hazardous to those working with it, but not usually to those in the general area.


There, you can thank me for thinking for ya'll


Tron

 

[MrPartickler]

Now as to Freon, Freon is like any gas. Play with it's temperature and you play with it's chemical properties. Heat it slowly and to a given temp it'll change in a certain way, heat it very quickly to a much hotter temp (ie like what happened at the WTC) it'll incinerate because it goes past it's flammable limit. Change the pressure (as in an explosion) this will drive the incineration process even further and faster. In other words in the conditions present at the WTC any freon was heated so fast it simply "disappeared" . It's much like sublimating water.
It's the same process the military uses to dispose of nerve gas.

Shaking my head.

Tron

Ok...

IF freon were like any gas (which is not generally true),

and IF the disposal happened in a controlled environment akin to the military's disposal facilities for such a gas (which does not appear to be an assertion made by anyone else...but I'll add that since the anti-terrorism flags are all up, I'm personally not particularly keen on searching too hard to find out a whole lot about nerve gas preparation, storarage, and disposal.),

and IF the vaporization were instantaneous (which could not have happened in a nonuniform, completely uncontrolled environment, explosion, and ensuing <i>fire which lay unextingushed for many weeks</i>, buried beneath the disorganized wreckage of two of the largest buldings in the world at that time),

and IF all the freon in those two large bulidings were contained within the critical environment (which it could not have been since the explosions were localized to the area/floors surrounding the impact of the planes...the rest was either crushed, buried and/or on fire),

and further IF sublimating ice (not water) could produce anything other than steam (unless you're speaking of water plasma and there wasn't nearly enough heat--even at the WTC--to make that [sources available upon request].),

THEN I would agree with you completely: There'd be absolutely no chance of any toxic gases having been produced from freon at the WTC. 🙄

However, since the experts are far less certain that all these things were true, I say we just let them check it out and report back. Better safe than sorry.

 

[BigJim]

Re: No...

There, you can thank me for thinking for ya'll


Tron

Glad to see you returned from the wilderness Darth. 🙂 Even more glad to see you havn't lost your sense of humilty.

He said nothing about Freedom of choice. If a panic is caused because the normal public is a bunch of IDIOTS, then the public will blame the government for giving a warning. In fact, most studies of evacuation plans show more people will die during an evacuation of an area than if the people were just told to stay put.

I know HE said nothing about it directly, but can you imagine the implications of it? I tend to think the world is in the state it is because millions of idiots havn't had the sense/guts/integrity to take responsibility for their own lives. They always look for someone else to blame about some part of their life which is really due to something they couldn't be bothered to knuckle down and do.

Just out of interest Mike, how would you handle a momentous truth? Pick anything you like. Aliens have been on earth for the last month and are among us/earth is made of chocolate/moon is made of cheese...... whatever. Pick some vastly momentous circumstance of your choice. If you were the Pres, what would you do and how would you do it?

 

[Neutron]

First Of All...

Do those Aliens have the means of destroying mankind, and wil they base it on intelligence or morality? If so, how will they decide? If they do it my way, hell I'll just say go at em boys.
Now, I am in the position actually to decide this. One of my duties at work is to assess any accident and decide what to recommend to the state should we have a bad one. We;re trained do it CORRECTLY not conservatively, in other words don't recommend evacuation just because you feel it might be right, do it because YOU KNOW it might be right. The reason being history shows people DIE in evacuations.
So I always take that into account. Do I really give a rats ass if someone dies because they panic? Nah, not really, I honestly could give a rats ass. Do I want to be the cause of it? No, thats the equivalent to murder, even though if in the long run it benefits mankind.
Personally, if aliens landed I doubt anyone could keep it a secret anyway. I could care less what the government keeps from me, or anyone else. I find it odd the people who worry about this crap are USUALLY the ones who haven't earned the right to bitch because they haven't bothered to defend this country. I've found that someone is always trying to say the government is doing shit to take away our rights, yet I feel more free than I ever have.
What I DO resent is taxes. I lose over 50% of my income to taxes. I don't resent what I pay for the military or basic government functions like transportation or education. I DO resent the large part that is spent on welfare and social programs. I find it odd our forefathers were deadly against social programs, and during the 30s when Roosevelt started Social government (to help with the depression) that people were against it. Now it's almost a constitutional right that I'll have to support some deadbeat family so mommy or daddy doesn't have to work.

Tron

 

[Neutron]

Name Me One...

Expert who is saying this? I haven't seen anything by an expert. Just an article in a liberal rag.
I'm a better engineer and have more experience handling freon and hazardous substances than any of these piss ant experts.

TRon

 

[His Divine Shadow]

Ditto to what TTD said. It's a supreme shame, and should never have happened, but, having happened, it's not a shocker that the government did some "covering up."

However, I'd love to be proven wrong, and have this whole incident turn out like Tron said.

 

[Neutron]

I Have An Idea..

Let's all get rid of our air conditioners, (Nerve gas)
Smoke Detectors (Radioactive)
Knives (Sharp)
Gasoline (Explosive)
Bug Spray and Anti Freeze (Hazardous waste)
Automobiles (Release Sulfuric Acid)

Because they're all potential terrorist devices.

Mike

 

[His Divine Shadow]

And those nasty toenail clippers. Can't let a hijacker get ahold of those, now can we?😉

 

[BigJim]

Before you know it, all the terrorists will be going around calling Americans wankers.


Wanker. 😛

 

[R. Davis]

Giving the public misleading information, doesn't surprise me one bit. Politicians have been doing that as long as there been government.

 

[beachtickler]

Its depressing to see how readily everyone has accepted government lying as the norm. They may do it, but it doesnt mean we have to like or accept it. Does anyone doubt that the Bush presidency is the worst on the environment in American history? Even when environmental initiatives have overwhelming public support they are opposed by the Bush administration. Not surprising since our moronic Prez is thoroughly owned and on the leash of big business!

 

[TickledToDeath]

Its depressing to see how readily everyone has accepted government lying as the norm. They may do it, but it doesnt mean we have to like or accept it. Does anyone doubt that the Bush presidency is the worst on the environment in American history? Even when environmental initiatives have overwhelming public support they are opposed by the Bush administration. Not surprising since our moronic Prez is thoroughly owned and on the leash of big business!

It's not that we "accept it", it is just that there is little we can do about it once we vote their lying asses into office. Even when it seems as if we DON'T vote them in, somehow they get in anyway. Blame the system.
😕 Wonder what would happen if one year, NOBODY voted?!
By nobody I mean the "people" not those already IN some office and those who are running for said office.
Brings to mind the Richard Pryor movie "Brewsters Millions".
'None of the Above'.
Sounds like a plan to me. That would make a statement if for no other reason than for "shits and giggles".😉 😀

Another movie line from the first Batman movie, Jack Nicholson:
"What this town needs is an enema..." Take it one step further and make it what this country needs.

TTD🙄 😎 😀