The trade center fire suppression effort is a decidedly low-tech affair.

A variety of creative approaches have been considered, including drilling holes deep into the debris piles so that foam could be pumped directly onto the fire, or somehow injecting nitrogen into the piles to try to extinguish the fire by forcing out the oxygen.

But with the exception of a week in early October, when 3,000 gallons of a special chemical were added to the water being pumped onto the site, it has largely been just firefighters with hoses and city water.

Nearly 110 firefighters and rescue workers are at the scene at all times, but most of them act as spotters, watching as the demolition effort continues and trying to find human remains. The actual fire suppression team has 10 firefighters and officers on each 12-hour shift who are given two basic assignments: some work with hand lines; and others, like Mr. Maldonado, 35, are lifted in ladder trucks, and then use high pressure hoses to shoot the water down.

''It is tedious work, hour after hour operating a line,'' said Tom Ferreri, 32, a firefighter from Brooklyn who has worn his respirator so much that a scar has formed at the top of his nose. ''It is not like any other fire I have ever faced.''

But there is no lack of determination and few complaints from the firefighters, who consider it an honor to be at ground zero, laboring to put out a fire at a site where 343 firefighters and more than 2,500 others died.

''Unfortunately, we aren't here saving people or getting people out of a fire,'' Mr. Ferreri said. ''But we are here to get our brothers out, trying to bring closure for families.''

Each day's firefighting targets are largely dictated by how the demolition work is going. Dozens of giant backhoes, grapplers and other earth-moving equipment move constantly across the site, resembling a pack of dinosaurs voraciously feeding in some primordial swamp. As they grab at the debris, they open up air vents that feed the underground fire.