Conquer Club

Juan_Bottom wrote:http://rattube.com/blog1/2008/12/08/wtc7-nist-finally-admits-freefall/

OMG OMG!
Does this change anyone's perspective at all? If this be true, then I must definitly beggin to question my stance yet again.

Neoteny wrote:Alternative explanations to what? Gravity?

Juan_Bottom wrote:I thought you were on science's side? Are you going all creationist on me?

Neoteny wrote:I don't think we can blame the government for gravity.

Neoteny wrote:I don't think we can blame the government for gravity.

Juan_Bottom wrote:Now I don't claim to know who would put bombs in the towers, or why, but there is reasonable doubt in my mind at least as to what happened. I'm kinda on the fence... There is a large enough list of circumstancial and physicle evidence for me to question everything. And strictly from a scientific veiwpoint, though I myself am not an engineer, I would not expect any buildings to collapse as if there is nothing underneath them. ESPECIALLY if they "pancake" downwards, ya know? It just sounds fishy.
And I don't get how more and more evidence gets added to the pile, people just more and more tune out.

Juan_Bottom wrote:Well you can at least blame them for lying about gravity. They have refused to admit the freefall speed for a long time haven't they?

GabonX wrote:I'm not up to date on conspriacy theories but I haven't seen any denial of "free fall speed."

hecter wrote:In terms of the towers falling on their own footprint, they were literally pulled in from the inside by their weakened support beams.

The scientific fact is that the massive steel columns in the core of the buildings would never have been threatened from the jetliner impacts or the ensuing fire. Take a look at the structure of these buildings:

1. The architects of the World Trade Center designed the buildings to absorb the impact of a crashing jetliner because that was an obvious structural design imperative in Manhattan. The designers of the buildings always confidently maintained that they would remain structurally secure from collapse under those circumstances.

FRANK A. DeMARTINI, MANAGER, WTC CONSTRUCTION & PROJECT MANAGEMENT has testified to the fact that the buildings at the World Trade Center should have been able to sustain multiple jumbo jet impacts without threatening the structural integrity of the buildings’ steel-reinforced frames:

“I believe that the building probably could sustain multiple impacts of jetliners because this structure is like mosquito-netting on your screen door—this intense grid. And the jet plane is just a pencil puncturing that screen netting. It really does nothing to the screen netting.”

Detailed structural analysis of the Twin Towers determined that:

“The buildings have been investigated and found to be safe in an assumed collision with a large jet airliner [Boeing 707-DC 8] traveling at 600 miles per hour. Analysis indicates that such collision would result in only local damage which could not cause collapse or substantial damage to the building and would not endanger the lives and safety of occupants not in the immediate area of impact.“

As noted by John Skilling, the engineer responsible for designing the World Trade Center, the buildings would withstand a major crash and the ensuing fires:

“Our analysis indicated the biggest problem would be the fact that all the jet fuel would dump into the building. (But) the building structure would still be there.”

See 9/11 – A Closer Look by scientist Kevin Ryan:
http://video.google.com/googleplayer.sw ... en&fs=true
911 Mysteries Part 1 – Demolition:
http://video.google.com/googleplayer.sw ... en&fs=true

Each tower contained:
• Over 90,000 tons of concrete;
• 47 Massive Steel Core Columns and
• 240 Steel Perimeter Columns welded together and connected by hundreds of steel joints, perpendicular cross trusses, thousands of large steel bolts and concrete-filled steel floor decking at each floor level;
• 100,000 Ton Heat Sink to absorb excess heat;
• Updated fireproofing and a fire control system designed to prevent “chimney effect” and suffocate fires by depriving them of oxygen.

To convey the extent of the structural integrity of the World Trade Center, the Engineering News Record reported that:

One “could cut away all the first story columns on one side of the building, and partway from the corners of the perpendicular sides, and the building could still withstand design live loads and a 100 mph wind from any direction.”

2. No large steel-reinforced building anywhere in the world, at any time before or since 9/11, ever experienced full building collapse due to fire:

“Never before in the history of the world has a steel building collapsed due to fire.”

The unique exception is 9/11 when 3 steel-reinforced skyscrapers with state-of-the-art fire-proofing at the World Trade Center allegedly collapsed due to fires, although the fires clearly never seriously threatened the structural integrity of the buildings.

In 1945 a U.S. Air Force B-25 bomber struck the Empire State Building, killing 14 people. However, neither the impact nor the ensuing fires caused significant damage to the building’s steel-reinforced frame and never threatened the structural integrity of the building.

3. Structural analysis conducted by MIT Engineer/Scientist Dr. Jeff King concludes:

a. The 47 massive steel core columns of each of the towers were adequately designed to withstand collapse.4. Structural steel begins to melt at 1510 degrees Celsius (2750 degrees Fahrenheit) and only if that temperature is maintained over a long period of time. Burning jet fuel can only reach temperatures of 1120 degrees Celsius and decreases in temperature if the fuel feeding it is being depleted (as was the case in the Twin Towers). Therefore, the temperature from the burning jet fuel (commonly cited as the reason for weakening the structure) could not possibly have melted the steel-reinforced columns.
The point becomes moot very quickly anyway because, as FEMA acknowledged, the level of dissipation of the jet fuel precluded its ability to burn long enough to even threaten structured steel:

b. “The Trade Center Towers and most modern buildings are heavily redundant.” Normally under the conditions that were present:

“The structure re-stabilizes and unless there is significant further damage, it doesn’t progress to a total collapse.”

c. “The columns could not have collapsed into themselves.” The official explanation of impact and fire damage causing complete loss of mechanical strength of structured steel and simultaneous core collapse is impossible.

d. Explosives are the only plausible mechanism to explain the high-speed slurry of the buildings.

FEMA (Federal Emergency Management Agency) Report 403, World Trade Center Building Performance Study, 2002, clearly states that all jet fuel was totally consumed within the first few minutes after impact.
Scientist Kevin Ryan concludes that the rapid fuel consumption was an additional reason why it was impossible for the fires to have melted the structured steel:

“Including the fact that only 4,000 gallons of jet fuel were available to feed the fires in the impact zone and that was gone in a flash-fire in 5 minutes.”

See 9/11 – A Closer Look by Kevin Ryan:
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid ... 8593493167

The actual temperatures of the WTC fires were only 650 degrees Celsius (1200 degrees Fahrenheit) which is dramatically insufficient to melt steel. Thermite (the incendiary explosive of which there was evidence at Ground Zero), however, typically reaches 2500 degrees Celsius (4500 degrees Fahrenheit).

“The fire is the most misunderstood part of the WTC collapse. Even today, the media report (and many scientists believe) that the steel melted. It is argued that the jet fuel burns very hot, especially with so much fuel present. This is not true.

Part of the problem is that people (including engineers) often confuse temperature and heat. While they are related, they are not the same. Thermodynamically, the heat contained in a material is related to the temperature through the heat capacity and the density (or mass). Temperature is defined as an intensive property, meaning that it does not vary with the quantity of material, while the heat is an extensive property, which does vary with the amount of material. One way to distinguish the two is to note that if a second log is added to the fireplace, the temperature does not double; it stays roughly the same, but the size of the fire or the length of time the fire burns, or a combination of the two, doubles. Thus, the fact that there were 90,000 L of jet fuel on a few floors of the WTC does not mean that this was an unusually hot fire. The temperature of the fire at the WTC was not unusual, and it was most definitely not capable of melting steel.” (Eager & Musso, 2001)

Therefore, as many scientists, engineers and architects have observed, under the conditions presented there simply was not enough energy available for “crushing 80,000 tons of structural steel below” or for the “mid-air pulverization of 90,000 tons of concrete” of each tower into fine dust.

5. The fires were not raging infernos. Quite to the contrary, they were controllable fires. F.D.N.Y. Battalion 7 Chief Orio Palmer, a marathon runner, reached the “hot spot” on the 78th floor of the South Tower. He was soon joined by Fire Marshall Ronald Bucca, another avid runner, who had just raced up all 78 floors to join him. They were the first to reach the impact zone and appraise the damage from the fires. They radioed the firefighters from Ladder Company 15 who were running up the stairs in full gear. Battalion 7 Chief Palmer had assessed the damage and radioed down that he could get them put out with two fire lines. The following is a verbatim transcript of his radio transmission at 9:52 a.m. on 9/11:

BATTALION 7 CHIEF ORIO PALMER:

“Battalion Seven. Ladder 15, we’ve got two isolated pockets of fire. We should be able to knock it down with two lines. Radio that, 78th floor, numerous 10-45 Code Ones.”

(“10-45 Code Ones” is referential to dead bodies)
It is extremely noteworthy that the radio transmissions of Battalion 7 Chief Orio Palmer and the radio responses to it literally occurred only seconds prior to the total collapse in WTC 2. According to the official U.S. government explanation, at that moment there should have been massive structural failings at that section of the building at that time. Therefore, according to the official version, the firefighters should have been rushing panic-struck to evacuate anyone that they could and as rapidly as they could, including themselves. Yet they are not doing so. What they are doing at that moment, in reality, is calmly and professionally preparing to move up to floor 79 to rescue more people. Below are their transmissions from moments before the collapse:
LADDER 15:

“Chief, what stair you in?”

BATTALION 7 CHIEF ORIO PALMER:

“South stairway Adam, South Tower.”

LADDER 15:

“Floor 78?”

BATTALION 7 CHIEF ORIO PALMER:

“Ten-four. Numerous civilians, we gonna need two engines up here.”

BATTALION 7 CHIEF ORIO PALMER:

“Tower one. Battalion Seven to Ladder 15.”

LADDER 15:

“Fifteen.”

BATTALION 7 CHIEF ORIO PALMER:

“I’m going to need two of your firefighters Adam stairway to knock down two fires. We have a house line stretched, we could use some water on it, knock it down, ’kay?”

LADDER 15:

“Alright, ten-four. We’re coming up the stairs. We’re on 77 now in the B stair. I’ll be right to you.”

BATTALION 7 OPERATIONS TOWER ONE:

“Battalion Seven Operations Tower One to Battalion Nine. Need you on floor above 79. We have access stairs going up to 79, ’kay?”

BATTALION NINE:

“Alright, I’m on my way up, Orio.”

At 9:55 a.m. is the final radio transmission from Battalion Chief Palmer and Fire Marshall Bucca, as the building suddenly and literally implodes:

BATTALION 7 CHIEF ORIO PALMER:

“Battalion Seven. Ladder 15–”

At that moment F.D.N.Y. Battalion Seven Commander Orio Palmer and Fire Marshall Ronald Bucco were both killed in action, along with 341 fellow members of F.D.N.Y. who were unable to evacuate in time because the buildings imploded suddenly and without warning.

In summary:

• F.D.N.Y reported “two isolated pockets of fire” near the impact zone in the South Tower.
• F.D.N.Y. also reported that it would only take two fire lines to extinguish the fires in the South Tower.
• The fires were compartmentalized and contained. The structure sustained the impact and sealed off the fires from expanding, just as it was designed to do:
“In fact, the Towers did what they were built to do.”
• FEMA conceded that the jet fuel was totally consumed within the first few minutes after impact.
• Yet FEMA would have us believe that:

“This was somehow enough to bring down the Tower’s 47-steel-column core, 236 exterior columns, and thousands of steel trusses, all at the same time.”

“Each of the towers was about 1,300 feet tall. To support these extremely tall buildings, there were 47 steel columns around the perimeter, with each column being far thicker at the bottom than at the top. The perimeter columns were connected to the core by means of steel bar-joist trusses in the concrete floors. Although there has been considerable talk of “flimsy trusses,” Scientific American quoted engineer Robert McNamara as saying “nowadays, they just don’t build them as tough as the World Trade Center.” With regard to the bar-joist trusses in particular, the FEMA report said: “The floor framing system of the two towers was complex and substantially more redundant than typical bar-joist floor systems.” Investigations of some recovered steel have found, furthermore, that far from being defective, it met or even exceeded the standard requirements. Given these facts about the towers, we can dismiss a second idea that has been widely promulgated, namely, that the impact of the airplanes would have substantially weakened the towers, Thomas Eagar says that the impact of the airplanes would have been insignificant, because “the number of columns lost on the initial impact was not large and the loads were shifted to remaining columns in this highly redundant structure.” “Within a few dozen seconds after the plane crash,” Eric Hufschmid points out, “the North tower was quiet, stable, and motionless.” Because the steel used in must be able to hold five times its normal load, Eagar points out; the steel in the towers could have collapsed only if it was heated to the point at which it “lost 80 percent of its strength” which would be about 1,300 F.”

“In order for a floor to fall, hundreds of joints had to break almost simultaneously on 236 exterior columns and 47 core columns.”

Eagar’s theory, like all other versions of the official account, cannot do justice to the fact that the collapse of the towers was total, resulting in a pile of rubble that, in Eagar’s own words, “was only a few stories high.” Even if one granted that his theory might explain why the floors and outer columns collapsed, it does not explain, argues Peter Meyer, the collapse of the massive steel columns in the core of the buildings:

Jeff King, examining the official account in light of what the videos show, says

‘The biggest and most obvious problem that I see is the source of the enormous amount of very fine dust that we see generated during the collapse… Where does the energy come from to turn all this reinforced concrete into dust?’”

MIT /Scientist/Engineer Dr. Jeff King refutes the official collapse theory as physically impossible:

“Momentum doesn’t just go away without some kind of external force being applied.

Describing one of the WTC towers as “a building that is mostly air” sounds profound but is no more valid than saying that atoms are mostly empty space, and so matter should collapse or implode at any provocation. It is a clever rhetorical flourish that does a great injustice to the structural integrity of these buildings, implying that they were houses of cards waiting to tumble down. In fact they were very rigid and had far more compressional strength than needed to avoid collapse. Each core had 47 steel box columns, all interconnected with steel plates at each floor, and trussed box columns at the corners that can be seen in the picture above supporting construction cranes. The outer “tube” comprised 256 14″ square steel box columns tied together with 52″ tall steel plates at each floor.

This “tube-in-tube” design, with 110 floors acting as braces that linked the two tubes together, created an extremely strong geometry allowing redistribution of stresses. To think that such a structure would magically disintegrate rather than allow itself to be tipped over is simply bizarre.”
(Dr. Jeff King; December 5, 2002)

Yet two 110-stories fell at free-fall speed, directly into the path of most resistance – the floors beneath them:

“Seismic data from Columbia University puts the North Tower collapse at about 8 seconds and the South Tower at approximately 10…Ten seconds. These are 110-story buildings coming to earth at free-fall speed, the rate at which an object drops through air. The lower floors would need to give way completely as the floors above them fell…A 10-second collapse means the upper floors encountered no resistance from the undamaged floors beneath them.”

“Eric Hufschmid, author of the book Painful Questions, is a metal-cutting software engineer:

‘The floors of the World Trade Center Towers were a 3-dimensional mesh of steel beams. You have to keep in mind now, the floor is about an acre in size. There are thousands of joints all over it. In order for the floor to fall down, thousands of joints would have to break simultaneously. And then if you look at the speed at which this came down – less than ten seconds? You blink your eye and thousands of joints just popped somehow. The only way you can explain that is with explosives. They had to have had explosives placed all over the floors at the primary joints. And then that would explain how all of the joints broke at such a rapid rate. The debris was crashing from one floor to the next. Debris cannot crash through steel and concrete floors as fast as it falls through the air. And there was no slowing. Explosives had to be breaking the joints ahead of the falling rubble, which is why the top half starts off collapsing slowly and then it starts picking up speed.’”

13. Analysis of the collapses by structural engineers, physics professors and other scientists conclusively proves that they were, by scientific necessity, the result of planned demolition:

No matter what a government purports to be true, it is the Laws Of Physics which determine the rate at which a building falls. Had the buildings at the World Trade Center collapsed due to fires from the jetliner impacts, the Laws of Physics demand that they would have done so at one specific rate of speed. If they collapsed due to controlled demolitions, the Laws of Physics demand that they would have collapsed at a specifically different rate of speed. The Law of Conservation of Momentum predicts that if the towers had collapsed due to fires or jetliner damage, then that fall would have taken approximately 45 seconds due to the measurable scientific fact that the falls would have encountered natural resistance as each floor collapsed atop the next. However, the towers collapsed at nearly free-fall speed, taking only 10 seconds to achieve total collapse which would have been a blatant and impossible violation of The Law of Conservation of Momentum had their collapse been due to the fires. A 10-second collapse is in full accord with Galileo’s Law of Falling Bodies determining the rate of collapse of an object for which resistance has been removed. Therefore, that result is only scientifically achievable via controlled demolition which causes the imploding effect that was very evident in the videos and rapidly speeds the process of building collapse (as the steel beams are cut and burned in fractions of a second by strategically placed demolition cutter charges), concrete is powderized in mid-air into dust before it hits the ground (as it was on 9/11), steel support beams literally melt (as they did on 9/11), the building tumbles symmetrically into its own footprint (as they did on 9/11), leaving a measurably larger dust cloud (as was the case on 9/11) and a debris pile that measures many times greater (as was also the case on 9/11) than the amount of dust resulting from collapse due to fires.
See: http://video.google.com/googleplayer.sw ... en&fs=true

“The interesting fact is that each of these 110-story Twin Towers fell upon itself in about ten seconds at nearly free-fall speed. This violates Newton’s Law of Conservation of Momentum that would require that as the stationary inertia of each floor is overcome by being hit, the mass (weight) increases and the free-fall speed decreases.

Even if Newton’s Law is ignored, the prevailing theory would have us believe that each of the Twin Towers inexplicably collapsed upon itself crushing all 287 massive columns on each floor while maintaining a free-fall speed as if the 100,000, or more, tons of supporting structural-steel framework underneath didn’t exist.”
(William Rice, P.E.; 2007)

As Professor Steven Jones notes, the official notion that Building 7 at the WTC collapsed as a result of fire is in violation of the Second Law of Thermodynamics. Buildings collapsing as a result of fire simply topple over – they do not collapse symmetrically into their own footprint.

See 9/11 Revisited at http://video.google.com/videosearch?q=9 ... ted&emb=0#

14. Over 500 professional architects and engineers have put their reputations on the line to publicly demand a real investigation of the collapse of the World Trade Center. Richard Gage is a credentialed architect who is the founder of Architects & Engineers for 9/11 Truth. For a summary of their findings with video analyses, see: www.ae911truth.org/ and slideshow:
http://www.ae911truth.net//ppt_web/slid ... 40&lores=1

KEY FINDINGS:

• “High-rise buildings do not collapse due to fire, even after their fireproofing has performed its usefulness after a couple of hours.”
• Twin Towers’ destruction exhibited all the characteristics of destruction by explosions:
• Extremely rapid onset of “collapse”
• Sounds of explosions and flashes of light witnessed near the beginning of the “collapse” by over 100 first responders
• “Squibs” (focused explosions) 40 floors below the “collapsing” building seen in all the videos
• Mid-air pulverization of 90,000 tons of concrete and steel decking, filing cabinets & 1000 people – mostly to dust
• Massive volume of expanding pyroclastic dust clouds
• Vertical progression of full building perimeter demolition waves
• Symmetrical collapse – through the path of greatest resistance – at nearly free-fall speed — the columns gave no resistance
• 1,400 foot diameter field of equally distributed debris – outside of building footprint
• Blast waves blew out windows in buildings 400 feet away
• Lateral ejection of thousands of individual 4 - 20 ton steel beams up to 500 feet
• Total destruction of the building down to individual structural steel elements – obliterating the steel core structure
• Tons of molten metal found by FDNY and numerous other experts under all 3 high-rises “like lava from a volcano.” Streams of “molten metal which was still red-hot weeks after the event.” “Firemen sprayed water to cool the debris but the heat remained intense enough at the surface to melt their boots.” The fire was not completely extinguished until over 3 months after 9/11.

“Molten iron is the product of the incendiary Thermite, a cutter charge which is used in many controlled demolitions. There is no other conceivable source of molten metal found at the base of World Trade Center 7. Hydrocarbon fires burn 1700 degrees maximum. Molten metal, molten iron in this case, and most all molten metals burn- they need 2700 degrees to create them. We’re missing a 1000 degrees of energy, of temperature.”

• FEMA finds rapid oxidation and intergranular melting on structural steel samples
• More than 1000 Bodies are unaccounted for — 700 tiny bone fragments found on top of nearby buildings
• Chemical signature of Thermate (high tech incendiary) found in slag, solidified molten metal, and dust samples by Physics Professor Steven Jones, Ph.D.
• Examination of the forensic metallurgy of WTC steel “reveal a phenomenon never before observed in building fires: eutectic reactions, which caused ‘intergranular melting capable of turning a solid steel girder into Swiss cheese.’”
• Building 7 was typical of a classic demolition: “An implosion causing a vertical collapse at free-fall speed into a consolidated rubble pile.” WTC 7 was “straight-down symmetrical into its own footprint.

The only thing that can cause this is if all of the perimeter columns, in this case 81 of them, and 24 core columns, are cut at once. In fact, to bring the penthouse down, you have to cut the interior just a fraction of a second prior to the exterior, again which causes the exterior walls to fall, straight down rapidly. In this case, 6.5 seconds.” “The penthouse falling first is a telltale sign of demolition.”

• There is expert corroboration. The top European controlled demolitions expert confirms that WTC 7 was a controlled demolition. 27-year controlled demolitions expert Danny Jowenko states: “This is controlled demolition…it starts from below.” “They have simply blown away columns…A team of experts did this…This is professional work, without any doubt.”

“Once you get to the science, it’s indisputable. At Building 7, a 47-story skyscraper, not hit by an airplane on 9/11, it fell symmetrically, smoothly, at virtually freefall speed, into its own footprint – a perfect controlled demolition. There’s only graphic evidence for 2 or 3 fires in that building; 5th and 12th and maybe 13th floor. The official story tells us that the steel was softened. But if that was the case and this building fell due to fires, the fires, by their nature, creep from place to place leaving one area cool and burning another area. That would force an asymmetrical collapse. The building would tip over. So for the first time in history, fires have done what only a handful of demolition companies are capable of doing.”
-Richard Gage

Fire Protection Engineer Edward Munyak, P.E., Registered Mechanical and Fire Protection Engineer in the State of California currently employed as Fire Protection Engineer for the City of San Jose, California:

“I have collaborated with a research chemical engineer ( P.E. in CA also) and he has worked with NIST reports that positively show that the jet fuel contributed very little to the duration of the fires and that in fact all the fires were very weak in historical perspective. They were oxygen starved as evidenced by the black smoke. If you dig deeper into the NIST reports they confirm that steel temperatures were low.”

“My presentation showed that all three WTC “collapses” have no resemblance to any previous high rise fire, full scale fire tests in the UK involving much higher steel temperatures, or computer simulations using finite element analysis.”

(Edward Munyak, P.E.; 2007)

Scott C. Grainger, S.E., President and Chief Engineer, is a licensed Civil and/or Fire Protection Engineer in the states of Arizona, Colorado, New Mexico, New York, Virginia, California, Nevada and Washington. He is the owner of Grainger Consulting, Inc., a fire protection engineering firm for 23 years. Approximately 50% of his work is forensic. “In addition to my forensic work, a good portion of my work is in the design of structural fireproofing systems.” Regarding 9/11, he wrote:

“All three collapses were very uniform in nature. Natural collapses due to unplanned events are not uniform.”

(Scott Grainger, S.E.; 2008)

Engineer David Scott has also professionally documented and verified the fact that:

“Near-freefall collapse violates laws of physics. Fire induced collapse is not consistent with observed collapse mode”

(David Scott, AMICE, CEng, MIStructE, Degreed and Licensed Engineer; 2008)

Even FEMA Study Team Member and Structural Expert Matthys Levy who co-authored Why Buildings Fall Down concedes:

“If you’ve seen many of the managed demolitions where they implode a building and they cause it to essentially to fall vertically because they cause all of the vertical columns to fail simultaneously, that’s exactly what it looked like and that’s what happened.”

See: WMV video download (524kB)

15. Steven E. Jones, Ph.D. is a former Professor of Physics from Brigham Young University who resigned in order to research the events of 9/11 full-time. Dr. Jones conducted tests of debris samples from Ground Zero and determined the presence of thermate. Thermate, which is actually thermite strengthened with sulfur, is the state-of-the-art choice for building demolitions. Use of thermate also creates a distinct and traceable signature, much like a fingerprint at a crime scene. The scientific analysis of those samples conclusively identified a “Thermate signature” at Ground Zero.

a. Evidence that Twin Towers were brought down through the use of pre-positioned cutter-charges that employed high-tech explosives, not by impact damage and fires.

b. Analysis of the debris samples also determined the presence of significant amounts of manganese, iron and sulfur, which are a scientific fingerprint of the aftermath of the use of Thermate.

c. Use of the extremely hot-burning explosive incendiary Thermate also leaves a “heat signature.” The inability to reduce the temperature of the debris was the result of thermate use and could not have been from fire, which would have quickly cooled. The debris at Ground Zero literally kept burning for weeks, defying extensive attempts to cool its heat. Thermate burns so hot that it will cut and melt steel beams—fire is incapable of doing so. This was evidenced by:

Orange-to-red-hot pieces of molten metal were visible in the debris.

Infrared satellite photos taken weeks after the collapses still reveal hotspots in excess of 1000 degrees Fahrenheit.

Six weeks after collapse, Ground Zero debris was still hot enough to literally melt the boots of workers after short exposure to its heat. (Note: From video clip with Silverstein and DeMartini; cite below)

d. The sulfidation of the steel at Ground Zero is another characteristic that is concomitant with the use of thermate.

e. Evidence of molten metal; flowing and in pools

f. Observed Temperatures of approximately 1000ºC

g. The symmetric collapse of each building is also distinctively compatible with controlled demolition.

h. Concludes that the scientific evidence clearly refutes the official positions of FEMA, NIST, and 9-11 Commission reports that fires plus impact damage alone caused complete collapses of all three buildings.

Also see the scientific documentation of Kevin Ryan:
The Top Ten Connections Between NIST and Nano-Thermites, July 2008
More Evidence for Energetic Materials, May 2008
High Velocity Bursts of Debris From Point-Like Sources in the WTC Towers, July 2007 (pdf)
Also see:
http://74.125.45.104/search?q=cache:hpn ... =clnk&cd=1

and: http://www.wtc7.net/articles/stevenjones_b7.html

Watch Improbable Collapse:
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid ... 6596731782

16. Kevin Ryan, BS Chem, is a Certified Quality Engineer and scholar whose application of solid scientific methods to the study of 9/11 has resulted in an explosive indictment of the official version of events. Analysis of data obtained from the EPA by Chemist Kevin Ryan and other scientists has determined the presence of extreme environmental anomalies at Ground Zero. These anomalies are detailed by the three scientists in a paper accepted and published in a peer-reviewed science journal.

KEY FINDINGS:

• Conditions inconsistent with typical building fires but consistent with conditions after buildings are destroyed by controlled demolition, including the use of Thermite/Thermate (state-of-the-art explosives used in building demolition) and concomitant materials and conditions consistent with a Thermite fingerprint.

• Large pools of molten metal were observed in the basement areas of both towers and Building 7. Evidence of molten metal and explosions accompanied by white dust clouds are products of the Thermite reaction.

• Extremely high temperatures in the fires at the WTC which are indicative of Thermate/Thermite explosions that burn markedly hotter than typical fires.

• The fireproofing in the buildings had been updated prior to 9/11 and was more than sufficient to contain fires much larger than those present.

• Extremely high levels of volatile organic chemicals as well as unusual species never before seen in structure fires.

• Very atypical debris. For months after the destruction at the World Trade Center (WTC) on 11th September, 2001, the fires at Ground Zero could not be put out, despite the following facts:

• Several inches of dust covered the entire area after the
destruction of the WTC buildings.

• Millions of gallons of water were sprayed onto the
debris pile.

• Several rainfall events occurred at GZ, some heavy;

• A chemical fire suppressant called Pyrocool was
pumped into the piles (Lipton and Revkin 2001).

“The characteristics of these un-extinguishable fires have
not been adequately explained as the results of a normal
structure fire, even one accelerated by jet fuel. Conversely,
such fires are better explained given the presence of
chemical energetic materials, which provide their own fuel
and oxidant and are not deterred by water, dust, or chemical suppressants.” (Kevin R. Ryan Æ & James R. Gourley Æ & Steven E. Jones; 2008)
See the scientific documentation by Kevin Ryan: Extremely High Temperatures During the World Trade Center Destruction, January 2008
Environmental Anomalies at the World Trade Center: Evidence for Energetic Materials, August 2008
More Evidence for Energetic Materials, May 2008
Kevin Ryan was the Manager of Environmental Health Laboratories, a division of Underwriters Laboratories. After publicly questioning the inconsistencies he identified in the official government report on the causes of the building collapses at the World Trade Center, Kevin Ryan was promptly fired as Manager. (Legal Defense Fund For Kevin Ryan: http://www.ultruth.com/)

Excerpts from Ryan’s letter (UL is Underwriters Laboratories, the company that certified the steel components used in the construction of the World Trade Center):

 Testing by UL determined “that the buildings should have easily withstood the thermal stress caused by pools of burning jet fuel.”

 “We know that the steel components were certified to ASTM E119. The time temperature curves for this standard require the samples to be exposed to temperatures around 2000F for several hours. And as we all agree, the steel applied met those specifications. Additionally, I think we can all agree that even un-fireproofed steel will not melt until reaching red-hot temperatures of nearly 3000F.”

 “The results of your recently published metallurgical tests seem to clear things up, and support your team’s August 2003 update as detailed by the Associated Press, in which you were ready to ‘rule out weak steel as a contributing factor in the collapse.’ The evaluation of paint deformation and spheroidization seem very straightforward, and you noted that the samples available were adequate for the investigation. Your comments suggest that the steel was probably exposed to temperatures of only about 500F (250C), which is what one might expect from a thermodynamic analysis of the situation.

However the summary of the new NIST report seems to ignore your findings, as it suggests that these low temperatures caused exposed bits of the building’s steel core to ‘soften and buckle.’ Additionally this summary states that the perimeter columns softened, yet your findings make clear that ‘most perimeter panels (157 of 160) saw no temperature above 250C.’ To soften steel for the purposes of forging, normally temperatures need to be above 1100C. However, this new summary report suggests that much lower temperatures would be able to not only soften the steel in a matter of minutes, but lead to rapid structural collapse.”

 “This story just does not add up. If steel from those buildings did soften or melt, I’m sure we can all agree that this was certainly not due to jet fuel fires of any kind, let alone the briefly burning fires in those towers.”

Test models of the WTC steel were tested by UL and those test models did not fail at temperatures much higher than those from the fires of 9/11. Ryan concluded:

• The temperatures were far too low to soften the steel.

• The floors could not have collapsed from the impact and fires.

• Up-to-date fireproofing had recently been installed in the Twin Towers:

“After the 1993 bombing, the fireproofing in both buildings was updated considerably.”

• The impact from a Boeing 767 could not have widely dislodged the fireproofing under any impact, let alone dislodge the fireproofing so far away from the point of impact.

Watch Improbable Collapse:
http://video.google.com/googleplayer.sw ... en&fs=true

17. In another peer-reviewed study, it was determined that seismic activity clearly identified explosions separate from the jetliner impacts:

“On September 11, 2001, the seismic stations grouped around New York City recorded seismic events from the WTC site, two of which occurred immediately prior to the aircraft impacts upon the Twin Towers. Because these seismic events preceded the collisions, it is clear they were not associated with the impacts and must therefore be associated with some other occurrence. None of the authorities charged with the responsibility for the investigation of the events of 9/11 have proposed a source for these seismic events, nor have they given a valid reason for the difference in times between the seismic events and the aircraft impacts. Only by consideration of the evidence of
basement explosions before the aircraft impacts, as experienced by William Rodriquez and 36 others, can an explanation be found for the fact that the seismic stations recorded seismic events originating from the WTC sites prior to the aircraft impacts.”

“This is neither theory nor hypothesis, but a statement of publicized facts regarding the timing of the aircraft impacts. There exist two separate precision data time sets that address when the aircraft crashed into the Towers. Both data time sets are based on UTC (Coordinated Universal Time, the world’s atomic clock system) and the sources that determined these times were prestigious, reliable and credible. There is no question regarding the precision and accuracy of the instruments used to record both data time sets, since their entire function depends and relies upon temporal accuracy, and therefore there can be no doubt that both data time sets are correct. The time data sets represent objective scientific data recorded by two separate, independent entities. The problem is the data sets have different impact times.”

CONCLUSION:

“Because these signals preceded the impacts there can be no doubt that the seismic signals recorded were not those associated with the aircraft impacts on the Towers. These signals were in fact the seismic spikes associated with the huge basement explosions reported by witnesses.” (Furlong & Ross; 2006)

18. MIT Scientist/Engineer Dr. Jeff King’s scientific study analyzing the WTC Collapse Forensics also determined that:

a. The black smoke in each building signified slow-burning inefficient fires in an oxygen-deprived environment.

b. The 47 Core Columns were hermetically sealed and absent of fuel for the fires. They were intentionally sealed to limit oxygen, prevent “chimney effect” and seal off to stop a fire.

c. The small puffs of smoke emanating from the sides of the buildings as they collapsed were signs of controlled demolition.

d. The immediate formations of large dust clouds as collapse initiated were distinctively compatible with demolition and were not compatible with collapse due to fires.

e. Concrete and other building materials were literally reduced to powder before hitting the ground, which is consistent only with demolition. If a building collapses due to fire or other hazards, concrete and other heavy materials are not reduced to powder.

f. It is noteworthy that there were reports of underground explosions in both towers.

g. Extensive damage visible in the lobby of the building prior to the initiation of collapse is further evidence of controlled demolition.

h. There are clear signs that explosives were used and that is, in fact, the only plausible explanation from the standpoint of the collapse forensics.

19. The Biggest Smoking Gun: Collapse Of Building 7

World Trade Center 7 was a 47-story steel-reinforced skyscraper about 400 feet away from the Twin Towers. No plane crashed into WTC 7 on 9/11. Yet, at 5:21 p.m. on 9/11, the 47-story building collapsed at near free-fall speed in precisely the fashion of a controlled demolition.

Juan_Bottom wrote:I know, that was too much.

hecter wrote:Nobody said anything about melting steel and nobody said anything about jet fuel.

hecter wrote:You just have to weaken it, and clearly there were fires going on in the building as you can see plumes of black smoke billowing out of it.

hecter wrote:The fires were burning for quite some time which clearly weakened the supports, as you can literally see the building being pulled inwards.

“I believe that the building probably could sustain multiple impacts of jetliners because this structure is like mosquito-netting on your screen door—this intense grid. And the jet plane is just a pencil puncturing that screen netting. It really does nothing to the screen netting.”

One “could cut away all the first story columns on one side of the building, and partway from the corners of the perpendicular sides, and the building could still withstand design live loads and a 100 mph wind from any direction.”

“Never before in the history of the world has a steel building collapsed due to fire.”

• 100,000 Ton Heat Sink to absorb excess heat;
• Updated fireproofing and a fire control system designed to prevent “chimney effect” and suffocate fires by depriving them of oxygen.

a. The 47 massive steel core columns of each of the towers were adequately designed to withstand collapse.4. Structural steel begins to melt at 1510 degrees Celsius (2750 degrees Fahrenheit) and only if that temperature is maintained over a long period of time. Burning jet fuel can only reach temperatures of 1120 degrees Celsius and decreases in temperature if the fuel feeding it is being depleted (as was the case in the Twin Towers). Therefore, the temperature from the burning jet fuel (commonly cited as the reason for weakening the structure) could not possibly have melted the steel-reinforced columns.
The point becomes moot very quickly anyway because, as FEMA acknowledged, the level of dissipation of the jet fuel precluded its ability to burn long enough to even threaten structured steel

Part of the problem is that people (including engineers) often confuse temperature and heat. While they are related, they are not the same. Thermodynamically, the heat contained in a material is related to the temperature through the heat capacity and the density (or mass). Temperature is defined as an intensive property, meaning that it does not vary with the quantity of material, while the heat is an extensive property, which does vary with the amount of material. One way to distinguish the two is to note that if a second log is added to the fireplace, the temperature does not double; it stays roughly the same, but the size of the fire or the length of time the fire burns, or a combination of the two, doubles. Thus, the fact that there were 90,000 L of jet fuel on a few floors of the WTC does not mean that this was an unusually hot fire. The temperature of the fire at the WTC was not unusual, and it was most definitely not capable of melting steel.” (Eager & Musso, 2001)

5. The fires were not raging infernos. Quite to the contrary, they were controllable fires. F.D.N.Y. Battalion 7 Chief Orio Palmer, a marathon runner, reached the “hot spot” on the 78th floor of the South Tower. He was soon joined by Fire Marshall Ronald Bucca, another avid runner, who had just raced up all 78 floors to join him. They were the first to reach the impact zone and appraise the damage from the fires. They radioed the firefighters from Ladder Company 15 who were running up the stairs in full gear. Battalion 7 Chief Palmer had assessed the damage and radioed down that he could get them put out with two fire lines. The following is a verbatim transcript of his radio transmission at 9:52 a.m. on 9/11:

BATTALION 7 CHIEF ORIO PALMER:

“Battalion Seven. Ladder 15, we’ve got two isolated pockets of fire. We should be able to knock it down with two lines. Radio that, 78th floor, numerous 10-45 Code Ones.”

(“10-45 Code Ones” is referential to dead bodies)
It is extremely noteworthy that the radio transmissions of Battalion 7 Chief Orio Palmer and the radio responses to it literally occurred only seconds prior to the total collapse in WTC 2. According to the official U.S. government explanation, at that moment there should have been massive structural failings at that section of the building at that time. Therefore, according to the official version, the firefighters should have been rushing panic-struck to evacuate anyone that they could and as rapidly as they could, including themselves. Yet they are not doing so. What they are doing at that moment, in reality, is calmly and professionally preparing to move up to floor 79 to rescue more people. Below are their transmissions from moments before the collapse:
LADDER 15:

“Chief, what stair you in?”

BATTALION 7 CHIEF ORIO PALMER:

“South stairway Adam, South Tower.”

LADDER 15:

“Floor 78?”

BATTALION 7 CHIEF ORIO PALMER:

“Ten-four. Numerous civilians, we gonna need two engines up here.”

BATTALION 7 CHIEF ORIO PALMER:

“Tower one. Battalion Seven to Ladder 15.”

LADDER 15:

“Fifteen.”

BATTALION 7 CHIEF ORIO PALMER:

“I’m going to need two of your firefighters Adam stairway to knock down two fires. We have a house line stretched, we could use some water on it, knock it down, ’kay?”

LADDER 15:

“Alright, ten-four. We’re coming up the stairs. We’re on 77 now in the B stair. I’ll be right to you.”

BATTALION 7 OPERATIONS TOWER ONE:

“Battalion Seven Operations Tower One to Battalion Nine. Need you on floor above 79. We have access stairs going up to 79, ’kay?”

BATTALION NINE:

“Alright, I’m on my way up, Orio.”

At 9:55 a.m. is the final radio transmission from Battalion Chief Palmer and Fire Marshall Bucca, as the building suddenly and literally implodes:

BATTALION 7 CHIEF ORIO PALMER:

“Battalion Seven. Ladder 15–”

At that moment F.D.N.Y. Battalion Seven Commander Orio Palmer and Fire Marshall Ronald Bucco were both killed in action, along with 341 fellow members of F.D.N.Y. who were unable to evacuate in time because the buildings imploded suddenly and without warning.

In summary:

• F.D.N.Y reported “two isolated pockets of fire” near the impact zone in the South Tower.
• F.D.N.Y. also reported that it would only take two fire lines to extinguish the fires in the South Tower.
• The fires were compartmentalized and contained. The structure sustained the impact and sealed off the fires from expanding, just as it was designed to do:
“In fact, the Towers did what they were built to do.”
• FEMA conceded that the jet fuel was totally consumed within the first few minutes after impact.
• Yet FEMA would have us believe that:

“This was somehow enough to bring down the Tower’s 47-steel-column core, 236 exterior columns, and thousands of steel trusses, all at the same time.”

“Molten iron is the product of the incendiary Thermite, a cutter charge which is used in many controlled demolitions. There is no other conceivable source of molten metal found at the base of World Trade Center 7. Hydrocarbon fires burn 1700 degrees maximum. Molten metal, molten iron in this case, and most all molten metals burn- they need 2700 degrees to create them. We’re missing a 1000 degrees of energy, of temperature.”

• FEMA finds rapid oxidation and intergranular melting on structural steel samples
• More than 1000 Bodies are unaccounted for — 700 tiny bone fragments found on top of nearby buildings
• Chemical signature of Thermate (high tech incendiary) found in slag, solidified molten metal, and dust samples by Physics Professor Steven Jones, Ph.D.
• Examination of the forensic metallurgy of WTC steel “reveal a phenomenon never before observed in building fires: eutectic reactions, which caused ‘intergranular melting capable of turning a solid steel girder into Swiss cheese.’”
• Building 7 was typical of a classic demolition: “An implosion causing a vertical collapse at free-fall speed into a consolidated rubble pile.” WTC 7 was “straight-down symmetrical into its own footprint.

Neoteny wrote:That was kinda ridiculous.

Juan_Bottom wrote:

hecter wrote:Nobody said anything about melting steel and nobody said anything about jet fuel.

But that's how they claim that the steel was weakened.
Wrong. It isn't melting, it's just incredibly hot and flexible. When you apply pressure to flexible things, it bends. In a building, that's very bad. Jet fuel would be an easy way to start the fires, but it definitely was not the only thing burning in that building.

hecter wrote:You just have to weaken it, and clearly there were fires going on in the building as you can see plumes of black smoke billowing out of it.

Just because there was fire doesn't mean the fire did any real damage.
But it could do damage. It's fire, it's what fire does.

hecter wrote:The fires were burning for quite some time which clearly weakened the supports, as you can literally see the building being pulled inwards.

I disagree I don't think that the fires could have weakened the supports. The jet fuel does not burn hot enough to melt the steel used in construction. And the fires were small and fairly contained. Not to mention the collapse of one tower was so unlikely, yet still happened three times.
Again, nobody said anything about melting steel. And just because a fire is contained doesn't mean it's not burning extremely hot.

Juan_Bottom wrote:It still doesn't make good sense to me. These planes didn't hit the top floor right? And they didn't do even damage on the floors that they hit. I mean, the impact and exit sides of the tower would have beendifferent... but then why did the towers collapse on their own footprints?

Backglass wrote:The buildings had incredible mass compared to the airplanes. There is no way they would fall like a tree being felled by a lumberjack.

Think about this. Every once in a while you here about a drunk driver plowing into a house. Why doesnt the house just topple over like a house-of-cards? Mass.