Human Remains Found Near Ground Zero
N E W Y O R K, Sept. 9 -- With the second anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks approaching, nine pieces of human remains have been found on the 20th floor scaffolding of a building right on the edge of Ground Zero.
Construction workers found the remains Monday on scaffolding of a building that stands just south of where the World Trade Center once stood. The building, a 25-story skyscraper built in 1907, was closed after it was damaged in the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.
Officials said the remains have been examined by an anthropologist from the New York City Medical Examiner's Office and assigned World Trade Center identification tags.
These are the latest such remains to have been found in buildings adjacent to the site, where such discoveries have been made at least two times before, most recently, according to the medical examiner, this past June. Their discovery brings the total of remains collected from the site to 19,902, according to the medical examiner.
A Somber Reminder of the Unburied
The discovery of these remains so close to the second anniversary of the attacks is yet another poignant reminder of the dead whose remains are unburied.
Of all the human remains collected, stored, cataloged and tested, only 7,526 have been identified — meaning they have been linked to one of the 1,521 persons who have been positively identified as among the total 2,792 victims of the attack.
Some of those have been claimed by families for burial or cremation. The rest wait with the unidentified bones for eventual inclusion in a Ground Zero Memorial, from which they could later be removed for additional identity testing.
It has been a considerable feat of science to identify so many, considering the state of many of the remains. Outside experts at first theorized that only about 25 percent would ever be identified. New York's forensic scientists have identified more than half, but still see their task as incomplete.
Another 1,226 persons are listed as deceased through the emergency issuance of court-ordered death certificates. Although their remains have not been identified, their families are certain: They went to work at the twin towers that day; there is a good record of their activities
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