A state judge has ordered the transcripts of calls made on the morning of September 11, 2001 by more than 30 of the victims to be released by the close of business on Thursday.

The Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, which owned the Trade Center, had attempted to block the transcripts' publication, but its request was turned down by the court.

The authority has decided not to appeal against the decision, but has urged the media to "refrain from publishing gruesome, gratuitous or personal details."

The court ruling comes less than three weeks before the second anniversary of the attacks - when members of al-Qaeda hijacked four airliners and flew two of them into the twin towers, killing at least 2,792 people.

One of the other planes hit the Pentagon, while the fourth crashed before reaching its target.

For many relatives of those who died, the release of the transcripts is hard to accept.

"For me and my children, it's like being slapped in the face with it happening again," said Leila Negron, 36, whose husband, Peter, worked at the Trade Center as an environmental specialist.

After reading excerpts from the transcripts, Laurie Tietjen, who lost her brother in the attacks, said she was concerned the media would reproduce excerpts insensitively.

"People are looking for the horror stories, not the good things," she said.

"A lot of the information there is pretty personal. It doesn't help to have it out there in the public. It's just extremely hurtful to the families."

But not all relatives see the publication as a bad thing.

Monica Gabrielle of West Haven, Connecticut, lost her husband, Richard, in the attack.

"There's not much that's private about this," she said.

"Hopefully, there's a whole host of information there that can contribute some information as to what went wrong, what could be done better, what went right."

Dorothy McLaughlin, whose 36-year-old son George died in the attack, said that, although the information could be shocking, "I know that a lot of families would like to hear [the recordings]."

She said she was not sure whether she wanted to hear her own son's last calls, and couldn't be sure he had time to make any.

The New York Times has been negotiating with the Port Authority since March 2002 to gain access to the tapes and other records collected from the day of the attacks.

The Port Authority released a 73-minute recording of firefighters' radio communications last year after the New York Times took it to court.