The extraordinary claim that
fire was the ultimate cause of the complete progressive collapse of three skyscrapers on September 11, 2001 is the
flimsy foundation upon which the Police State is being constructed. How realistic
is that claim?
Ever
since a B-25 hit the Empire State Building on the morning of July 28, 1945,
high-rises have been designed to withstand the impact of airliners similar to
the ones that hit the Twin Towers on 9/11.
The
Empire State Building, hit on Sat. morning, was back in service in two days.
In the case of the Twin
Towers, based on a study definitively described in City in the Skyas
“the most complete and detailed of any ever made for any building
structure,” this plane-strike resistant design is verified by
Towers head structural engineer John Skilling like this – – –
Concerned
because of a case where an airplane hit the Empire State Building, Skilling’s
people did an analysis that showed the towers would withstand the impact of a
Boeing 707. …According to Skilling, “There would be a horrendous
fire. A lot of people would be killed,” he said. “The building structure would still be there.” –Seattle Times, Feb. 27, 1993
This is further verified by
Chief NIST 9/11 Investigator Dr. Shyam Sunder in The New York Times like this:
“The newly disclosed documents, from the 1960’s, show that the Port
Authority considered aircraft moving at 600 m.p.h., slightly faster and
therefore more destructive than the ones that did hit the towers.”
In the video clip below, Twin
Towers project manager Frank D. Martini summed it up this way: “It would be like sticking a pencil through mosquito netting.”
Martini claimed the towers could withstand several airliner impacts without
serious danger of failure.
Towers
would survive plane impacts
Towers
Project Manager Frank D. Martini
As
predicted — and thus verifying the above design assumptions — each tower
returned to a stable configuration within approximately four minutes after the
planes struck. The South Tower remained standing for 56 minutes after the plane
hit and the North Tower for 102 minutes.
Since
neither tower collapsed till well after the plane impacts, it’s clear that the
collapses must have been the result of something other than structural damage.
In
fact, our skyscrapers are incredibly durable. For example, there was the Feb.
26, 1993 1,336-pound bomb attack on the North Tower. It blew a 98 foot hole
through four basement pylons — and killed 6 and injured 1,042. But the Tower
didn’t collapse and was back in service in short order.
However, the fact that
structural damage was not the cause
of collapse on 9/11 is most clear in the case of the least well-known — some
say “hidden in plain sight” — of the three, Building 7
(WTC7). NIST, charged by Congress with the official investigation, summarizes
the role of structural damage in Building 7’s collapse like this:
“Other
than initiating the fires in WTC 7, the damage from the debris from WTC 1 had
little effect on initiating the collapse of WTC 7. The building withstood
debris impact damage that resulted in seven exterior columns being severed
…This was near the west side of the south face of the building and was far
removed from the buckled column that initiated the collapse. …” –NIST NCSTAR 1A, WTC Investigation… xxxvii… xxxvii
So if these three collapses
weren’t the result of structural damage, what was the cause?
At
first glance, it seems reasonable to suppose that fire must have been that
cause, especially since it was present in all three cases — and NIST’s Dr.
Sunder specifically claims fire for Building 7 this way:
“We
really have a new kind of progressive collapse that we have discovered here,
which is a fire-induced progressive collapse. In fact, we have shown FOR THE FIRST TIME that fire can induce a
progressive collapse.” –WTC
Building 7 Chief Investigator Dr. Shyam Sunder
However,
things aren’t that simple.
Dr. Sunder’s claim of a “first time” is the first clue. It points out that such
a fire-induced progressive collapse had never happened before in the entire 117
year history of high-rises at that time. That makes Dr. Sunder’s fire-induced
claim unprecedented (without a precedent) and thus by definition,
extraordinary.
And
there’s another clue: On Feb. 14, 1975, the North Tower had a serious fire burn
out of control for about three hours and spread to an estimated 65% of floor
eleven without doing any structural damage (two to three times as long as the
fires burned in the Towers on 9/11) — and the building was open for business
the next day.
And this from head structural
engineer John Skilling, remember. “There would be a horrendous
fire. …” he said. “The building structure would
still be there.”
In fact, this extreme level
of fire resistance in all steel-framed
high-rises has been designed-in for over a century and was common and accepted
knowledge. Dr. Sunder’s extraordinary “for the first time”
claim for starters. And – – –
“New
York City, 2001. No tall building had ever collapsed primarily due to fire
…” –NIST commentator (intro to NIST Building 7 video linked above)
“…prior
to that day [Sept. 11, 2001] high-rise structures had never collapsed…” –FDNY Chief Daniel Nigro’s statement on WTC7
Chief Nigro’s statement “high-rise structures had never collapsed” is the more
comprehensive statement. And correct. And, as of this writing (September,
2016), except for one in Mexico City as the result of an 8.2 magnitude
earthquake, none have completely collapsed, let alone in seconds, from any
cause or combination of causes since 9/11.
This extreme general
durability of skyscrapers was well-known throughout the entire architectural
and structural engineering community and was the basis of this initial reaction:
On
September 13, 2001, the cover of the New Civil Engineer in the UK consisted of
a picture of 1 WTC during its collapse with a single word written across it:
“unthinkable”. “Just hours earlier, it had been genuinely inconceivable that
structures of such magnitude could succumb to this fate.” While the initial
damage from the airplanes was severe, it was localized to a few floors of each
tower. The challenge for engineers was to explain how local damage could result
in the complete progressive collapse of three of the biggest buildings in the
world. –Collapse of the World Trade Center: “Unprecedented!”
Note for later use: “The challenge for engineers was to explain how local damage could
result in complete progressive collapse… .”
But
that’s only the tip of the iceberg, and the tip of the strangest fires ever
told – – –
The question is, “If it wasn’t fire and/or structural damage, what
was it?”
Dan
Rather sees WTC Building 7 collapse on 9/11
CBS
NEWS, New York City, Sept. 11, 2001
There’s only one thing that
causes any steel-framed high-rise to collapse the way
those three buildings did on 9/11 — in fact to collapse at all — and Dan Rather
nailed it:
“For the third time today, it’s reminiscent of those pictures we’ve
all seen too much on television before when a building was deliberately
destroyed by well-placed dynamite to knock it down …“
In other words, the answer to
“If it wasn’t fire and/or structural damage, what
was it?” is “planned and engineered
demolitions.”
Since nothing else has caused
such a collapse, the way they fell, that is, the “collapse signature”
itself — in fact, that they fell at all — is prima-facie evidence of
demolitions of some sort.
So,
with controlled demolition in mind, it isn’t the three building collapses that
were extraordinary, it’s the claim they were caused by fire and/or structural
damage that’s extraordinary.
And as Carl Sagan famously
quipped, “Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.”
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Further, “prima-facie” means accepted until proven wrong, so for
anyone who wants to claim something other than engineered demolitions, they
must first prove that it couldn’t have been engineered demolitions. Merely
providing alternative hypotheses doesn’t do the job.
So
has anyone disproved demolition? We’ll see shortly.
None
the less, despite 130 years of no-collapse design and history, as proponents of
the official government conspiracy theory like to point out, things do
sometimes unexpectedly happen for the first time. But in this case, despite the
proven design principles, that would be three fire-mediated collapses on the
same day and never before and never again.
So, if you’re going to claim
“fire did it,” after you
disprove demolition, the evidence you provide for fire had better be hellaciously extraordinary.
Here’s
some perspective on the organization assigned to come up with that hellaciously
extraordinary evidence – – –
Until 1988, when renamed the
“National Institute
of Standards and Technology” (acronym: NIST), the organization had been the National Bureau of Standards,ultimately responsible for
things like the accuracy of your fillup at the local gasoline pump. It wasn’t
until the NCST Act was passed in October of 2002 that NIST took on the massive
— and what turns out to be politically sensitive — 9/11 investigation.
Most likely the NIST
investigators didn’t have a clue what they were getting into until later. But
whenever it did occur to them – – – let me
put it like this: Since demolitions would have to have been set up well ahead
of 9/11 – – – “How would you like to be the first bureaucrat
on your block to suggest — let alone prove — demolition brought even one
building down on 9/11 — let alone three?”
Which
may well explain a lot of what follows. Especially NIST’s failure to seriously
investigate controlled demolition despite the unique and unmistakable collapse
signatures of all three buildings. The collapse signatures even Dan Rather
nailed.
So what did NIST do about investigating the prima-facie
most likely cause of the collapses?
They try
to avoid telling you, but if you look carefully – – –
In the case of the towers,
NIST forth-rightly asks itself in point 8 of its Towers Investigation FAQ, “Why didn’t NIST consider a ‘controlled demolition’ hypothesis with
matching computer modeling and explanation like it did for the ‘pancake theory’
hypothesis?”
The important point is in the
question itself: despite the three prima-facie collapse signatures, for some reason, NIST didn’t “consider a ‘controlled
demolition’ hypothesis with matching computer modeling and explanation”
for controlled demolition.
When pressed for a definitive answer, you discover that NIST
unrealistically assumed — either honestly or otherwise — a commercial style
controlled demolition (which none of the three could possibly have been) —
which used the loudest explosives available. Then, ignoring the unmistakable
collapse signatures, NIST claimed it didn’t hear the proper level of noise for
these assumed commercial demolitions and so failed to
investigate further.
OK,
so one way or another, NIST critically screwed up by failing to seriously
investigate demolition, possibly because they had their fingers stuck in their
ears and were humming loudly.
Given
the implications of what would have been of necessity pre-planted explosives,
can you blame them?
There is plenty of evidence
that demolitions did occur. There’s
peer-reviewed proof that a quieter non-standard technique using someting called
thermite — or thermate — was used. If you’re interested, a good place to look
is in the 100 plus peer-reviewed papers published here and with the ~2,300 members of Architects & Engineers For 9/11 Truth.
So
NIST failed to disprove demolition, and they failed three times, The prima
facie evidence provided by the collapses themselves and their unique signatures
stands, and that makes any alternative hypotheses or theories, conspiracy or
otherwise, moot.
But just for the fun of it,
what about NIST’s own competing fire-mediated version of what happened?
Clearly whatever they come up with — to satisfy Sagan —
had better be hellaciously excellent, especially since they failed to rule-out
demolition.
First,
to an unprecedented degree in its 9/11 work, NIST counted on computer modeling.
NIST’s
former Fire-Sciences head, Dr. James Quintiere, explained the underlying
problem with that intensive use of modeling like this:
NIST
used computer models that they said have never been used in such an application
before and are the state of the art. For this they should be commended for their
skill. But the validation of these modeling results is in question. Others have
computed aspects with different conclusions on the cause mechanism of the
collapse. –statement to the U.S. House Science Committee hearings
on WTC collapse
Within certain limits, such
models are, by design and function, easy to manipulate. As one of my compadres
put it, slightly tougue-in-cheek, “Even with “AutoCAD,”
“SOLIDWORKS,” etc., you could model a building to blow over flat in a 30 mph
wind.”
That’s why some nerds call
computer simulations “technical fiction.”
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Such flexibility is a good
thing for NIST, though, since its explanations must satisfy this, remember: “The challenge for engineers was to explain how local damage could
result in complete progressive collapse… ”
To
satisfy that challenge, NIST needed to accomplish at least two main things with
their modeling:
1. Prove
that a fire-mediated total progressive collapse of a model of the building was even possible.
2.
Prove that modeled collapse looked like the collapse that
actually happened.
With
the inherent flexibility of modeling in mind, how hard could that be?
For
the towers, NIST came up with their final reports quickly and on time. They
were reluctant, though, to make their Towers simulations available to the
public — and wouldn’t do so until pressured by the architectual and engineering
community.
“WTC investigators resist
call for collapse visualisation,”
“World
Trade Center disaster investigators [at NIST] are refusing to show computer
visualizations of the collapse of the Twin Towers despite calls from leading
structural and fire engineers, NCE has learned. Visualizations of collapse
mechanisms are routinely used to validate the type of finite element analysis
model used by the [NIST] investigators.” –Parker, Dave, New Civil
Engineer, October 6, 2005
Hmmmm
– – –
Moving right along, NIST’s
approach and mind-set are most transparent and revealing in its attempt to
explain Building 7’s collapse. Which wasn’t so easy.
You can tell because the final report took an extra three-plus years.
Here’s
Dr. Quintiere’s take in the middle of that delay:
6. The
critical collapse of WTC 7 is relegated to a secondary role, as its findings
will not be complete for yet another year. It was clear at the last NIST
Advisory Panel meeting in September [2005] that this date may not be realistic,
as NIST has not demonstrated progress here. Why has NIST dragged on this
important investigation?” –Former Chief of NIST’s Fire Science Division
Can you think of any reason
NIST might drag “on this important investigation”
for more than three years?
The
final report on Building 7 wasn’t released until 2008.
What
was in that report?
Based on one of its technical
fictions, NIST’s final report on Building 7 claims that “the most probable initiation sequence” started when
Column #79, in the northeast corner of the building, buckled as a result
of thermal expansion, and this caused the entire building
to collapse in a matter of seconds.
You might want to review that
collapse above. It’s the clip Dan Rather commented on.
Here’s
a quick overview of the problems with NIST’s scenario:
NIST asserts “most probable initiation sequence” ass-u-me-ing never
before seen fire as the cause — remember Dr. Sunder’s “first time” claim earlier — and completely ignores
that, based on the collapse signature alone, the most probable initiation
sequence is clearly demolition of some sort.
To compound the problem,
during a NIST Tech Briefing, Dr. Sunder further
explained the thermal expansion — and its
unprecedented result — this way: “And, of course, the phenomenon
that we saw on 9/11 that brought this particular building down was really
thermal expansion, which occurs at lower temperatures.”
From the presentation you
also discover the “lower temperatures” he’s talking
about are in the 400°C range.
Sounds pretty hot, right? But
because of early experience with the damage it can cause, for over a century,
steel-framed skyscrapers have been designed and insulated to resist thermal
expansion, even thermal expansion that occurs at higher temperatures. And remember, history shows
that such damage has never resulted in even one 9/11-type collapse.
Next we have the claim that
one column in the northeast corner “buckled” and somehow, within seconds, the
whole building collapses, including the columns in the far-removed southwest corner. Because of local structural
integrity, this problem is what prompted the engineers big challenge, remember:
“to explain how local damage could result in complete progressive
collapse.”
That is, how could “local damage” in the northeast corner almost instantly
cause the structural steel in the whole building — including the
far-removed southwest corner — to all collapse all at once?
HINT: It couldn’t — and in
fact, the complete progressive collapse couldn’t
have happened unless simultaneous damage
was also induced, not only in the southwest corner but in key structural
elements throughout the building. Can you think of anything that might have
caused that to happen?
And
finally, with regards to the Building 7 collapse above, to provide credible
evidence at all — forget extraordinary evidence — NIST needed to – – –
2.
Prove that their collapse model looked like the collapse that
actually happened.
That is, it’s not only the “most probable initiation sequence” their technical
fiction needs to show, that’s the easy part. It’s, as the engineers put it
right after 911 remember, “How do you explain the complete
progressive collapse?” The whole thing, not just the “initiation
sequence.”
Are
they going to do that? Are they going to show the whole thing? Here’s a clue –
– –
“Once
the collapse had begun, the propagation of the collapse was readily explained
without the same complexity of modeling.” FAQs – NIST WTC Towers Investigation
So the answer is, “No, they are not!” And as you’ll see, they don’t.
So NIST does a good job of
ignoring most of the collapse in its collapse animation. Even in that technical fiction, apparently having been
unable to model the collapse itself, they don’t show anything beyond their
asserted initiation sequence. The problem is that what they do show doesn’t look anything like the actual
collapse initiation anyway. But you can judge that for yourself in the video below.
The
collapse vs. NIST’s technical fiction
So,
as you can see, despite the extreme flexibility of its modeling tools, not only
was NIST unable to model the actual collapse with its simulations it couldn’t
even show a realistic initiation sequence, not even after four extra years of
trying.
AND, in the same vein, NISTs
simulations were also unable to model the actual collapse of either of the Twin
World Trade Center towers, thus ignoring two other elephants
in the room.
But the final affront is
that, fighting off a persistent string of FOIA requests using the national
security blanket thrown to it on Monday, Aug. 4, 2008 by Obama’s Executive Order 13470, NIST refused to release 74,777 (about 80%) of the key
simulation files it used to come up with its
shall-we-say-to-be-kind, dubious Column
79 hypothesis.
This
makes replication, the back-bone of science, not to mention checking its work
for logic, rigor, errors and fibs etc. impossible.
NIST’s excuse for not
releasing the key files? Their release “might endanger public safety.”
They may have that right if bureaucrats and certain politicians in the stocks
or hanging from trees and lamp-posts, etc. is dangerous to public safety.
Or do they wish to assert
their work proves U.S. skyscrapers are so delicate that, as another compadre
quipped, “They’re afraid terrorists will realize they can bring down our high-rises
by setting a wastebasket on fire in the parking garage?”
You can find much more
thoroughly detailed and documented critiques of NIST’s less-than-forth-coming
shennanigans with its approach, data, and technique, here, here,
and here for starters.
It’s clear that none of the
NIST personnel wanted to be “the first bureaucrat on their
block to suggest — let alone prove — demolition brought down even one building
on 9/11.”
Given
their career path and the political implications, can you blame them for trying
to hide it? Well can you?
And did NIST provide the hellacious proof that would
convince Carl Sagan of their extraordinary claim that fire was the ultimate
cause of those three — count ’em, THREE— completely
unprecedented collapses upon which the Police State is being constructed?
And
of course, their work, shabby as it is, is moot anyway since they failed to
disprove the most obvious prima facie explanation, controlled demolition.
Or, now that its foundation
has been compromised, is it time to start deconstructing the Police State? Is
it time to throw sand in the gears of the out-of-control machine and indict some of
its psychopathic minions? As they
have in Malaysia. What do you think?
For updates, comments, and corrections,
see The Strangest Fires updates, comments, corrections.
AND, “Like,” “Tweet,” and
otherwise, pass this along!
L.
Reichard White [send him mail] taught physics, designed
and built a house, ran for Nevada State Senate, served two terms on the
Libertarian National Committee, managed a theater company, etc. For the next
few decades, he supported his writing habit by beating casinos at their own
games. His hobby, though, is explaining things he wishes someone had explained
to him. You can find a few of his other explanations
listed here.