Miracle Workers

Network Node

In the days following the disaster, Verizon scored some major miracles. It replaced or moved the equivalent of 20 million T-1 circuits downtown. It replaced 7 of 10 damaged cell sites. It reconnected lines to dozens of major banks and brokerages that had moved operations to midtown Manhattan and New Jersey. Not incidentally, it momentarily abandoned its legacy of horrendous customer service.

And then, there was 140 West Street.

One of five switching centers in lower Manhattan, the 75-year-old building at 140 West serves some 200,000 business and residential phone customers. It handles 20% of the phone and data traffic from the stock exchange. And it stands next to what was once 7 World Trade Center.

As of last weekend, some five tons of steel beams from the fallen towers piled up against the back of the building, blocking access to manholes and major cables. Power was gone. Most of the five subbasements were flooded with up to two feet of water, most of it from fire hoses; firefighters actually were battling nearby flames, still blazing, from a seventh-story window of the building.

By Friday, 100 workers had cleaned most of the water, mud, and dust off the 10 floors of equipment. Then as many as 300 more workers moved in for fine cleaning. Every wire and connection had to be vacuumed before the system was switched back on. At least three times through the weekend, teams were evacuated as rescue workers warned of more building collapses nearby.

On Friday, Verizon had hoped to have 140 West mostly operational by the end of the weekend. Come Sunday, in part because of the evacuations, it was clear that goal couldn't be met. Inside the building, just 50% of the circuits had been restored. Outside, there was still no power. Crews had been forced to reroute 1.4 million of the building's 3.5 million circuits.

The sad reality was that not all of those circuits were needed. Many people who used to make calls through 140 West, "simply won't be there anymore," said Verizon vice chairman Larry Babbio, who headed the recovery effort.

Space Available

Service providers such as Verizon tended to take care of their biggest customers first. In fact, the big banks and brokerages appeared, on the whole, remarkably quick to regroup. In part, this was because they had dedicated resources to remarkable contingency planning. In April, Merrill Lynch ran a disaster simulation -- assuming a massive hurricane -- involving every business unit across the firm. When real disaster struck, it managed to relocate 90% of its lower Manhattan employees by week's end. Another big bank, forced to abandon its offices, sent thousands of workers to offices in New Jersey -- leased and kept empty for just such an occasion.

Then there were the little guys. Lacking clout and capital and global contingency planning, hundreds of small firms scrambled for office space, phone lines, and computers. The stock exchange, ultimately, is a visual metaphor; most financial markets depend on a vast network of far-flung data connections -- much of which had to be restored.

Garban Intercapital, a little-known but crucial broker in fixed-income, derivatives, and other wholesale financial markets, fled from the 84th floor of the south tower -- miraculously, with no casualties. On Wednesday, a task force began networking with banks, brokers, and other contacts. And by Friday, the company had found temporary space for most of its employees in midtown and in Jersey City, New Jersey.

At first, brokers could work only by phone -- which was suitable for certain relatively illiquid markets that operate on that basis anyway. Slowly, though, the data connections came back -- first to the Government Securities Clearing Corp. and the Depository Trust Bank and then to Garban's clearing bank. The firm hoped to restore some brokerage services to its customers by week's end. "You make some big strides and then some small ones," said Mike Sheard at Garban's parent company, IPAC, in London. "All I can say at the moment is, work in progress."

Some refugee companies would take anything with walls and a roof. On Thursday morning, September 13, online retailer Bluefly announced that it could provide 9,000 square feet of temporary space at its midtown offices. Bluefly's employees had witnessed the disaster from a bus as they traveled to New Jersey for a company outing. "We felt sadness and then deep fear," says Bluefly CEO Ken Seiff. "And we realized right away that there were little things we could do" -- like organizing drives for blood and clothing. And giving up the unused floor it had been saving for future expansion.

"It's relatively raw," said Seiff. "There's electricity but not much else." Still, by Thursday afternoon, Seiff had collected 20 serious inquiries. Another 80 companies called, offering the new tenants furniture, tech support, and even pizza -- some of it free, some not.

Likewise, by Thursday afternoon, brokerage First Albany Cos. Inc. had six tenants for the space near Pennsylvania Station that it had offered the day before for free. By Friday, 70 workers had already moved in. The stock exchange waived, in this case, a rule that normally bars employees from competing firms from sharing offices.

How long will the itinerant employees stay? Steve Wink, First Albany's general counsel, had no idea. "Nobody's thought that far down the road yet."

Keith H. Hammonds (khammonds@fastcompany.com) is a Fast Company senior editor.