Recently, Association of BellTel Retirees Chairman Thomas Steed, Retired FDNY firefighter Dan Noonan, 9/11 legal advocate Michael Barasch, along Dr. James Dahlgren, MD. Environmental Scientist and Assistant Clinical Professor at UCLA School of Medicine, held a very successful webinar with over 1,000 participants.
Hundreds joined the webinar live, with more watching on YouTube.
The webinar highlighted the tragic aftermath of the 1975 NY Tel Co Fire – with many from the FDNY and TelCo family coming down with cancers – and bridged that to the toxic connections with the September 11 terrorist attacks.
Discussing the 1975 NYTel Fire, Noonan noted, because no one died on the day specifically, “[The Telephone Company] spun it as the Miracle on Second Avenue! We called it the Disaster on Second Avenue!”
Mr. Steed was quick to agree, “It was no miracle.”
The four discussed the tragedy of that day and what took place, as the 5-alarm fire raged for some 24-hours, requiring 699 firefighters, and then the many months of clean up and restoration work by 4,000 members of the Telephone Company workforce from across the Bell System.
Noonan, then in his second year with the FDNY, explained his fire company was among the first to arrive on the scene.
He said that while the fire was deemed “under control” after 17 hours, “we had to evacuate the building twice… one time there was an explosion of hydrocarbon gas… any firefighter who was near it, [the explosion] knocked them off their feet.”
Thomas Steed recounted being there at the early stages of the fire operation and how he and countless other telephone workers watched and waited for the building to be deemed safe, so they could finally get to work.
“When I arrived, smoke was coming out of the upper floors. Firefighters in ladder trucks were attacking the fire with streams of water and we had to wait until the fire was finally out the following morning. We were all geared to go in, but we had to wait.”
Dr. Dahlgren spoke about the health effects working in a toxic environment.
“Acute poisoning levels for hydrochloric acid and Vinyl Chloride Monomer can cause an acute illness and the levels of exposure here were massive. [This was] immediately dangerous to life and health.” He continued, “And that’s why people were so sick, because of the acute high-level exposure to these highly toxic chemicals.”
While no one died that day, the dangers lurked under the surface as firefighters and telephone workers who remained for months at the site started showing signs of cancer and other severe illnesses.
The first victims on the FDNY side began to get sick and die, as soon as two weeks after the fire, said Noonan. He explained a young, healthy FDNY lieutenant dropped dead weeks at the site of a small Bronx fire, as result the damage from the Vinyl Chloride Monomers.
To that, Attorney Michael Barasch, who is the nation’s leading legal and environmental health advocate for the 9/11 community said, “I’m sure there has been no concerted effort to reach out to [the telephone workers] to find out how many of them got cancer, how many died. These people are in the dark.”
The webinar lasted an hour as the four recounted the months that followed and, explained the absolute toxic connections for the Verizon and Empire City Subway workforce who also turned out to restore service following the 9/11 Terrorist Attacks.
While the 1975 NY Telephone Fire was recognized as the largest indoor toxic fire in our nation, the response to the World Trade Center terrorist attack on 9/11, resulted in the largest toxic burn pit our nation has ever seen.
The common dominator among the two incidents, is these two unique workforces: Firefighters and Telephone Company professionals standing shoulder to shoulder during an emergency.
Tune into the webinar on the BellTel YouTube Channel. The Association would like to thank the Barasch McGarry Law Firm for helping to lead this important webinar.
This article was first published in the Fall 2022 BellTel Newsletter.
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