[1] The Department of Health and Human Services maintains three Disaster Portable Morgue Units (DPMU) which are staged at HHS Logistics Centers.
[2] The National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) was assigned the role of managing the federal response to aviation disaster victims and their families.
[3] Following the creation of the Department of Homeland Security in 2002, the DMORTs were moved into the Emergency Preparedness and Response directorate as part of the National Disaster Medical System.
[4] In 2007, the National Disaster Medical System was removed from DHS and returned to the Department of Health and Human Services under the control of the Assistant Secretary for Preparedness and Response.
As forensic scientists (pathologists, anthropologists, odontologists) examine the recovered remains, they enter their findings—called postmortem data—into VIP (Victim Identification Profile).
For the World Trade Center attack, Secretary of Health and Human Services Tommy G. Thompson activated the National Disaster Medical System.