Sep 11 Eyewitness at Ground Zero Mosque Site

Marine veteran Peter Parente, above, was part of the crew that recovered what looks like one of the main landing gear from United Airlines Flight 175 from the then Burlington Coat Factory, now the proposed Ground Zero Mosque. The gear crashed through the roof down through a couple floors to be caught halfway through the third floor. Parente said it was "bone-chilling" to see that gear hanging there. The building had just been renovated and was full of inventory, which was substantially destroyed. The photo above shows him with the strut in a van carting it away to the FBI. You can listen to him describe that day in a radio interview here, (13:16).

The liberals claim that the location for the mosque is not ground zero. The mosque developer, Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf claims it is not hallowed ground because its neighborhood includes strip clubs and betting parlors.

Parente says, “That is 100% Ground Zero. It was Ground Zero that day and its still Ground Zero today. There was death in the air; I could smell it, I could taste it inside that building.”