Prometheus 6

42 Feet of Pipe Is Said to Be Missing
By WILLIAM K. RASHBAUM and AL BAKER

The standpipe that failed to provide water during the fatal Deutsche Bank fire last month was not simply breached or cut — it was taken apart, and a full 42-foot stretch of it was removed from the building’s basement, several people with knowledge of the matter said.

Various reports in the days following the Aug. 18 blaze, which left two firefighters dead, had characterized the break in the pipe as a smaller section, one whose disappearance may not have been glaringly apparent to people working in the building.

But the people with knowledge of the matter said that indeed two consecutive 21-foot sections of the six-inch diameter cast-iron pipe, which ran horizontally across a section of the basement just beneath the ceiling, were cut or dismantled, leaving a large gap in full view of anyone in that part of the basement.

“If anyone had bothered to take a look, they would have known it was not in operable condition,” one of the people said.

The failure of the standpipe meant that firefighters lost crucial minutes in their effort to get water on the blaze, and officials are investigating whether the delay caused the deaths of the two firefighters, Joseph Graffagnino, 33, and Robert Beddia, 53.

The two 21-foot pipe sections, once joined with couplings and gaskets to each other and to the two sections at the ends of the missing portion, were apparently then removed from the building, the people said.

One of the people said that some portions of pipe were found in the basement, but it was unclear whether any of them were part of the two missing 21-foot sections.

Prosecutors from the office of the Manhattan district attorney, Robert M. Morgenthau, who are investigating the fire and the events that led up to it, are still unsure why the long section of pipe was removed and who removed it, according to one person with knowledge of that inquiry.