More bones found at World Trade Center

More bones believed to belong to September 11 World Trade Centre victims were found as New York continued searching underground areas that were apparently overlooked during the excavation years ago.

Deputy mayor Ed Skyler, overseeing the recovery effort, said yesterday that searchers had identified additional manholes and utility cavities that needed to be examined.

The team of searchers, which includes police and firefighters and forensic anthropologists from the medical examiner's office, expects to burrow into at least 12 subterranean areas in coming days. About five have been excavated, yielding more than 100 pieces of human remains.

The medical examiner's office said 18 were found yesterday and the total cache of discoveries ranged from tiny fragments to recognisable bones from skulls, torsos, feet and hands. Some were as large as whole arm and leg bones.

"They will go through every grain, every piece of material carefully, and sift through it," Skyler said.

The underground pockets are located along the western edge of the 16-acre lower Manhattan site, underneath a north-south service road that was built in March 2002 as the excavation was continuing. Building the road freed up a major thru-way that had been closed since the September 11 attack six months earlier.

However, when it was built, some below-ground cavities that had been used for utility and infrastructure purposes were paved over without being searched for remains.

Days ago, crews doing routine work at the site opened one of those manholes and discovered human bones inside, setting off an expedition for other remains.

Families of the victims, 40% of whom still have no identifiable remains, have been outraged about the discovery of the underground tombs. They are calling for government intervention and have demanded answers about why the search was incomplete.

Skyler said the city was concentrating on finding remains before it would turn to a review of any mis-steps.

"It's a question that should be answered, but for now our focus is on dealing with the situation and finding whatever remains are recoverable," he said.

Skyler said widespread stoppage of rebuilding efforts would not be necessary, but if any portion of the rebuilding needed to pause to accommodate the search, officials would take that step by step.

Some September 11 families, however, want all rebuilding to halt until the recovery is finished.

"Their actions say remains are not a priority, they're secondary to the rebuilding," said Charles Wolf, who lost his wife and has never received any of her identified remains.

"This is bringing up all the gnawing, gut-wrenching stuff inside us again."

The new cache of remains is not the first to turn up unexpectedly since the clean-up officially concluded in 2002. Hundreds of bone fragments recently were found on the roof of a nearby skyscraper that was badly damaged in the 2001 attack and had been condemned.