Dumpster Divers

A pair of dumpster divers who have managed to gain access to dumpsters behind the Port Authority offices where Ground Zero plans are overseen, have come across nearly 300 pounds worth of blueprints and documents that could prove to be quite useful to terrorists plotting an attack against the site.

A pair of self-described "salvage experts" said they have twice found massive piles of sensitive blueprints, schematics and e-mails detailing several of the buildings at the site, the temporary PATH train station, and a proposed PA Police headquarters in a trash bin behind 115 Broadway.

The building overlooks the trade center site, and is where the PA has rented out an entire floor for engineers who run the redevelopment.

The first of the pair's finds came about a year and a half ago, and the second on March 13.

The two men, who asked that they be identified only as Tony B. and Fox, said they didn't know what to do with the documents but feared they could get into the wrong hands, so they held onto them at their lower Manhattan warehouse.

"We knew what we had. I thought the information was important and potentially dangerous if it fell into the wrong hands, and we weren't going to let that happen," Fox said. "We were protecting the trade center. We were protecting the country."

When asked about the discarded documents, the PA did not explain how the detailed plans ended up in the trash intact.

"This is a $16 billion project that produces literally tons of building plans and documents that are not privileged and confidential," said PA spokesperson Candace McAdams.

"If our security professionals determine a document to be privileged and confidential, we have very strict protocols in place for discarding that document, including, sealing and shredding."

But the documents found by Tony B. and Fox and reviewed by The Post do in fact read, "SECURE DOCUMENT - CONFIDENTIAL FOR OFFICIAL USE ONLY," on every page.

Fox said when he and his partner read the story in Friday's Post about a homeless man finding detailed blueprints for the Freedom Tower in a city trash can, they immediately knew who to call.

It's yet another failure by the Port Authority to take all necessary and reasonable precautions to prevent confidential and sensitive materials from falling into the wrong hands.

While some of the documents relate to temporary structures built at Ground Zero such as the PATH access, others included detailed schematics for the Freedom Tower. Terrorism experts have long concluded that the Tower would likely be a target for terrorists, and indeed, terrorists have plotted to attack Ground Zero even before the towers are rebuilt - as witnessed by the Hudson tunnels plot.