WASHINGTON – Friday, a court ordered release of the New York City Fire Department radio communications from the events of September 11, 2001 revealed 15 hours of horrific chaos, confusion and frustration. Congressman Bart Stupak (D-MI), who introduced the Public Safety Interoperability Implementation Act, expressed sympathy for those who lost their lives as a result, but also stressed the need for essential funding to ensure critical communications investments occur to prevent such outcomes.

“The attacks on 9-11 were horrendous attacks on our country and showed us some of our vulnerabilities. Now, in addition to that tragedy, we find that some of those deaths may have been prevented had there been a more adequate communications system in place.” Stupak said. “This information is an extremely unfortunate example of a vulnerability that exists in communities across the country. With more than 80 percent of America’s local first responders not able to interoperate, or communicate with their counterparts, the inability of first responders to communicate with each other is more than a major concern; it’s a threat to our national security.”

Stupak reintroduced the Public Safety Interoperability Implementation Act (H.R.1323) along with Congressmen Vito Fossella (R-NY) and Eliot Engel (D-NY) again in March of this year. The bill would establish the Public Safety Communications Trust Fund. After an initial three year grant program, the funding for the Trust Fund will come from future sales of spectrum, or public air waves. Grants will be allocated to eligible entities to achieve interoperability, with multi-year grants available to ensure that agencies can develop long term plans without having to worry about funding from one year to the next. 

“When I introduced my interoperability bill, the 9-11 Commission had just concluded that the inability of first responders from different agencies to talk to one another was a key factor in the death of at least 121 fire fighters of the 343 who lost their lives on 9-11,” Stupak said. “With something as simple as communicating over a radio network, regardless of agency or jurisdiction, we may have been able to save lives. That is why this funding is so critical to protecting our communities and securing our homeland.”

There are 12,000 pages of oral testimony from firefighters of the incidents of 9-11 in addition to the 15 hours of radio transmissions. From the first exchange at 8:46 a.m. to well after the collapse of the second tower, the different voices heard over the call channels expressed a disoriented state of frustration and panic. Some of the many recorded exchanges cite that first responders didn’t know whether to stay in the towers or retreat, how to find emergency medical assistance or how to find people trapped in the rubble and debris because different agencies were unable to communicate through the same network.

“Even before these tapes were released we knew that interoperability was vital in the first stages of an attack,” Stupak said. “In fact, President Bush said in 2002 that the first minutes and hours after an attack are critical and it is essential to have the equipment, strategies and communications for our first responders. Yet in the last two years, the President has not included adequate funding to even begin to address the problem.”

The 9-11 Commission Report said, “the inability to communicate was a critical element of the World Trade Center, Pentagon, Somerset County, Pennsylvania, crash sites where multiple agencies and multiple jurisdictions responded.  The occurrence of this problem at three very different sites is strong evidence that compatible and adequate communications among public safety organizations at the local, state and federal levels remains an important problem…Federal funding of such (interagency communication) units should be given high priority…”

“America cannot wait for another terrorist attack and suffer the loss of lives because first responders cannot communicate with each other,” Stupak said. “As founder of the Congressional Law Enforcement Caucus, we have demonstrated how the interoperability problem can be solved using today’s technology. I challenge the administration to apply this technology today to keep Americans safe.”

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