THE collapse of the World Trade Center towers in 2001 produced vast plumes of dust contaminated with toxic chemicals from building materials.
It was thought that the dust, which settled over much of lower Manhattan, would pose a health risk to anyone inhaling it. But tests by Paul Lioy of the Environmental and Occupational Health Sciences Institute in Piscataway, New Jersey, and colleagues at nearby New York University and Rutgers University show survivors are not at significant risk. Although between 100 and 1000 tonnes of toxic 鈥減olycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons鈥� were bound to the dust, the particles were mostly too large to be inhaled deep into the lungs, where they could lodge and cause damage, the team will report in a future issue of Environmental Science and Technology.