Ground Zero Responder Turned Away From Hospital Because of PTSD Service Dog?

Ground Zero Worker Turned Away from Hospital When He Brings Service Dog
NBC New York
By Lori Bordonaro
September 23, 2016

Hazan later told NBC 4 New York, "At a mental health care facility, it makes it an egregious violation of human rights."

A ground zero first responder suffering post-traumatic stress disorder was turned away from a New York City hospital when he tried to bring his service dog to a therapy session, he says. Fifteen years after responding to ground zero, former New Jersey EMT Jamie Hazan had finally gotten the perfect prescription for his post-traumatic stress disorder: Bernie, a service dog.

He takes Bernie nearly everywhere, including doctors appointments. But when Hazan arrived at New York State Psychiatric Institute hospital in Washington Heights for his therapy session Tuesday, he was told Bernie wasn't welcome.

Hazan began recording the exchange on his cellphone.
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9-11 Responder Saved Lives, Lost His to PTSD

At memorial, family and friends say PTSD led to death of 9/11 first responder Kevin Kelly 
Newsday
By SARAH ARMAGHAN
Updated October 24, 2015

Resnik was with Kelly the day he rescued a police officer who had fallen during an evacuation alarm at the pile, he said. "When everyone was listening to the horn and running away, Kevin stayed behind and grabbed this officer to make sure he got out safely," Resnik said.

Members of the Bellmore-Merrick EMS and other agencies salute and stand at attention while the procession passes in memory of ex-Capt. and Life Member Kevin Kelly at Sacred Heart Church in Merrick, Saturday, Oct. 24, 2015. Photo Credit: Steve Pfost

Ten months after losing their father, husband, colleague or friend, more than 100 people close to Kevin Kelly, a 9/11 first responder, gathered to memorialize him Saturday afternoon in Nassau County, where several spoke of his struggles with post-traumatic stress disorder after spending 14 days on the Ground Zero pile.

The line-of-duty death of Kelly, a Bellmore-Merrick EMT who took his own life Dec. 11 after battling both PTSD and respiratory illnesses, is a reminder that people who helped others by responding to the terror attacks need all the mental and physical health assistance they can get, his family and friends said.

"He had a lot of suffering. Now he's at peace," Kelly's wife, Mary Rose Kelly, 52, of Lindenhurst said after the service. "PTSD is a silent killer. They don't have enough help for those dealing with that."

After the Zadroga Act, which helped 9/11 victims and first responders with their health needs, expired this month, Resnik said it felt like "Congress turned their back on us."
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Landing gear of plane that hit Twin Tower found

NY police: Landing gear part found, is tied to 9/11
By Chelsea J. Carter and Rob Frehse
CNN
updated 6:52 PM EDT, Fri April 26, 2013

STORY HIGHLIGHTS
NEW: Authorities will decide after an inspection whether to sift the soil for remains
The part was discovered behind the site of a planned Islamic community center
Surveyors called police on Wednesday, saying they found "damaged machinery"
Police believe the piece is part of a landing gear from one of the 9/11 airliners

New York (CNN) -- A piece of one of the airliners that hit the World Trade Center towers on September 11, 2001, has been found behind the planned site of an Islamic community center near ground zero, the New York Police Department said Friday.

Part of a landing gear was discovered wedged between 51 Park Place -- the site of the controversial community center -- and another building just blocks from ground zero and "includes a clearly visible Boeing identification number," police said in a written statement.

The part was discovered Wednesday by surveyors hired by a property owner. They called 911 to report that they'd found "apparently damaged machinery," the police said.

Part of a landing gear was discovered wedged between 51 Park Place and another building. "The NYPD is securing the location as it would a crime scene, documenting it photographically ," the statement said.
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Afghanistan veteran serving at Ground Zero because of it

Afghanistan vet finds a new way to serve
By Jeremy Bradley
CNN
January 1, 2013

STORY HIGHLIGHTS
Ricardo Benejam was born and raised in New York City and saw the twin towers fall
Benejam enlisted in the Army and was deployed to Afghanistan in 2007 and 2009
He now works at the 9/11 Memorial as a visitor services host
Benejam: It's like you're continuing to serve because you're telling the story

(CNN) -- Ricardo Benejam is a born-and-bred New Yorker. He grew up with a view of the World Trade Center from the window of his childhood apartment in lower Manhattan.

On September 11, 2001, he was a freshman in high school when the twin towers fell.

"I had actually blurted out, 'We'll be going to war,'" he recalls. "You knew it wasn't an accident. That was my first thought at 14 [years old]."

He witnessed the devastation firsthand as he walked home that day.

"I saw cars that were littered with dust," he said. "I saw people in business suits that were littered in dust."

Benejam visits ground zero several times a week now, not just to pay respect to his fellow veterans or to reflect on the events that inspired him to serve his country. He works at the 9/11 Memorial.

"Working down there, it's like you're continuing to serve because you're telling the story of what happened and what was there before," he said.

Part of what makes his job so special is the bond he shares with other veterans visiting the site.

"You meet a veteran, and it's almost like seeing a brother or sister," Benejam said. "A lot of us have deployed (as a result of) what happened on 9/11."
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God's House at Ground Zero

Last night after a day of remembrances on TV I settled into bed hoping for something different. I found it.

Documentary Shows How WTC Cross Brought Hope After 9/11 Tragedy
By Jeff Schapiro | Christian Post Contributor
The film “The Cross and The Towers” tells the story of the crosses that were found at Ground Zero two days after the 9/11 terrorist attacks, which have inspired hope in both Christians and nonbelievers alike. Despite an atheist organization's attempts at having one of the crosses banned from the National September 11 Memorial and Museum, the film's executive producer, Scott Perkins, hopes that the lawsuit will open up the door for more people to learn about the cross through his film.

"It was the story of hope in the midst of devastation, and we had heard about the story through one of the first responders," he said in an interview with The Christian Post on Thursday. "It's the story about the cross, and how the cross ministered to many workers and many of the heroes that were involved in the days following 9/11 and the months following 9/11.”
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There were so many stories of people remembering someone they lost that dark day. Average people just doing normal things that morning never expecting they would become a part of the most horrible day in our history. There were others, also just average people, doing their jobs. Jobs that involved a risk to their lives on a daily basis but as this day began for them, none of them expected they would be included among that hundreds of heroes sacrificing their lives for the sake of others.

In the hours, days, weeks, months that followed no one wanted to give up trying to recover their bodies as hope of finding survivors vanished. As firemen and police officers put on hardhats refusing to leave evil did not win that day. Love did.

The Cross is a symbol of love overcoming suffering by the willingness of Christ to sacrifice His life for the sake of others. He overcame evil, hatred, beatings, the whip and the nails hammered into his body. That dark morning Christ called out to God, His Father, that He forgive the people responsible for it. He refused to surrender love no matter what was done to Him. The men and women showing up at Ground Zero refused to surrender love in the face of what evil caused.

They needed something to hang onto to help them through it. Chaplains were there watching over them and then, when they were tried, worn out, losing hope and strength, in a cavern they found the cross and found a reminder of God's love.

9/11 memorials: The story of the cross at Ground Zero

By Sally Jenkins, Published: September 8

NewYork — The shape was oddly identifiable in the blasted wreckage of the World Trade Center, standing upright amid beams bent like fork tines and jagged, pagan-seeming tridents. A grief-exhausted excavator named Frank Silecchia found it on Sept. 13, 2001, two days after the terrorist attacks. A few days later, he spoke to a Franciscan priest named Father Brian Jordan, who was blessing remains at Ground Zero.

“Father, you want to see God’s House?” he asked. “Look over there.”

Workers at the World Trade Center disaster site look up at a large illuminated cross near the rubble of the collapsed buildings at Ground Zero.

Ed Betz / AP

Father Brian peered through the fields of shredded metal. “What am I looking for?” he asked.

Silecchia replied, “Just keep looking, Father, and see what you see.”

“Oh my God,” Father Brian said. “I see it.”

As Father Brian stared, other rescue workers gathered around him. There was a long moment of silence as he beheld what he considered to be a sign. Against seeming insuperable odds, a 17-foot-long crossbeam, weighing at least two tons, was thrust at a vertical angle in the hellish wasteland. Like a cross.

Ever since the two jets had slammed into the twin towers on Sept. 11, leaving 2,753 dead, Father Brian had been asked by countless New Yorkers, “Why did God do this?” He would reply tartly, in his Brooklyn-born accent: “It had nuttin’ to do with God. This was the actions of men who abused their free will.” Now here was God explaining Himself. It was a revelation, proof that “God had not abandoned Ground Zero,” even as the awful excavations continued.

Silecchia said worriedly, “Father, they might put this in some dump heap.”

“Frankie, no,” Father Brian said. “No, they will not.”

Instead, as the 10th anniversary of the attacks nears, the “World Trade Cross” continues to occupy a central if controversial place at Ground Zero. Shortly after its discovery, Father Brian persuaded city officials to allow a crew of volunteer union laborers to lift it out of the wreckage by crane and mount it on a concrete pedestal. They placed it in a quiet part of the site, on Church Street, where on Oct. 3, 2001, Father Brian blessed it with the prayer of St. Bonaventure. “May it ever compass Thee, seek Thee, find Thee, run to Thee . . . ” When he finished, the crane operators sounded their horns, a choral blast.

Each week, Father Brian held services there. He became the chaplain of the hard hats.
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If you want to know where God was when you were suffering, He was right there all the time sending others to find you, help you and remind you that you were never really out of His view. Man has freewill to do as they choose. For as long as someone is willing to set their own lives aside for the sake of others, He is there overcoming evil for as long as love, hope, compassion, mercy and charity rises above whatever evil tries to destroy.

September 12, 2011
‘My life was forever changed’
Police chaplains recall the days after 9/11 attacks at Ground Zero

Mark Millican
markmillican@daltoncitizen.com

— Jim Cox remembers the rain.

And the heat emanating from the smoldering buildings.

And the ashes.

“When I walked into Ground Zero in the drizzling rain I could smell it — the ash,” he recalled of visiting New York City just days after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. “And we were standing in this stuff. Who knew what we were standing in? Ashes of the buildings, probably human ash and other things. And I stood there and looked at those piles of rubble a couple of stories high or more, and the smoke coming up. And I could feel the heat, even in the rain — and I broke into tears.

“And my life was forever changed.”
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Senate passes revised 9/11 first responders health benefits bill

Senate passes revised 9/11 first responders health benefits bill
From Ted Barrett and Dana Bash, CNN
December 22, 2010 4:19 p.m. EST
STORY HIGHLIGHTS
NEW: Sen. Charles Schumer hails passage as a "great day" for America
The Senate passes the revised bill on a voice vote, sending it to the House
Sen. Tom Coburn: Compromise produced a better bill, totaling $4.2 billion over 10 years
The bill would provide free treatment for health issues from working at ground zero

Washington (CNN) -- The Senate on Wednesday passed a compromise version of a bill to provide free medical treatment and compensation to first responders of the September 11 terrorist attack.
The bill passed on a voice vote on what is expected to be the final day of the lame-duck session of Congress. It now goes to the House, which also is expected to approve it and send it to President Barack Obama to be signed into law.
Jubilant Democrats hailed the last-minute approval as a triumph for firefighters, police officers and other emergency personnel who put themselves in harm's way to help others in the 2001 terrorist attack.
New York Sen. Chuck Schumer, who acknowledged that approval of the bill was in doubt until a few hours before the vote, called it a "great day" for the nation an especially for first responders sickened by exposure to toxic pollution from the collapse of the World Trade Center towers because now they know their country will take care of them.
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Senate passes revised 9/11 first responders health benefits bill

Stand on higher ground about Ground Zero Mosque

Stand on higher ground about Ground Zero Mosque
by
Chaplain Kathie

The first thing to think about is the fact this is not a repeat of Saladin sending his men to take over Jerusalem, replacing the temple with a dome or is it about the Crusaders trying to stop him. This is not a holy war against Muslims. If you believe the "mosque" shouldn't be built at Ground Zero, then you don't know what this nation stands for any more than you know where Ground Zero is.

This "mosque" is not really a mosque they are planning to build. They are not taking over a sacred site but an old Burlington Coat factory building. It is supposed to be a cultural center, but even if it was a true mosque, that shouldn't matter either. At least not in this country.

If you value the Constitution, then you should not try to stop it or condemn it because if you do, then you better start to wonder about your own rights to worship as you see fit. If you value the troops, then you better start wondering what they are doing in Iraq and Afghanistan, because both missions have turned into protecting the people of both nations and trying to give them a better life. While they didn't start out that way, Saddam was captured and killed and then it became a mission of protecting the Iraqi people from sectarian violence. In Afghanistan, it became getting the Taliban out of power and setting up road map for the Afghans to have a better life. Our troops have shed their blood in both nations fighting side by side with Iraqis and Afghans but some here in this country are outraged over a Muslim cultural center blocks away from where the Twin Towers came down?

We found no problem paying and borrowing money for combat operations in both nations. We have thousands of wounded troops, thousands put into graves and countless thousands suffering from PTSD, more dying by their own hand because of combat and families destroyed. They have paid a tremendous price for the sake of these Muslims, yet talk show hosts fuel the fire of hatred, want to pick and choose whose religious freedom is worthy of being protected and what group can build where it wants.

If you value the troops and your own religious freedom then stop attacking both of them. Actually open your eyes and see clearly what this is all about. If our troops can die for their sake, why can't you show a little tolerance for them?

Iraq veteran found fabricating stories about Iraq and Ground Zero

Honored Iraq veteran from Verona is found fabricating stories
Saturday, July 31, 2010
Mark Mueller/The Star-Ledger


VERONA — On Memorial Day, as Americans honored the nation’s war dead, Angelo Otchy bowed his head to accept a medal from officials in Verona for his sacrifice and service.

The 35-year-old Army veteran told a reporter that day about his three tours of duty in Iraq. Voice dropping to a near-hush, he spoke, too, about the buried bomb that ripped through his Humvee, injuring him and claiming the lives of three friends, one of them a soldier from Paterson.

“I’m haunted by that day every day of my life,” Otchy told The Star-Ledger.

But Otchy wasn’t in that Humvee. He was at home in New Jersey when the soldiers died. And he didn’t serve three tours of duty in Iraq. He served half of one tour before he was sent back to the States for extended rest and relaxation.

A Star-Ledger examination of Otchy’s claims — including a review of Army records and interviews with military officials, members of his battalion and the blasted Humvee’s lone survivor — show the Verona man fabricated his story.

Otchy’s uncle, a retired Army colonel who now works as a surgeon in Fairfax, Va., alerted The Star-Ledger two weeks ago to the discrepancies in his nephew’s background. Daniel Otchy called his nephew a troubled man who has been in and out of the military all of his adult life and has a need to seek affirmation.

“I have always tried to support my nephew,” he said, “but what he’s done here is just not right.”

Doubt also has been cast on claims Otchy made Sept. 11, 2001, when he was interviewed by reporters near a triage station along the West Side Highway in Lower Manhattan.

Dressed in camouflage fatigues, he said he was a New Jersey Army National Guard soldier who had been conducting search-and-rescue operations atop the ruins of the collapsed Twin Towers.

“I must have come across body parts by the thousands,” Otchy said. His comments, captured by television cameras and picked up in an Associated Press report, were carried in newspapers around the world, translated into German, Japanese and Afrikaans.

A slightly longer account would later be published in the book “America’s Heroes,” about the response of rescue workers on 9/11.

Records show Otchy wasn’t in the National Guard in 2001. In addition, Otchy’s uncle said his nephew told him he didn’t work on the pile at Ground Zero.

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Iraq veteran from Verona is found fabricating stories

Study: 1 in 8 Ground Zero workers had post-traumatic stress

Study: 1 in 8 Ground Zero workers had post-traumatic stress
BY CARL MACGOWAN carl.macgowan@newsday.com
7:27 PM EDT, August 29, 2007

One in eight recovery and rescue workers who helped with the months-long cleanup at the World Trade Center showed signs of post-traumatic stress disorder three years after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, a study has found.Workers with little or no prior experience with disasters showed the highest frequency of PTSD, said the study, published Wednesday in the American Journal of Psychiatry. The data come from the World Trade Center Health Registry's survey of 28,000 workers in 2003 and 2004.The survey found that 12.4 percent of workers likely had PTSD, an anxiety disorder caused by traumatic events such as war, terrorism or assault. Nationally, about 4 percent of the population has PTSD, the report said.

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