May 30, 2002: Ground Zero Cleanup Operation Officially Ends

A brief ceremony marks the official ending of the cleanup and recovery effort at Ground Zero, eight months and 19 days after 9/11. As part of the ceremony, attended by thousands of people, a flatbed truck carries the last steel beam from the World Trade Center away from the site. The cleanup has been completed three months sooner than predicted and at a cost of $750 million. More than 108,000 truckloads of debris, comprising 1.8 million tons of steel and concrete, have been removed from the site. The debris was taken to the Fresh Kills landfill on Staten Island. Controversially, much of the steel was melted down or shipped out of the US for recycling (see September 12-October 2001). A small number of workers will remain at the site for a few more weeks, due to a delay by Deutsche Bank in letting firefighters search its high-rise at 130 Liberty Street. The final truckload of debris will be removed on June 24 and control of the site will be turned over to the New York Port Authority, which owns the land. Forensic investigators will continue sifting through debris at Fresh Kills, in the hope of finding and identifying more victims, until mid-July. [CBS News, 5/16/2002; CBS News, 5/30/2002; CNN, 5/30/2002; PBS, 5/30/2002; BBC, 7/15/2002; Glanz and Lipton, 2004, pp. 316-318; Stout, Vitchers, and Gray, 2006, pp. 219 and 226-227]