The last steel beam left standing at the World Trade Centre site has been cut down in the first of a series of ceremonies marking the end of the eight-and-a-half-month clean-up.
The 30-foot girder survived when the twin towers collapsed into a mountain of 1.8 million tons of rubble on September 11th.
For months it was covered by debris, but as the pile shrank the column was revealed, still standing where it was erected when the south tower was built three decades ago.
During the past few months, workers topped it with a flag and covered the sides with spray-painted messages and photographs of victims.
Hundreds of construction workers who have laboured at the site watched as the column was severed with a torch, draped with a flag and a wreath and placed on to a flatbed truck. Some workers wrote messages on the girder, while others touched it as if it were a coffin.
"The construction workers who have dedicated themselves to this effort are on the verge of completing an enormous job, and in many ways this is their night to reflect and remember," Mayor Michael Bloomberg said.
The ceremony was the first of three planned for construction workers, rescue workers and families in a gradual farewell to the round-the-clock recovery operation.
Tomorrow, the beam will be removed from the site in a procession past an honour guard of police officers and firefighters. It will be put into storage and might be used one day in a memorial.
AP