Newsday

First, there is the unsettling view. The building stands at the very edge of the giant pit where the World Trade Center once stood, and where 343 firefighters died.

Then, there are the tourists. Thousands are drawn to the quarters of Engine 10 and Ladder 10, rebuilt after its near destruction on Sept. 11. Some touch the plaque bearing the names of the six men of the Ten House who perished that day. Others ask questions. It can all be taxing.

And yet, for some firefighters, those were minor troubles.

They worried more about the air they were breathing and the toxic skyscraper next door.

For years after the triumphant reopening of the Ten House in 2003, firefighters there voiced concerns about the potentially hazardous trade center ash that had blanketed the neighborhood and contaminated the Deutsche Bank office tower looming over their headquarters.

Their suspicions grew when a few of them began to suffer respiratory ailments.

Those worries, and the caution they inspired, now appear to have been a factor in the latest ground zero tragedy: a chaotic blaze that left the FDNY grieving two more dead.

On Aug. 18, the former Deutsche Bank building caught fire as it was being stripped of asbestos as part of its ongoing demolition. Scores of firefighters rushed inside, and into a death trap. The building's standpipe had been cut, leaving them with no reliable water supply. The floors were a maze of plastic and plywood hung to contain the asbestos.

Two firefighters, neither with the Ten House, got lost and died in the smoke.

Later, the city revealed that the FDNY had failed to follow regulations that normally require firefighters from the local engine company to familiarize themselves with the building and perform regular inspections during the demolition.

Fire Capt. Peter Bosco, who arrived at Engine 10 last winter, was relieved of his command pending the outcome of an investigation.

Fire officials at the time said they didn't know why the inspections weren't being done, but hinted that it may have had something to do with environmental concerns.

That suggestion now appears to have been an understatement.

In recent years, several firefighters stationed at the Ten House were forced to retire after developing respiratory problems _ guys like Terence Rivera, who took a lung full of dust on Sept. 11, but also newer firefighters like Bundy Chung, who didn't join the department until 2002.

Chung, a chiseled fitness buff who posed shirtless for the Fire Department's annual fundraising calendar in 2004, failed a lung capacity test less than a year later. He left the department in 2005 and sued the city the same year, saying he had been exposed to toxic dust.

"This guy wasn't even here on 9/11," said Peter D'Ancona, a former Ten House firefighter who recently retired after developing lung problems of his own. "Where were they getting sick from?"

It was hard, he said, not to suspect it had something to do with the tower.

The moldy, scaffolding-enshrouded skyscraper has been closely monitored for years for signs of toxic leakage. The city has insisted there is no danger, but many remain unconvinced.

A union delegate arranged for an environmental attorney take dust samples from inside the firehouse looking for toxins.

Joel Kupferman, of the New York Environmental Law and Justice Project, said some of the firefighters worried about whether toxins at the tower were escaping the protective seal.

"They felt that no one was out there taking care of them," Kupferman said. "It wasn't just that it was because their firehouse was next door. It was because they were the ones who would have to go into that building and get everyone out if there was a fire."

The building didn't help its reputation when it began dropping big pieces of debris disturbed by the demolition work, including glass that smashed on the street and a 15-foot pipe that plunged through the firehouse roof last May, injuring two people.

D'Ancona said he got the word that the building was off limits after having to respond to check out falling glass.

The firehouse, he said, wasn't equipped with hazardous materials suits. Firefighters wore their air tanks on the call, but afterward, he said, irritated commanders told the company to stay out of the building.

Chung tells a similar story.

"I remember being at a scaffolding fire, and after we put it out, were told that there were high levels of asbestos there. We had to fill out a form saying we had been exposed," he said. "After that, there were chiefs who told us never to go into that building."

The firehouse stopped doing regular inspections of the Deutsche Bank building in 2006.

Bosco, who took command of Engine 10 last winter, said that when he arrived he was also told that inspections had been suspended because of the contamination.

It is still not clear whether that policy was ever written down, but Bosco's brother, John, who is also his lawyer, said he assumed that it had "come from on high, up the chain of command."

"It made sense to protect the firefighters," he said.

That an element of the blame for the fire fatalities has fallen on one of the house's commanders has infuriated some of its former members.

"When they tell you, 'don't go in that building anymore,' its because they care," D'Ancona said. "Not because they're afraid or aren't doing their jobs."

This, after all, is the firehouse that defiantly decided after the Sept. 11 attacks not to abandon its decades-old logo: an image of an axe-wielding firefighter astride the twin towers, over the slogan, "First Due at the Big One."