One block between Ground Zero mosque and human remains
By TOM TOPOUSIS and PHILIP MESSING
www.nypost.com
Last Updated: 9:14 AM, September 10, 2010________________________
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Here's the chilling proof that Ground Zero stretches well beyond the boundaries of the World Trade Center site, and reaches close to the proposed mosque and community center.
A map compiled by firefighters who sifted through the wreckage of lower Manhattan in the seven months after the attacks shows the gruesome discovery of human remains stretched as far as 1,135 feet from the middle of the trade center -- including remains found just a block from the mosque site.
The map was obtained by The Post from sources after the Fire Department did not respond to requests to review it. It shows that remains were found just 348 feet to the south of the mosque site at 45 Park Place, on top of the massive post-office building that stretches along Barclay Street, from Church Street to West Broadway.
SEE HOW CLOSE THE MOSQUE SITE IS TO WHERE HUMAN REMAINS WERE FOUND AFTER 9/11
Firefighters using global positioning systems recorded seven remains on the post office.
Remains also were found atop CUNY's Fiterman Hall, bounded by Park Place and Barclay Street on the eastern side of West Broadway, just 360 feet away from the mosque site.
The map was made by the FDNY's "Phoenix Team," which tracked the discovery of the remains.
The issue of where remains were found has come to the forefront during the national debate over the proposed mosque.
Relatives of 9/11 victims have argued that their loved ones' remains were scattered for blocks in the dust and debris.
Advocates for the project, and the mosque's leaders and developers, have defended their decision to locate it two blocks north of the World Trade Center site by insisting that it is not that close to Ground Zero.
Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf, who describes himself as the "visionary" behind the mosque, told CNN this week, "This is not Ground Zero proper. No one's body is in that location."
On buildings and streets surrounding the World Trade Center site, dots signifying the presence of remains spread out, with the largest concentrations around the fallen towers.
Outside the trade center, the largest concentration of remains was found at the badly damaged World Financial Center across West Street, where workers trying to rebuild the complex alerted firefighters to their grisly finds.
The farthest from the World Trade Center that remains were found was near the corner of West Street and Carlisle Street, about 1,135 feet south of the center of Ground Zero.
But the map is only a partial glimpse of the scope of the search for remains. The vast majority of the 21,812 remains were culled from debris sorted at the Fresh Kills Landfill. Of those remains, only 12,771 have been identified so far.
And 1,123 of the 2,752 victims have yet to be identified.
In his first interview since returning from a State Department-funded tour of the Mideast, Rauf conceded on CNN that had he known how controversial the location would have been, he might have reconsidered putting a mosque there.
Gov. Paterson, whose earlier offers to help find a new location for the mosque had been rebuffed, said yesterday that he saw Rauf's latest comments as a move "in the right direction."
Paterson declined to comment on Rauf's additional remarks that the mosque issue has become so politicized that moving it could endanger national security.
Additional reporting by Candice Giove
tom.topousis@nypost.com
NEW YORK
