*Conspiracy Theorists

Here are some interesting links that address the conspiracy theories behind the fall of the Three WTC buildings, among other things.

First, Protec Services, a company of demolitions experts, wrote an interesting whitepaper refuting many of the conspeorists' claims on how the towers fell. And unlike the conspeorists, they are experts in demolotion. And they say, essentially, "We know demolotions, this wasn't it." Read the report. It's only 12 pages and rather interesting. I haven't found anything particularly suspect about Protec, yet. They introduce seismology data though, which is helpful. They confirm my complaints with the conspiracy theorists, though. Namely, they have only visual/anecdotal information, and they aren't really consulting with demolition experts.



And here is a page that links a number of resources that confirm or refute the conspiracy theories with regard to 9/11.

So, I sat down and watched Loose Change 2 again, in conjunction with watching Nova's episode on Why the Towers Fell.

The movie Loose Change, when viewed by itself, raises a lot of questions, as well as suspicions when viewed by itself. When you watch it alongside a program like Nova, however, you realize how much they are missing.

Please note that this discussion will only involve the North and South Towers of the World Trade Center. Loose Change also addresses the plane crash into the Pentagon, and the plane that crashed in Pennsylvania. I don't have enough information to address those points.

LC(Loose Change) tries to establish the reason for skepticism of the towers falling due to the plane collisions by citing a number ofsky scrapers that survived plane crashes and multi-floor fires. However, they do not go into any detail about how those buildings were designed compared to how the WTC was built. This is a noteworty point, because the buildings were contructed differently.

Take the Empire State Building. It was not as tall as the WTC towers, and it was built with a steel grid frame across the whole floor of the building. This reduced the amount of space that could be leased out, as well as minimized open space.

The WTC was made differently. Aside from being much taller, they designed a core that contained the steel grid design, along with all the elevator shafts. The exterior of the building was also constructed with steel frames. This helped ensure the buildings could withstand the force of wind without being knocked over. The core and the shell were linked via floor trusses. This ensured it was stable. At least, as we know now, it was stable for most incidents. All the steel was treated with fire-retardant foam. The core was encased with fire resistant dry wall. The dry wall was fire resistant, but not strong. You could easily chisel through it with a window squeegy, as one survivor did when he was trapped in the elevator shaft.

The LC writer claimed the WTC core was "hermetically sealed". This doesn't quite explain the nature of the core as indicated above from the Nova program.

The LC writers simply wanted us to know that a number of designers said that the building was designed to withstand plane collisions and bombs and impervious to just about anything. What Nova reveals is that back when the WTC was designed, they lacked certain modelling tools that would allow them to truly address what happens to the building with that much jet fuel.

Furthermore, when the planes impacted the WTC, they flame retardant materials were blown away from the steel. Much of the steel found in the ruins was missing almost all of the flame retardant features. the dry wall was gone. The jet fuel served as lighter fluid to whatever remained in the building, starting fires on all the floors that were initially impacted. Once that happened, the Jet fuel burned off, but anything flammable did the rest of the work. The heat was strong enough to cause the steel to soften. Combine that with the increased load on the steel beams that were still in tact after the plan collission, and you have a whole lot of pressure bearing down on softened steel. So, the trusses give way, the floors start to collapse, and bam-bam-bam, the building goes down, floor by floor, building up incredible momentum.

The LC group then gets witness accounts of people who say the building looked like a controlled demolition. Given the way the trusses gave way, that's pretty much how it would look. Sadly, just because something looks or sounds like a controlled demolition doesn't mean it is one. Case in point: the Congressional office building that was shut down earlier this week on reports of gun shots that were actually construction noises.

In conclusion, the Nova episode gave us a lot more information about the structural causes of the collapse that the LC crew didn't care to go into.

Furthermore, if the truth scholars thoughts that the 9/11 attacks were fabricated by Cheney, Bush, et al, I'm surprised they are still alive. If the FBI and CIA could pull off a major coup like the the 9/11 attacks, they could easily have most of the truth scholars sent to a time-share at exotic Gitmo. Or they could all perish from bullshit poisoning.