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Bone shards that may be from 9/11 found on roof

Posted on: Tuesday, 27 September 2005, 11:43 CDT

By Claudia Parsons

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Construction workers have found bone fragments that may be remains of people who died in the World Trade Center attacks on the roof of a neighboring skyscraper damaged on September 11, 2001, a city official said on Tuesday.

The fragments, handed to the office of the city's chief medical examiner who will establish whether they are human and try to identify them, were found during work to dismantle the Deutsche Bank building.

The 41-story building was struck by falling debris when the Twin Towers collapsed and has been vacant ever since, pending a decision on how to safely demolish it.

Ellen Borakove, director of public affairs for the city's Office of the Chief Medical Examiner, said less than 10 small fragments had been found on the roof over the past week.

"We don't know yet if they are human, we have to do some further examination to determine that," Borakove said, adding those tests could take about a week.

"If they do turn out to be human, we will have to see if we can extract DNA to see if we can identify them," she said.

Recovering the remains of victims of the attacks has been a slow and painful process, and identifying victims from tiny fragments such as bone shards has not always been possible.

Of the 2,749 office workers, rescuers and others killed after two jetliners flew into the twin towers and caused their collapse, only 292 full bodies were recovered, according to families of the victims.

In February New York authorities called a halt to efforts to identify victims of the attacks, leaving the remains of nearly half those killed unidentified.

Some 9,720 unidentified bone and tissue fragments have been sealed and stored in case developments in technology allow for identification in the future, officials have said.

Demolishing the Deutsche Bank building has been held up by complications over how to handle hazardous material such as asbestos and other material blown into the building by the collapse of the Twin Towers.

The discovery of what may be human remains highlights the other big concern for families of the victims who are already pressing for millions of tons of rubble from Ground Zero to be treated as human remains and given a proper burial rather than dumped in a landfill like garbage.

Borakove said contractors working on the Deutsche Bank building were briefed to hand over anything that might be remains of victims. "They have a protocol in place. They know anything that resembles human remains has to be reported to our office immediately," she said.

Source: REUTERS

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