Rudy's 9/11 Radio Problem, Investigation Urged
Posted on Mon Oct 15, 2007 at 05:06:21 PM EST
Tags: Rudy Giuliani (all tags)
Rudy Giuliani, who's running for President primarily on his record as Mayor of New York City during the 9/11 attacks, takes another hit today from The Real Rudy and Brave New Films.
Watch the new video. The firefighters on 9/11 were carrying the same piss-poor radios that malfunctioned during the 1993 WTC attacks. That's why the firefighters didn't get the call to get out of the buildings. More than 100 firefighters died. As Digby explains:
Giuliani came into office in 1994, shortly after the first WTC attack. He knew then that the radios didn't work properly and yet it took him seven years to deal with the problem. And when he finally got around to it, he gave Motorola a sweetheart, no-bid contract for radios that were never tested in advance. When the NYFD got them, they didn't work and they had to be reissued the same radios that had proved inadequate in 1993.
That's why, on September 11th, the firefighters didn't hear the warnings to get out of the buildings. The cops heard them. They mostly got out. Their radios could get the right frequency. The firefighters' old radios couldn't.
Rudy's history as a Mayor who failed to provide adequate emergency preparedness needs investigation. It also needs exposure. Who needs a leader of the United States who couldn't even provide for his city's first responders as Mayor?
More...
Sign the Petition. It seeks an investigation of:
- Why was nothing done to improve FDNY radio performance for seven years after a clear need was demonstrated in the 1993 World Trade Center attack?
- When new radios were finally ordered, why did the city block other companies besides Motorola from bidding on the contract?
- Once Motorola was given the contract, why did its cost jump from $1.4 million to $14 million?
Why were these new radios never tested?
Eric Goia is the New York City councilman with authority to call for the investigation being requested by firefighters and others. Sign the petition.
There's more background on Rudy's five 9/11 lies here. And it's not just the radios.
Giuliani never forced the police and fire departments to abide by clear command-and-control protocols that squarely put one service in charge of the other during specified emergencies. Though he collected $250 million in tax surcharges on phone use to improve the 911 system, he diverted this emergency funding for other uses, and the 911 dispatchers were an utter disaster that day, telling victims to stay where they were long after the fire chiefs had ordered an evacuation, which potentially sealed the fates of hundreds. And, despite the transparent lessons of 1993, Giuliani never established any protocols for rooftop or elevator rescues in high-rises, or even a strategy for bringing the impaired and injured out—all costly failings on 9/11.
Update: Here's the NIST report on emergency response operations (pdf).
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