Man located a year after Twin Towers attack

A MAN listed as missing in the World Trade Center attacks has been found alive in a New York hospital — almost a year after the atrocity.

George Sims, 46, who suffers from amnesia and schizophrenia, was believed to have been selling goods close to the Twin Towers on September 11.

His family did not hear from him in the days after the attack and reported his disappearance to the police.

Mr Sims, of Newark, New Jersey, was later added to the official New York list of victims, as one of 90 people recorded as missing.

No death certificate had been issued for the father-of-one, but as the September 11 anniversary fast approached his family had almost given up hope of discovering what had happened to him.

However, earlier this month they received a telephone call from officials at a New York health centre saying they believed that a patient in the centre was in fact Mr Sims.

His mother, Anna Sims, said: “He’s alive, but he’s not in the best of health.

“When I saw him, he did not know me. He did not know his daughter. He did not know his brother,” said The Star-Ledger newspaper of Newark.

No one knows where Mr Sims was on the day of the attacks or how he ended up at the hospital, but members of his family remained hopeful that he would eventually recover and tell them what happened.

“If God brought him this far back to me, he will come back the rest of the way. It will take time,” Mrs Sims said.

“I am just grateful he is alive. God worked a miracle.”

The case illustrates why an exact death toll for September 11 may never be known.

Last week the figure was revised down by four to 2,819, but New York officials said it is still being adjusted and is expected to be changed again this week.