Three N.Y Fire Officials Demoted

Three senior fire officials responsible for inspecting a condemned skyscraper where two firefighters died were stripped of their commands and reassigned Monday. Mayor Michael Bloomberg said that a preliminary investigation indicated that careless smoking by construction workers had started the Aug. 18 fire at the former Deutsche Bank building, which was being dismantled. Two firefighters, Robert Beddia, 53, and Joseph Graffagnino, 33, died of cardiac arrest while trying to battle that blaze. After the fire, the department acknowledged that it did not have a plan in place to fight fire at the tower and that it had not inspected the building's standpipe system in more than a year, even though it should have done so every 15 days. Inspectors found pieces of the standpipe disconnected in the tower's basement. Commissioner Nicholas Scoppetta on Monday ordered deputy chiefs to inspect all buildings in their divisions that are under construction or demolition and to review plans to fight fires at every building.