Ground Zero Recovery Worker Suffers From Illness Due to Work Conditions

JON SFERAZO, President, Unsung Heroes Helping Heroes:

My name is Jon Sferazo. I'm 51 years old. I'm a disabled union structural ironworker.

I spent 29 to 32 days at the World Trade Center site. I have been afflicted with reactive airway disease. I had scarring in my voice box. And that, combined with my breathing loss problem, is what you are hearing today.

I worked construction for 27, 28 years. I was a character. I had a good personality. I liked to joke with the guys. You did that to help the day go by. When you're the kind of person that runs into a tragedy, instead of away from it, things occur in your life that create a new person.

I was an ironworker, and we knew what demolition was. We knew what we heard. We were given access to come into the World Trade Center site the following morning. We were the first vehicle to come out. And I remember coming to some kind of realization. All right, you just got to get out there and you got to get this done. Let's get out there. Let's look for people.

We couldn't possibly visualize the devastation that was unfolding in front of us, as we were getting involved with the work we were doing. There was smoke everywhere. You know, it was like the smell of death. And I was sucking in so much of it. It was very difficult to breathe.

Anything you put over your face restricted volume of some kind going into your lungs. But only paper masks were available in the beginning. And it wasn't until, God, almost a week later, they were issuing respirators for us.

I remember, the first four days were a nightmare. And I suffered for years afterwards with nightmares. I saw them pull a section of stairway, one big shot. And when we picked it up, there was a fireman. There was a fireman underneath, intact — the only thing I ever saw intact while I was down there, long dead, but he was intact. And it renewed your feelings that there could still be survivors there.