That was at least the fourth time police officers in helicopters had broadcast warnings of ominous conditions at the top of the towers, yet another dire message carried solely on police channels. The rescue workers of New York City did not have a system for sharing that information: no common frequencies, no practice of working together at command posts, nothing they could count on beyond the serendipity of an encounter with someone carrying the right radio. Fred Ill, the captain of Ladder Company 2, who had radioed dispatchers early in the crisis to remind them about getting firefighters on
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