Trade Centre burns victim 'wanted quick death'

A young securities broker enveloped in a fireball on the 82nd floor of the World Trade Centre when the terrorists struck says he remembers thinking "Please, God, just make it quick".

Manu Dhingra, 27, has become the first person released from the New York Weill Cornell Burn Centre after surviving with burns to a third of his body from his ankles to his face.

Mr Dhingra said he could not explain why he has been given a second chance when thousands of others were not.

He told a news conference at the hospital: "I just can't let it go to waste. Life can't be normal."

Mr Dhingra said he had just emerged from the lift for a day of trading at Andover Brokerage when "I was just covered in a ball of fire".

He said: "I thought it was over," he said. "I thought it was a bomb."

Then he realised he was alive and that "there's nobody going to come up to the 82nd floor", so he began walking down despite the searing pain.

Two co-workers helped him, clearing the way as they descended the flights of stairs and occasionally fetching water for his rapidly dehydrating body. He said that the pain was so severe he couldn't allow his friends and colleagues to touch him.

He said their greatest help was in deceiving him about the trip down. Once, when he wanted to rest, they told him to keep going because there were just 10 floors left. He found out later they were on the 61st floor.

After the trip down, he was bundled into an ambulance. He did not know the twin towers had collapsed until he was safely in the hospital.