From disaster to present day: the resiliency of masonry following September 11, 2001

Terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001 in both New York City and Washington D.C. in the United States destroyed two 110-story office towers and a third 47-story office building at the World Trade Center (WTC) in New York and portions of the Pentagon in Washington D.C. All WTC buildings in the plaza area (Fig. 1, blue area) were destroyed that day as well.
The towers essentially had no masonry components. However, many of the surrounding buildings were impacted by the collapses but survived in some part, due to the masonry used in their construction. In Washington, the area of the masonry clad-Pentagon damaged on September 11 had been partially strengthened prior to the attack and was subsequently rebuilt.
Over the past decade, New York has worked to rebuild the World Trade Center area. This paper provides an update and acknowledges the resiliency of the masonry buildings in the aftermath of a major disaster. Some of the 2013 photographs are taken from a different vantage point from the 2001 photographs due to the construction that has taken place.