2.30pm
NEW YORK - With bagpipes skirling, the last steel beam still standing at "ground zero" was cut down today (NZT), bringing a symbolic end to more than eight months of gruelling recovery work at New York's World Trade Centre site
The 10-metre, 58-tonne beam -- column 1001 B of the southeast corner of the south World Trade Centre tower -- was taken down as four workers bathed in floodlights and wielding torches applied the last cuts, sparking a crowd of 1,000 workers and uniformed officers to chant "USA, USA, USA."
It was an emotional end to a herculean task -- the grisly search for human remains and the clearing away of mangled debris and ash seven stories high and eight stories underground left when the 110-storey twin towers collapsed after being hit on September 11 by hijacked airliners.
Workers cleared some 1.8 million tonnes of rubble and steel from the site in more than 108,000 truckloads, according to Deputy Commissioner Frank McCarton of the Office of Emergency Management, which oversaw the recovery efforts.
More than 19,000 body parts were also recovered.
The beam, a makeshift shrine to the more than 2,800 people killed in the attacks, bore the numbers of dead from each of the city's uniformed services, had personal messages scribbled on it and pictures glued to the surface.
Representatives of all the groups of workers involved in the recovery including engineers, carpenters, iron workers, plumbers and construction workers were on hand.
"The workers who dedicated themselves to this effort are on the verge of completing an enormous job," said Mayor Michael Bloomberg. "In many ways this is their night to reflect and remember."
Iron worker Joseph Alba brought a special perspective to the ceremony. He was a member of the first crew that erected steel on the site of the World Trade Centre in 1967 and on Tuesday was a member of the last work crew.
"We are just workers," said the 60-year-old Alba, wearing a starched denim shirt and denim pants to his last shift at ground zero.
"I'm glad it's over," said Alba, who said he was working at the nearby South Ferry terminal on Sept. 11 when the planes hit.
Alba watched the towers burning, then saw them collapse and the cloud of dust forced him back. "I never believed it would go down. Never in my life." he said.
The Stars and Stripes beam was loaded on a flatbed truck that will haul it from the ruins during a ceremony on Thursday that will serve as the formal end of the recovery.
Standing shoulder to shoulder, hundreds of white uniformed sailors representing every naval vessel in the city for Fleet Week, lined the 150-metre ramp that leads seven stories down from street level to the bottom of the pit of the 6-hectare site.
As the workers filed out of gaping hole in the ground, they were greeted by Bloomberg and handed a folded American flag by the US sailors.
Story archives:
Links: Terror in America - the Sept 11 attacks
Timeline: Major events since the Sept 11 attacks
Last trade centre beam removed from ground zero
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