The NY Times did not have as complete of a set of information as the City Does and I would not put much credence in their estimates. If you don’t think these people died or that they are exaggerated phantom bodies, I suggest you pay a visit to the Great Kills Landfill where there are currently over 20,000 body parts in storage that were over looked by the rescuers at the WTC site. Or maybe you could explain to my son why his basketball had to be canceled so that the Gym at the church could be used for funerals and memorial services? Maybe you could also explain to my daughter why her preschool had to be delayed so that her school building could be used for the same purpose at a different parish? Or maybe you would like to go to either of my kids’ schools and explain to the children with dead and missing parents that they aren’t really dead? Maybe you can explain to me why I have been stuck in traffic for funerals or memorial services at least 4 times a week since September 11th?
My own personal scorecard is this:
25 Dead or Missing from my Parish
28 Dead or Missing from the neighboring Parish
1 Wife’s Cousin’s Husband w/2 surviving children under 3
2 Ex-coworkers at Cantor Fitzgerald with 6 surviving children and 2 spouses
2 Ex-coworkers sons at Cantor Fitzgerald (that I trained as interns) both with surviving wives and 2 children under three each.
Many more in and around me every day.
Just for something that is a little official for you taste; here is FEMA’s report from 10/1/2001. Keep in mind that many are still in area hospitals.
World Trade Center Update
En Español
New York City and state officials have revised the total number of missing from the WTC disaster to 5,219, down from 5,641 listed previously. According to New York City officials, some of the names had been double counted due to multiple reports. The confirmed dead has risen to 314, the city also announced. The death toll is likely to rise as some injured survivors are still fighting for life in area hospitals. The New York Presbyterian Hospital's burn center has nine victims that are expected to die in the next few weeks.
Hospitals in New York and New Jersey treated nearly 7,300 patients in the aftermath of the attack, and 561 patients had injuries serious enough to be admitted to some 162 hospitals, according to local hospital associations. Many of these patients are burn patients.
The Urban Search and Rescue effort is winding down with only one FEMA USAR task force, California TF-4, assigned to New York this morning. Three task forces, Nevada-1, Colorado-1 and Nebraska-1 are scheduled to depart for their home bases today.
California-4 is scheduled to support the New York Fire Department until October 6. The Incident Support Team is likely to remain beyond October 6 to continue to support the New York recovery operations.
According to news media reports, the attack on the WTC is expected to cost the New York economy $60 billion dollars before all is said and done. The insurance industry has set the total loss in the city at $40 billion to $60 billion, the equivalent of the annual gross domestic product of the country of Hungary. Insurance payouts are expected to exceed $25 billion, which will top the previous record of $19 billion paid in the aftermath of Hurricane Andrew in 1992. (Manhattan DFO, FEMA HQ, news media)
New York city officials say 4,964 are dead or missing but none of the lists maintained by others comes near to that. One compiled by the New York Times puts the toll at about 2,950; another, by USA Today, the nation's biggest-selling newspaper, stops at 2,680; and that maintained by the Associated Press news agency goes no further than 2,625.
The American Red Cross, which has received $500m in donations, had expected to be contacted by the families of most victims but has dealt with only 2,563 cases six weeks after the attacks.
"Where are those people?" asked Luis Garcia, the Red Cross official in charge of allocating grants to them.
The huge discrepancy became evident only a day after the New York police department unit responsible for keeping a count said that it was edging closer to a reliable number for the dead and missing, partly by matching body parts to DNA from victims' toothbrushes and hairbrushes.
Anthony De Barros, a computer database editor at USA Today, said: "It has seemed to be odd.
"I don't want to discount the possibility that there were large numbers of people who were just visiting or working in the building that day, or people like carpenters or electricians. But still, even so, it is hard to understand where they are going to come from to reach the numbers the city is reporting."
Numbers have fallen after the initial fear that up to 10,000 people might have been killed, and again after the same names were found to have appeared on more than one list as information poured in from numerous sources. But still the city's total has fallen by only about 500 over the past three weeks.