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Analysis of Published Accounts of the World Trade Center Evacuation. Federal Building and Fire Safety Investigation of the World Trade Center Disaster (NIST NCSTAR 1-7A)***DRAFT for Public Comments***

Published

Author(s)

R F. Fahy, Guylene Proulx

Abstract

Published stories of the survivor's of the World Trade Center (WTC) attacks were collected to document the event and as background material to guide the development of the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) Investigation on occupant behavior during the evacuation of the WTC. These first- person accounts came from newspapers, radio and television programs, e-mail exchanges, and a variety of web sites. The accounts analyzed were from survivors located in several areas in each tower, providing a distribution of floors from the upper, middle, and lower strata of the two towers. In total, 745 accounts were analyzed, representing 435 survivors from WTC 1 and WTC 2. This large quantity of material was coded and analyzed to obtain a better understanding of the personal evacuation experiences of different survivors located on the different floors of the two towers. This report documents that analysis. The analysis was solely based on written accounts and does not include first-person interviews conducted as part of the NIST Investigation. Rather, the analysis provided background for the development of the telephone and face-to-face interviews conducted for the NIST Investigation.
Citation
National Construction Safety Team Act Reports (NIST NCSTAR) - 1-7
Report Number
1-7

Keywords

World Trade Center, high rise buildings, building collapse, disasters, fire safety, fire investigations, terrorists, terrorism, building fires, egress, communication networks, evacuation, human behavior, methodology

Citation

Fahy, R. and Proulx, G. (2005), Analysis of Published Accounts of the World Trade Center Evacuation. Federal Building and Fire Safety Investigation of the World Trade Center Disaster (NIST NCSTAR 1-7A)***DRAFT for Public Comments***, National Construction Safety Team Act Reports (NIST NCSTAR), National Institute of Standards and Technology, Gaithersburg, MD, [online], https://tsapps.nist.gov/publication/get_pdf.cfm?pub_id=909182 (Accessed March 29, 2024)
Created September 1, 2005, Updated February 19, 2017