By Vera Chinese and Corky Siemaszko New York Daily News
And NYPD also solves mystery of rope around the wing segment
The discovery of plane wreckage near the “Ground Zero Mosque” a dozen years after 9/11 was like a slap in the face to the grieving families Monday who never got a body to bury.
Sally Regenhard, whose firefighter son, Christian, is among the more than 1,100 victims whose remains were never found, said it’s proof the city gave up the search too soon.
“If the City of New York could overlook a large piece of debris like this, then how many human remains have been overlooked?” Regenhard said Monday. “I’m disgusted.”
Regenhard, who heads “9/11 Parents and Families of Firefighters and World Trade Center Victims,” said hundreds of body parts have been discovered since the official search for remains was suspended in 2005.
“They were more interested in building and business and not inconveniencing anyone,” Regenhard said. “I’m sure we’ll be finding human remains in the future.”
The still-grieving mom spoke out after Boeing confirmed the five-foot piece was from one of the airliners that brought down the Twin Towers.
NYPD spokesman Paul Browne said they don’t know which of the hijacked planes it was from.
But Regenhard said their experts suspect most of the body parts found near 43 to 51 Park Pl., which happens to be the site of the controversial proposed mosque, were from the South Tower.
That building was hit by United Airlines Flight 175.
Initially, police believed the rusty piece of metal was part of the landing gear. It’s actually a trailing edge flap actuation support structure from a Boeing 767, which is part of the underside of the wing and helps regulate plane speed.
The garbage-strewn spot where it was discovered Friday continued to be treated like a crime scene, roped off with yellow tape to keep away the curious.
“The NYPD continues to work with the office of the chief medical examiner as it prepares to sift soil at the location for human remains,” Browne said in a statement.
Also, Browne explained the mysterious rope that was looped around the metal — and fueled some conspiracy theories that the plane part had been lowered into place.
On Monday, Browne said the wing part had actually been lassoed by an officer “in order to move it in such a way as to look for its serial number or other identifiers.”
Investigators expect to be done by Wednesday, and then the plane debris will be placed in the custody of the NYPD’s Property Clerk, Browne said.
“They should put it in a museum,” said Peter Wright, a 24-year-old financial analyst on his way to his Wall Street job.
Mark Kerr, 52, a Verizon worker from Jamaica, Queens, who was working in Lower Manhattan on the day of the attack, said he wasn’t surprised by the discovery of the wreckage.
“We got a lot of nooks and crannies,” he said.
An 84-year-old woman who gave her name as Lorraine said she has walked past this spot countless times.
“I thought it was bizarre that they would find that so many years later,” she said. “Every day I walked past this, it brings back the memory. Every day I see the bodies falling.”
More than 2,700 people were killed in New York after Osama Bin Laden’s fanatical followers slammed a pair of hijacked planes into the towers on September 11, 2001.
American Airlines Flight 11 hit the north tower. Both flights originated in Boston and were bound for Los Angeles.
Meanwhile, foul weather forced workers at One World Trade Center to put off installing the last pieces of a spire that will make the 104-foot skyscraper the tallest building in the Western Hemisphere.
The Port Authority of New York and New Jersey says the spire pieces and a steel beacon will be lifted at a later date.
Workers began installing the 800-ton, 408-foot spire in December and when completed the building will be a stunning — and patriotic — 1,776 feet from top to bottom.
