This week the National Institute of Standards and Technology released its long awaited report on the collapse of WTC7, the smaller third building destroyed as a result of the attack on the World Trade Center on 9/11. The examination of the evidence is exhaustive and disproves every one of the bizarre conspiracy theories which have been circulated about the collapse of this building, which was not actually hit by the two jetliners used in the attack. At the heart of the report is the conclusion that after debris from the two larger buildings started fires on multiple floors of the WTC7, it was the failure of the building's sprinkler systems which allowed fires to run unchecked and led to the collapse.
The collapse of the two main WTC towers played two roles in the destruction of WTC7. First, flaming debris started fires on floors 7, 8, 9, 11, 12 and 13, which spread rapidly, feeding on office furniture, rugs and paneling. Second, the collapse of the main towers damaged both the primary and secondary connections to the city water supply so that the sprinkler system, which should have suppressed the fires, was no use at all. The fires then burned out of control for 7 hours, ultimately resulting in enough structural damage for the floors to start a pancake-style collapse, beginning with the 13th floor (there's some fuel for triskaidekaphobes).
The report is based on an exhaustive three year study which includes debris analysis, experiments with materials, actual fire testing and computer modeling. It goes over evidence which disproves all of the major alternative theories favored by conspiracy theorists, finding no support for claims that there was any kind of explosion or controlled demolition, and ultimately concluding that although collapses of buildings of this size have not happened before, what happened with WTC7 suggests that fire should be taken more seriously as a structural threat to larger buildings in the future, and includes recommendations for changes in building codes to prevent similar fires. Of course, very few fires combine multiple points of origin with massive damage to the infrastructure supporting the fire control sprinklers, a situation unique to the World Trade Center attack. Had the sprinklers operated properly, the fire would have done no more damage than is typical in other large building fires and the building would not have collapsed.
Article comments
— go to most recent comments1 - Dan Miller
Dave,
the new NIST report ought to lay them to rest once and for all. Probably ought to, but as your article clearly suggests,
probablysurely won't. Those things are immortal, and can't be killed off by facts, logic or anything else.I think the chemtrails are to blame. There were lots of those around on September 11th. They were clearly visible on the local broadcast of CNN WTC coverage on Venezuelan television that day. Of course, they have all been erased from the video tapes by now.
Either that, or the conspiracy theories are themselves a conspiracy to divert our attention from other worrisome things. Perhaps Russia is behind all of them, in an anticipatory strike to divert us from its efforts to retake Georgia.
Dan
2 - Erik Larson
"The report is based on an exhaustive three year study which includes debris analysis, experiments with materials, actual fire testing and computer modeling."
That means it's true?
Watch video of the collapse, listen the reports of eyewitnesses.
3 - Matthew T. Sussman
One thing I think we can all agree on: The World Trade Center Building 7 did, in fact, collapse, and not stay un-collapsed unlike previous published reports led you to believe.
4 - Lumpy
Ok erik. I watched the video and read eyewitness reports. They all show a burning building with heavy structural damage from debris being evacuated and then collapsing. None of them provided any motive, oppprtunity or ecidence of a conspiracy. Did I miss some magic pixies or gremlin activity? Was it undermined bybthe gnomes of zurich?
5 - sdk
The NIST report relied on computer models, not real tests on materials. At the very least, the computer model should be examined before we are really convinced.
Likely, such tests would not have achieved any result close to the unique event NIST tries to describe.
The DoD does not use only computer models to test their weapons systems, nor does NASA to develop space systems. There are a large network of test ranges and facilities to test systems.
Entire "towns" have been built and blown-up for the sake of weapons testing. However, what model has been constructed to try and explain the 3 unique events that all happened on the same day, in the same vicinity? There are high speed test tracks that are used for collision testing aircraft and missile systems. There are chemical and metallurgical tests that are routinely conducted at missile impact sites. None of these resources were used to try and answer the questions about the 9/11 events.
Why?
NIST has not really explained anything scientific unless they release the code in their model.
6 - Dave Nalle
The NIST report relied on computer models, not real tests on materials. At the very least, the computer model should be examined before we are really convinced.
This is untrue. Not only did NIST do materials testing, they made full size reconstructions with the same materials and ran large scale tests. Video of these tests is available on their site and results are included in the report. Their computer modeling was to some extent based on these physical tests.
dave
7 - sdk
The material tests and models failed to demonstrate their "unique" event. The computer models need to be scrutinized as well. Anyone who plays computer games knows what is visually possible.
8 - Cindy D
The responses to this article are lacking something.
Send in the clowns...there ought to be clowns...
9 - Arthur Scheuerman
Conspiracy Theories
Reports of Controlled Demolition, Molten Steel, Thermite, etc.
Richard Gages' pseudoscientific deluge of misinformation is typical of the absurd ideas put forward by the 9/11 'truth' movement. Real scientists rarely speak of the truth until they have spent enough time and experimental effort examining the evidence. Its amazing to me how the 'controlled demolition' people most of whom have little or no knowledge or experience or expertise in the building collapse or fire protection area, just dismiss the reports of the top Fire Protection engineering experts in their fields and take some theological professor's absurd babble as gospel. The vaguest possibility is immediately touted as the truth and repeatedly echoed on the internet without any research or fact checking.
The recent BBC video utilized the top experts in the field. Shyam Sunder the NIST lead investigator, Gene Corley the American Society of Civil Engineers lead investigator both of whom have years and years if engineering experience. Gene Corley who was also the lead investigator in the Oklahoma City disaster, - which was destroyed by explosives, - said there was "no evidence of explosives" at the WTC site. He and Johanthan Barnett another experienced Fire Protection Engineer were on the scene immediately and examining the steel. Dr. Barnett described the devastation caused by the interior collapse of Building 5 from fire. These are all top experts in their fields and have to get things right in order to maintain their positions. I doubt a person inexperienced in the fire protection field could prove them wrong on anything related to the towers collapse without years of study, but they keep trying. The BBC put on the top building demolition expert Mark Loizeaux who explains how the towers collapse could not have been a controlled demolition and all he gets is blasted for being 'in-on' the conspiracy.
Four years after the 9/11 attack and without inspecting any of the steel the Architect Richard Gage was listening to some equally uninformed Philosophy Professor David Ray Griffin and has an epiphany and from then on he 'knew' that the buildings "had to be brought down by explosives". "That's the only way that you could have all the exterior columns in Building 7 fail within a fraction of a second." How does he know all the columns failed at the same moment?
These lower columns were out of sight of the cameras. The first thing to fail was the east side interior columns as evidenced by the east penthouse on the roof caving in. Five seconds later the west penthouse caved in indicating core column failure and than the exterior frame started to descend, but there were large belt trusses around the entire building between the 22nd to 24th floors. There could have been columns failing at different times below these belt trusses but these trusses held the upper building steady until a large number of lower columns had failed. Building 7 took over 13 seconds to collapse not 6.
Kevin Ryan knew nothing about how floor assemblies are tested by his own company Underwriters Laboratory. He reported that they tested the steel and it withstood 2000 deg for 3 and 4 hours. The UL tests floor and wall assemblies not the steel per se. The problem is that the long span floors used in the towers were never tested in their long span configuration of 60 feet. Building 7 also used long span steel "I" beams. As any architect knows the longer span floors require either massive joists or beams uneconomical for high rise buildings or specially designed construction such as steel trusses. What most architects apparently don't know is that lightweight, long span steel trusses and "I" beams can fail at fire temperatures not yet compensated for in the codes. The standard furnace test can only handle 17 foot lengths of flooring. The furnace standards were set in the 30s 40s and 50s when about 15 feet was the standard span used in high rises built for the more conservative codes used. These older buildings used shorter spans, more robust columns and beams, stronger connections and better fireproofing then now. If a floor failed the pull-in (catenary) forces created by the short spans were easily handled by the strength of the rest of the structure. For this reason the codes allowed floors to have a shorter (3 hour) rating than the columns and girders (4 hours). The 17 foot furnace test, currently still used, is meaningless for the longer spans. The main problem in the WTC flooring was due to the differential elongation (expansion) of the steel parts of the trusses. NIST's studies found that the different expansion rates immediately deformed the steel parts, buckled the top chords and struts and disconnected the composite bond between the concrete slab and the joists. Greater thermal expansion of the bottom chords releases the tension and allows the cool top chord to sag until it acts as a cable in suspension creating pull-in forces on the columns. Contraction of sagging, long span steel flooring during the cool down faze after fire die down puts heavy pull-in loads on the connections. It is thought that Building 7 collapsed from expansion and contraction in the beams disconnecting enough of them to affect column stability. The whole interior and core failed before the perimeter wall which came down as a unit at 40% less than free fall speed.
Many people interpreted the loud sounds and debris being projected out sideways during the Tower collapses as an indication that explosives were used to demolish the buildings. Most of these 'explosive' sounds, heard during the collapses were heard after the collapses began. In order for an explosion to cause a collapse it would have to occur before the collapse. Some 'thunder' sounds were heard before the columns buckled and these were probably from floors collapsing.
The undamaged exterior walls can be seen bending and buckling inward in the videos of both Towers long before any sounds or ground vibrations occurred. In Tower 2, the exterior columns in the east wall were photographed bowing inward up to 10 inches, 18 minutes after the plane's impact. That's 38 minutes before the global collapse began. To be technical, you could say that Tower 2's collapse began slowly, with possibly some noise or impact sounds from falling floors, about 38 minutes earlier than the official collapse time. The explosive sounds and expanding dust clouds occurred just after the east wall buckled inward and started the collapse, and not before the buckling, as would have had to have happened with controlled demolition.
When the undamaged south wall of Tower 1 was photographed it was bowing inward up to 55 inches on floors 95 to 101, about six minutes before these columns were seen buckling inward. This bowing was witnessed and video taped by the Police Aviation Unit. In the North Tower "thunder" sounds were heard when some floors apparently collapsed on the south side 12 to 14 seconds before the top of the building was seen to tilt southward and begin falling as a unit starting the global collapse. Since each section of floor on the long-span side weighed about 500 tons, I would explore these 'explosive' sounds in Tower 1 as evidence of a floor or floors detaching and impacting the floors below on the south side which most probably accelerated south wall failure. I believe practically all the supposed 'explosive' sounds can be explained by the impacts made by the collapsing buildings after the columns were pulled in and buckled by the bowing and sagging floors and when the floors themselves began impacting the floors below. The boom, boom, boom, boom, boom repetitive 'explosive' sounds reported by firefighters running as Tower 2 was coming down were most likely caused by the sequential collision of impacting floors after the top of the building began falling. The great quantity of air on each floor being compressed in a fraction of a second by great weight and momentum would propel air, smoke, and any concrete dust and debris outward from the building at great velocity by the bellows effect of the floors coming together so quickly.
Initial Collapse Cause
Much has been made of the fact that NIST only analyzed the events up to the point where the Towers were poised to collapse before runaway collapse began and failed to pursue the remaining collapse. This was largely because after collapse began the chaotic impacts of the floors, walls and columns colliding could not possibly be analyzed accurately with even the strongest computers. As it was, it was a severe strain on computer capabilities to analyze the mechanism of collapse up to the point of runaway disintegration. By dint of super computers running for extended periods of time NIST did examine the complete collapse sequence of building 7.
It is clear from the computer studies that the heat from the fires caused differential expansion of the steel parts in the long span, floor trusses in the towers with the resulting thermal bowing in some floors directly exerting pull-in forces on the exterior columns or this thermal bowing could have detached a floor which would have impacted the floor below destroying composite action by separating the concrete slab from the trusses and inducing strong tensile (suspension) forces in the double weighted floor. In other floors thermal expansion of the floor against the columns compressed the trusses which along with shear forces within the trusses that buckled the diagonal struts collapsing the trusses which went into suspension (catenary action) and this also helped pull-in and eventually buckle the exterior column walls. Differential thermal expansion of the concrete and steel has also been shown by NIST to disconnect the knuckles (knuckles are the steel tops of the bent over bars in the trusses which are imbedded in the concrete slab) from the concrete slab causing loss of composite behavior in the floors.
All these adverse floor truss effects were caused by steel expansion which begins immediately as the steel is heated. Bowing and buckling can happen at low temperatures (300 C to 500 C) even before the steel would have weakened excessively from higher temperatures. Thermal contraction caused by cooling of sagging trusses or 'I' beams after the fire 'burns out' or dies down can cause strong pull-in forces on the exterior columns and core columns due to the contraction of the steel trusses or 'I' beams.
In order for a column to support the loads it has to be plumb and in line with the columns above and below. The fact is, columns have to be axially (in line and centered) aligned to support the weight of the building above. If they get out of alignment by 10 to 20 degrees they buckle and can no longer support the weight. The buildings collapsed because the floors first caved in from restrained thermal expansion and from thermal bowing or delamination of the slab and bar joists affecting floor truss stability. The sagging, 60 foot long, floor trusses gradually pulled in the 59 columns in one exterior wall in each tower and these column walls eventually buckled removing support on one entire side. In Building 7 floor failures exposed a critical column to loss of lateral restraint over many floors causing the column to buckle and remove support for many floors above and starting the complete collapse of the building.
In the Towers once the exterior columns buckling spread, along an entire wall removing support on one face, the buckling spread around the towers exterior and into the core and the towers began to tilt. With all the columns buckled the leaning top sections of the tower began to fall straight down. Although the North tower antenna appeared from some northern angles to have began falling straight down it actually tilted to the south because the south wall buckled first and the cantilevered top building section pulled the core along with the entire top over to the south. This is especially telling since with all the damage from the plane impact on the north side, the tower should have leaned over to the north. The South Towers' top tilted to the east because its east wall buckled first. Once the tower's tops began tilting all the columns across the buildings would eventually be out of alignment enough to have easily buckled.
Once the core columns got out of plumb, there would have been little resistance to their buckling at the weak splices. After the upper part of the buildings began descending, with the incredible weight of the top of the buildings' gaining momentum, like a heavy wedge or sledge all it had to do was break the welded, and single bolt connections holding the floors to the columns. This is coupled with the fact that the falling top section's momentum increases as the square of the number of floors impacted as the floors were detached and added to the weight of the descending top. There would have been little resistance to slow the top section's increasing mass of impacted floors acceleration to the ground. Because this acceleration due to gravity increased the speed and momentum of the collapsing floors and building top, the impacts were increasingly violent as shown on the seismic graphs; increasing in amplitude until maximum when the mass of accumulated floors hit bedrock seven stories into the cellar.
There have been some engineering analyses about the impacting floors slowing down the collapse so that the time to collapse should have been much longer than 'free fall' times of an object dropped from the towers tops. Once the buildings started to tip over from loss of column support on one side, the tremendous excess eccentric weight began buckling all the columns across the building. Once the tilted building's tops began descending the columns hit the floors or the lower columns at eccentric angles which easily detached the floors and buckled the columns. In order for the lower building section to offer any meaningful resistance to the falling building top, the columns would have had to hit each other exactly in line and plumb and this was impossible with the top of the building leaning causing eccentric angles of impact.
Once the top building section began tilting the columns on the side that originally buckled did not line up at all. These columns would have been hitting the floors and would have easily detached or buckled them. After the east wall buckled in Tower 2, the adjacent perimeter wall columns buckled from overloads and the columns on the opposite west side of the building, which were still attached and acted as a hinge would still be bearing on each other but at an eccentric angle which means they also would have also eventually buckled as the top tilted. These columns along with some of the core columns as they buckled are probably what kicked the bottom of the top building section to the west as reported by NIST. Because of the weight of the accumulating collapsing floors, there was a release of incredible potential energy changing to kinetic energy and building momentum as the accumulating chaotic mass of debris accelerated into the cellars.
Since the Tower's outer wall columns, especially in Tower 1, pealed out like a banana after the building top began to impact the floors, these wall columns may have been able to break the connections to the floors ahead of the floors being impacted? In other words, with the weight of the wall columns pealing outward from the vertical along with the added horizontal forces of impacting floors projecting debris outwards onto these columns, these columns, while leaning out, might have been able to break the wall-to-floor connections ahead of the level of impacting floors? If this is possible than I believe that the connection failures could have traveled down the sides of the buildings at a speed faster than free fall times. This might explain the rapidity of the collapses especially in Tower 1. The wall-to-floor connection failures could have traveled down the building sides faster than 'free fall' times and in effect started the floors falling before they were impacted by the accumulating mass of impacted floors above.
The heavy exterior wall columns in the 1500 foot high buildings while pealing off could project the column sections outwards a great distance. This distance (300 to 400 feet) was proposed as only being made possible by explosive forces. I disagree. If a wall is strong enough and doesn't break up as it falls outward it can fall out flat to a distance equal to its height. The Tower walls, however, did break at the weak splices as they fell. The fact that the exterior wall columns can be seen in the videos and pictures falling outward and downward and reaching the ground before the tower finished collapsing proves that the tower did not collapse faster than free fall times. These outer wall sections were falling at free fall speed and apparently were the first to hit the ground.
The compression of the 12 foot chunk of air on each floor down to a fraction of an inch in a fraction of a second as the floors came together would propel the air smoke and dust outward from the building at great velocity. The lightweight aluminum cladding as it broke free from the buckling columns also would have been propelled outward a great distance by this expanding cloud of air and dust. This air compression would account for huge dust clouds and pieces of aluminum seen projected outwards from the upper sections of the collapsing buildings. The light reflected off the aluminum pieces at the north wall of Tower 2 would be interpreted as flashes from explosive 'squibs'. The flashes below the buckling east wall may have been from the aluminum cladding breaking free from the lower columns as they expanded after being unloaded of axial compressive weight by the buckling of the wall above and their expansion breaking the connections to the cladding. Also explosives leave characteristic tears and fractures in steel and especially in aluminum, and such indications were not found anywhere in the debris pile. The compression of air in the elevator and air-conditioning shafts by the collapsing upper building section and floors, would project air, smoke, and dust down these shafts and out any path of least resistance or any of the HVAC air intake or discharge openings on the lower mechanical equipment floors in the exterior walls. This accounts for the plumes of smoke seen projecting outwards sideways from the buildings well below the collapsing floors. There were quite extensive Heating, Ventilating, and Air Conditioning (HVAC) shafts built into the building. These vertical shafts are connected to air conditioning exhaust and intake ducts open to the exterior on the mechanical floors.
Deep Seated Pockets of Fire
After any fire in which a building collapses, there often remain deep seated, pockets of fire deep within the rubble pile These pockets of fire sometimes cannot be reached by water streams because of their being covered by debris. Air is sometimes drawn up from the bottom of the pile and feeds these inaccessible fires with air. These fires can last for days and the heat can become intense and can heat any steel in proximity to the fire until the steel is glowing red, orange or yellow hot. These pockets of fire are common at burning building collapses and in no way evidence that that explosives or thermite were used to demolish the buildings. These fires are similar to blacksmith forge fires where air is blown into the charcoals by a bellows to raise the temperature of the fire to heat a piece of steel or iron. The blacksmith can tell how hot the steel or iron is by its color and can tell when the steel is soft enough to work it with a hammer The deep seated fires which occur in the rubble are supplied with air because natural convection currents. Heated air rises because of its bouyancy and is replaced by cool air drawn in from the bottom and sides of the fire. This air flow can become rapid because of the high temperatures developed. The more air drawn in the hotter the fire becomes and the increased temperature increases the convection currents which draws in more air. Like in a furnace the containment of heat by insulation provided by the impacted combustible material surrounding the fire allowes the gradual increase of temperature. I am convinced that temperatures of over 2000 deg F. can easily be developed in these deep seated pockets of fire in the rubble of a collapsed building.
These inaccessible fires often have to be dug out by hand tools, back hoes or grapplers in order to expose the burning material for extinguishment. It is common to hold off hitting the fire with water until it is fully exposed in order to prevent the great amount of steam that would be created from obscuring the work area until the fire is fully exposed and can be quickly extinguished. This is what is happening in the picture of a grappler pulling out a piece of glowing hot steel from the debris pile so often described as molten steel. Such ordinary fires are incapable of melting steel unless they are supplied with enough oxygen.
Much has been made of the presence of molten metal in the debris pile after the collapse. Presumably this molten metal was somehow thought to be connected to explosions or thermite charges, but there were Uninterrupted Power Supply (UPS) battery rooms on some floors of the Towers and Building 7. These battery rooms supplied continuous battery power to computers if the electricity failed for any reason. These batteries contained tons of lead which melts at low temperatures [327 C (621 F)]. The heat from the fires in the debris pile could easily have melted this lead or the aluminum from the plane or aluminum from the tower's cladding which were probably the metals that were seen flowing through the pile. NIST reported UPS in the 13th floor of Building 7 and the 81st floor of Tower 2. There were also quantities of lead, tin, silver and even gold used in the computer circuit boards.
Additionally the EPA reported over 400 different chemicals in the dust and debris. These chemicals could easily be assembled conceptually to propose any type of chemical reaction imaginable including thermite reactions. In addition thermite reactions are rapid and wouldn't last the hours or days at which times the molten metal was observed. As far as I know thermite has never been used to demolish buildings and the expertise probably doesn't exist. Thermite is hard to control and can't be held against the columns because it would burn down through any material used to support it against the columns.
Pure oxygen is used in oxyacetylene torches to actually ignite burn and melt the steel when cutting. These torches were used to help clear the debris pile during search and recovery operations. A slag of melted and re-solidified steel and Ferrous oxide is formed on the opposite side of the cut. This slag formation and the angle of the cuts were erroneously reported to be evidence of cutter charges having been used to sever the columns. Small molten pieces of glowing steel cool into spheres as they fly out from the cut. These steel microspheres could also have been produced during the construction by welders and retained in the concrete or else where only to be released during the collapse.
About the concrete destruction into dust; F.R. Greening did a paper called Energy Transfer in the WTC Collapse in which he says "the energy required to crush concrete to 100 μm particles is 1.9 -- 1011 J, which is well within the crushing capacity of the available energy. Hence it is theoretically possible for the WTC collapse events to have crushed more than 90 % of the floor concrete to particles well within the observed particle size range." http://nistreview.org/WTC-REPORT-GREENING.pdf I would also investigate the possibility that the concrete was sub par due to freezing during curing or too much air or water having been added during construction.
Do you think the architect or engineers who built the Towers would want to admit the deficiencies in design, fireproofing and other construction weaknesses after their buildings collapsed? Do you think they will get any other jobs after 4 of their buildings collapsed from fire? (Building 5 had a serious interior multiple floor collapse due to fire.) Do you know that the Port Authority of NY, NJ didn't legally have to follow any building codes? The reason the columns broke at the splices was that they had serious weaknesses due to lack of reinforcing plates or even welds on most of the exterior column, bolted splices and not because they were broken up into short pieces, presumably by explosives, 'so they would fit onto the trucks to be carried away'. The long span truss floors were never tested for fire resistance at their design length. Why do you think it took so long to get the plans for the buildings after they collapsed while the building engineers had them all along? I would think the architects and engineers for 9/11 truth would be accepting any excuse that would allow them to avoid the introspection necessary to fully realize their own lack of knowledge of fire safety precautions, even the wild idea that explosives or thermite was involved.
About the eye witnesses; there are many reasons that loud sounds can be produced at a fire. Most of the people in tower 2 did not know tower 1 had been struck by a plane but they heard the explosion and even felt the radiant heat produced by the fireball. Often at fires the ones closest to the fires and engaged in heavy work have a very limited overall conception of what is actually happening. When tower 2 collapsed most of the people in Tower 1 thought the sounds and vibrations came from the building they were in and they even felt a rush of air up the stairs as the air was compressed in the cellars. There can also be smoke explosions (backdrafts) particularly in fires that have a flammable liquid involved. One elevator shaft that extended into the cellars had a fuel-air explosion from the jet fuel spilling down and evaporating in the shaft. There were other fuel-air explosions in the elevator shafts. There could have been floor detachments impacting the floors below and producing loud sounds before any general collapse began. Explosives also produce loud distinctive pressure waves that can leave people deaf or blow out eardrums and usually blow out all the windows on the particular floor and in any buildings nearby. This kind of sharp piercing crack was not heard. The windows broken out and marble wall panels detached on the interior of the first floor lobby were probably because of torque or bending forces experienced on the lower floor columns from the plane impacts many floors above. The buildings were reported to sway several feet when the planes hit the towers. The reports of "explosions" in the cellars were also probably from such column or floor displacements or from jet fuel ignitions in the elevator shafts. If you imbed a stick into the ground and hit it with another stick most of the deformation will be in the ground around the bottom of the stick. There were reports of split walls and ceiling collapses on many floors after the planes hit.
How do you think that the supposed Conspirators knew that Building 7 would be hit by pieces of Tower 1 which would set it on fire? They would have to know this beforehand in order to set the mysterious explosive charges. Why did they wait 5 hours until most fires died down to set off these alleged charges, and how did these so called charges withstand the fires for 5 hours without igniting? How come the computer models show steel beam, thermal sagging and disconnection from the columns due thermal contraction of the beams due to the fires in Building 7?
How come the, A&E, 9/11 truthers never mention Building 5. Did building 5 which had a serious fire on many floors and had several floors collapse from the steel beams being disconnected from the columns due to thermal sagging and catinary action tearing out the bolted beam connections. (ASCE, Building Performance Study) I propose that some of the 'truthers' never even read the American Society of Civil Engineer's or NIST's report. Did building 5 also have charges set beforehand? How many other buildings had hypothetical charges set beforehand and were never set off? If they went to all the trouble to rig all these buildings with assumed explosives, why didn't they just set them off and forget the planes and the fires. Waiting for the planes and fires would surely increase their chances of being detected
There are so many questions answered by the fire theories and so many unanswerable questions posed by the Conspiracy theories that it is ludicrous to continue the proposition that explosives had to be employed to collapse these buildings.
In conclusion I think all the reports of controlled demolition can be explained by sounds or sights produced by the plane impacts and jet fuel and air explosions; the sounds of the Towers collapse. When the interior of building 7 collapsed it would have produced loud sounds before the exterior walls began collapsing.
BBC reporting error on Building 7 collapse.
In addition to the damage done to Building 7 by the heavy steel column trees that pealed off of the collapsing twin towers some of these steel columns penetrated the roads and broke the nearby water mains. There was no water supply immediately available and the Fire Department Chief in Command could not fight the numerous fires in Building 7 and ordered every one out of the building and out of the collapse zone (which was a large area including buildings and streets around building 7. Two huge buildings had already collapsed and when you can't fight a fire because there is no water pressure it grows out of control all bets are off as to exactly what will happen and in one of these newer lightweight, open area high rise office buildings.
When anticipating possible collapse it is the procedure to discontinue interior operations and clear the building and establish a collapse zone around the building. The anticipation of collapse was a brilliant call and no lives were lost when the 47 story building collapsed a few hours after the evacuation order was given.*
You ask "How did the BBC know that the Towers were going to collapse?" The BBC didn't know. Did you ever hear a mistake made by a reporter? Or do you believe everything you are told by a TV reporter in the heat of an emergency? The BBC reporter on the air received an erroneous report that the tower had collapsed before it actually did and reported it well before the actual occurrence. It was a simple mistake.
I can imagine how it happened. Possibly a reporter on being told to evacuate the area by a rescue worker balked and to get him to move faster the worker told him the building is coming down. The reporter called his boss and told him the building 7 is coming down. The person receiving the call believed the building was already collapsing. It went out over the air as the building had already collapsed before the actual occurrence.
Of course if you believe that all the top fire protection engineers from the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE) and government scientists from National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) investigating the collapse are in on a conspiracy and also want to accuse the BBC, the NYC Fire Department, the NYC Police Department, the Red Cross and all the Government agencies controlling access Building 7 of being in on a secret controlled demolition even though there was no hard evidence than I would say you are grossly mistaken.
* This is a message from Chief of Department (ret.) Daniel Nigro, addressing the conspiracy theories surrounding the collapse of WTC7. Thank you very much for this statement, Mr. Nigro. The work you and your colleagues did will never be forgotten.
Release date: September 23, 2007
Regarding WTC 7: The long-awaited US Government NIST (National Institute of Standards and Technology) report on the collapse of WTC 7 is due to be published at the end of this year (although it has been delayed already a few times [ adding fuel to the conspiracy theorists fires!]). That report should explain the cause and mechanics of the collapse in great detail. Early on the afternoon of September 11th 2001, following the collapse of WTC 1 & 2, I feared a collapse of WTC 7 (as did many on my staff).
The reasons are as follows:
1 - Although prior to that day high-rise structures had never collapsed, The collapse of WTC 1 & 2 showed that certain high-rise structures subjected to damage from impact and from fire will collapse.
2. The collapse of WTC 1 damaged portions of the lower floors of WTC 7.
3. WTC 7, we knew, was built on a small number of large columns providing an open Atrium on the lower levels.
4. Numerous fires on many floors of WTC 7 burned without sufficient water supply to attack them.
For these reasons I made the decision (without consulting the owner, the mayor or anyone else - as ranking fire officer, that decision was my responsibility) to clear a collapse zone surrounding the building and to stop all activity within that zone. Approximately three hours after that order was given, WTC 7 collapsed.
Conspiracy theories abound and I believe firmly that all of them are without merit.
Regards, Dan Nigro
Chief of Department FDNY (retired)
10 - Condor
I think the chem.-trails are to blame. - Dan Miller.
Dan, I'm sorry but you forgot the fluoride. Fluoride introduced into the biological entity from another means (toothpaste or treated water) to the chemicals introduced from the chem-trail compounds have the same effect as freebasing... it heightens the effect. Geesh...
Additionally... have you ever noticed that terriers are lack a certain brain function which hazards on the side of reason. For instance, a terrier will "destroy" any animal or human, which comes into its territorial zone. No matter the size of the terrier... there is no fear, no matter how the outcome the terrier latches on and will not realize that there is an error until the dog starts getting whipped up on. Then and only then will "some" terriers seek alternative short-term strategies... like running away.
Conspiratorial theorists are like terriers. They lack a similar portion of the reasoning brain and once latched on to a harebrained ideology… they cannot be swayed from their “gut” feeling.
That said some conspiratorial theorists have actually had their beliefs pan out. Such as…
We never landed on the moon.
Monica Lewinsky was a moussad agent.
Aids was invented at Fr. Deatrick to kill off certain groups of people.
The third Reich live in the underworld and cruise around in UFO’s and USAF knows all about UFO’s.
Just to name a few.
11 - Jet
Dave, very enjoyable read and "Not surprisingly, no amount of evidence will sway the psychotically obsessed truthers from their delusions" says it all.
Jet
12 - Dan Miller
Condor,
Mea culpa, mea culpa, mea maxima culpa. There are simply too many conspiracy related things adversely affecting us to include them all in one short comment. Also, I am a victim. When younger, I drank fluoridated water and still use fluoridated tooth paste. That's what my wife buys, and I am too lazy to buy something else.
May Zeus have mercy on my soul (if any).
Dan
13 - sdk
I have downloaded a 115-page document published by NIST that they title, "Final Report on the Collapse of World Trade Center Building 7."
This report essentially is a narrative of possible events leading to the collapse of WTC 7 based on their computer simulation tests.
I find NISTs reliance on computer models remarkable. And in their conclusion, the need a unique event to produce the type of failure and collapse they describe.
The DoD, NASA, aircraft and car manufacturers do not rely so much on computer modeling. If NIST had built a scale model of even a few levels and reproduced anything close to a rapid, simultaneous collapse from fire, well I would be impressed. Perhaps still skeptical, but impressed nonetheless.
NIST acheived their results from models. Models that we are not privy to know the parameters and conditions they assumed.
Well, models are only as good as their initial conditions and parameters. So, tell us (the public) about them. I worked at a DoD test facility for several years. I am a physicist. To say skeptics are delusional because they want more tests and evidence is sort of arrogant. The point is, whatever NIST produced has not reached the point of conclusive until they let us know what was in their black box to produce their model.
14 - Pablo
According to NIST this was an event that had never happened anywhere or anytime in the world before, thermal expansion my ass.
15 - Dave Nalle
Apparently the talking points have gone out through the tinfoil hat networks that the flaw in the NIST report is that it relies on nothing but comptuer modeling.
Yet the truth is that they did extensive materials analysis and experimental testing and simulations. They've got videos and analytical research reports and plenty of other documentation.
So maybe 115 pages was too much for SDK to read.
Dave
16 - Clavos
Bet we could exactly rebuild the entire WTC to original specs, on the exact same spot in Manhattan, fill it full of 3500 crash test dummies, fly the exact same kinds of aircraft into them, and, if they fell down the same way they did on 9/11, the tin foil hat crowd would STILL say it was an inconclusive test.
Feh.
17 - STM
Clavos: "the tin foil hat crowd would STILL say it was an inconclusive test"
Quite, and that's exactly what they ARE saying, even in Australia. I'm shocked.
18 - Condor
"According to NIST this was an event that had never happened anywhere or anytime in the world before, thermal expansion my ass." - Pablo
Pablo, you and NIST are correct. There was never a WTC before and nobody ever flew 2 fueled aircraft into the nonexistent WTC before either.
I guess there must be a first time for everything.
Now... goverment, quit wasting tax dollars on crap like this.
It's sort of like a bank robber, who kills in the commission of a crime. There are eye witnesses, video, a gun fight, more people are killed and perhaps a few cops.... after the trial the convicted are sent to jail... why? Why are needles for euthanization sterile? Good golly gee wizz.... we sure know how to waste a lot of good money.
Short of proving that heat melts metal, and extreme heat melts girders, I don't see the point. Are they hoping to find an alloy that is impervious to heat? Can't they just take the example from volcanic action? I don't get it.
19 - Dave Nalle
Condor, to be fair, the report is chock full of recommendations to prevent this kind of extremely unlikely thing from happening again. Construction standards nationwide are going to be revised as a result, including having sprinkler systems run off of self-contained back-up water supplies instead of or in addition to city water. So there's a purpose to it all, though there has to be an end to it.
Dave
20 - Pablo
Pardon me for pointing this out to you Condor, but ummm, uhhhh Building 7 was not hit by airplanes bubba.
21 - Clavos
He didn't say it was, booboo.
22 - Pablo
I tell ya, gotta love this site. Not only will the commenters use every derogatory name in the book in their defense of the official conspiracy theory about 9/11, the site itself BANS someone from writing a counter theory article, or theories from the official government line. It reeks of not only hypocrisy, but blatant censorship as well, which is why I have not written another article on this site.
I am also starting to think that Dave (smear man) Nalle, is becoming obsessed with this subject, and more particularly with Alex Jones the father of the 9/11 truth movement. Not only does he write numerous articles on these subjects, he even went so far as to put up a idiot site, copying the template of infowars. I have publicly called for Dave to confront Alex on the phone on his show, to which he has not replied. He prefers being a backbiter, instead of confronting someone like a man would do. I do not find that surprising however, given his track record on this site, and in particular how he attacks rather than engages, then will come out and say that you are not worthy of engaging cause your crazy. Hehehehe, yeah bubba, sure I am.
All you are actually left with Davey, is your cute name-calling, and boorish snobism. It is no wonder that you failed to mention that NIST itself said this was an event that never happened before in physics, and I am not talking about the jets that flew into the two towers, but building 7 which is the sujbect at hand.
As I have said previously about my own opinions regarding 9/11, and that it was an inside job, has absolutely nothing to do with whether or not the towers came down organically or with a controlled demolition, and I am more than able to articulate in a clear and concise fashion why I hold this opinion bucko.
Another interesting thing on this blogcritics site, is the so-called rule about personal attacks. Since I started writing on here, from the beginning I have been called everything from a tin-foil hat, deranged, paranoid, and most recently a nazi by Mr. Nalle the political editor of this site, and let me tell you this guy does some editing! I view these as personal attacks, I know for a fact that some of my comments on this site, of a far more benign nature have been edited out, but not Davey boy.
Not only did he set me up originally when I first started writing articles here, by urging me to write a 9/11 conspiracy article, which was banned and he should have known it, I never even got an apology for his ineptitude either.
So the way I see it Davey boy, your main thrust in your combination role of editor, writer, commenter, is SMEAR, DENIGRATE, raise your nose a bit higher, and smear some more. Whether it is me, Dr. Paul, Greg Palast, (whom you called a socialist, yet when pressed to provide evidence you ignored it)or anyone else you happen to disagree with.
For all of you out there that do not like my use, of bubba, or bucko, I use these terminologies for the most part for Davey and Clavy, since in my opinion they have done everything that they can individually and in sync to attack me personally on here on a regular basis. Since I am not one to spread the other cheek as it were, I respond in kind, and will continue to.
The tools of your trade Davey are not rational thought, nor are they reasoned civilized debate. Your tools are denigration, belittling, and setting me up to be censored bubba boy.
Just my two sense worth Davey
23 - Dave Nalle
Not only did he set me up originally when I first started writing articles here, by urging me to write a 9/11 conspiracy article, which was banned and he should have known it, I never even got an apology for his ineptitude either.
Here's the text of the letter I sent you after another editor rejected your 9/11 article:
Paul:
I was away from the computer most of the day today and came back to find you'd written a 9/11 conspiracy article and another (higher up) editor had rejected it. I wasn't aware when I suggested writing something along those lines that we had a strict prohibition on further 9/11 articles. I know we published a bunch last year, but I wasn't aware we'd banned them. No one ever tells me this stuff.
I guess if you want to explore those topics you might have to be sneaky about it - take the old oblique approach. Sorry to encourage you in my ignorance. Don't let it discourage you if you've got good stuff to write.
Sure looks like an apology to me. And I did try to go to bat for your article and gave you some sound advice. You'd rather be bitter and misrepresent what happened and that's entirely on you, bucko.
Dave
24 - Pablo
And I suppose that you did not call me a nazi the other day did ya bucko? Your tools are smear Davey, and if not smear, condescend, that is because your arguments are bunk, and in order to get your point across you must denigrate your opponent as you do on a daily basis bubba.
I am still waiting for an answer on you phoning up alex, but you wont reply to that will ya bubba? You would rather use some two bit video and try to tie it to infowars. By the way, did ya catch Alex in Denver today confronting Michelle Malkin? That was just the kinda thing that endears me to Jones. I will put a link in it for anyone who might be interested in it. It is at the very least entertaining, and for me, perfect, as I cannot stand Malkin or her ilk.
Jones Confronts Malkin in Denver
25 - Dave Nalle
I honestly don't recall calling you a Nazi as such, Pablo. Perhaps you could point me to the quote.
I was too busy watching Ward Churchill's goons beating up reporters to catch Jones and Malkin. Who carried the coverage?
Dave