Verizon Business Major Emergency Response Incident Team (MERIT)

Fact: Immediately after the Sept. 11th attacks the team worked for seven days straight in Lower Manhattan at the site formerly known as the World Trade Center (popularly referred to as Ground Zero).

The World Trade Center complex was a major telecommunications network source as well as containing several Manhattan-based Verizon offices. When the two 110 story towers were destroyed, the debris came crashing down and crushed the entire WTC complex and all of it's smaller buildings. The lose of the complex knocked out telecommunications (including phone service) to much of Lower Manhattan. It took a little more than a week before service was finally restored.