The next day, a portion of the landing gear of an airplane struck and damaged the roof of the St. Peter's Church building during the September 11 attacks. When debris from the towers killed Fr. Mychal (the first publicly identified casualty of the attacks), surviving firemen brought him from the towers site to St. Peter's and laid his body before the altar. The parish also served as a staging ground for rescue and recovery operations. "We were the first place they were bringing all the emergency equipment. Everything was in disarray," pastor Father Kevin Madigan stated. "Stuff was piled six feet high all over the pews—-bandages, gas masks, boots, hoses and cans of food for the workers and the volunteers, many of whom were sleeping in the church on bedrolls." The same also occurred in the downstairs church.