CIBC and Royal Bank have issued statements clarifying their view of their employees’ safety.

CIBC says that currently, almost 90% of CIBC World Markets’ 2,000 employees located in CIBC’s One World Financial Centre premises have been accounted for and are safe. “CIBC is endeavouring to contact remaining employees and we expect to complete that process in the next few days.”

Earlier, CIBC’s David Kassie issued a statement noting that some employees are unaccounted for. “However, at this stage, we are not aware of any loss of life or serious injury among our employees,” CIBC says, noting, “mechanisms for reaching people in New York in the current environment are imperfect.”

Over at Royal Bank, there is just one employee unaccounted for, and no known injuries. “We evacuated 460 people from One Liberty Plaza which faces the World Trade Centre Complex,” said Paul Wilson, media relations with RBC.

The building housed employees of RBC Dominion Securities and RBC Dain Rauscher Wessels. “All were evacuated successfully prior to the collapse of the two main towers at the WTC site on Tuesday morning. We initiated a business resumption plan on Tuesday which has enabled us to continue running our businesses from several predesignated sites in Manhattan and elsewhere in the region. While it is not exactly business as usual, all businesses are functioning well.”

As for the missing employee, Wilson says, “The employee may well have been located by tomorrow. We haven’t had any missing person queries.”