Super Thermite, might it have been used?

Not much I could find on this, it is a new technolgy nano in it's description.

Is it possible that new technolgies were used to bring down the towers, some of which we were unaware of on 9/11 and shortly thereafter.

These would cause strange explanations, because we just don't know these things even exist and what they can do, or how they would look when used.

Idea's and links would be welcomed, please stick to super thermite.

There are probably more resources on this stuff but here are three I've come across that give some info/credibility to its existence and its new applications to older explosives technology:

Scientists at Los Alamos National Laboratories are exploring the potential to release
energy from nanoparticles – nano explosives. Nanoenergetics is a new field in which
nanoaluminum particles are used as more effective explosives. Just as with the suntan
products, the nanoaluminum presents a higher surface area to volume of the material.
This means that when ignited a greater volume of the aluminum achieves chemical
reaction, releasing its energy, and generating a larger explosion per pound of material.
Nuclear weapons achieve their destructive power in this same way at the very lowest
atomic level. This means that nanoaluminum and the “superthermite” that is made from it
are presenting significantly more powerful weapons than those in use today. Details on
this power and ongoing projects are not publicly available. But, it is instructive that the
experiments are being carried out at the same laboratory that created the designs for most
of the nuclear weapons in the US arsenal (Gartner, 2005).

www.ctonet.org...



From an article entitled Combustion of Consolidated and Confined Metastable Intermolecular Composites (first page only):

The term, Metastable Intermolecular Composites (MIC) refers to an important subset of nanoenergetics. It is also known as a superthermite, or simply nanothermite, which are more descriptive terms. Typical compositions use a nanoscale metal fuel plus a nanoscale metal oxidizer. The reactions produce a large
amount of energy liberated primarily as heat. The high surface to volume ratio and the increased surface
contact between the reactants leads to a very rapid oxidation when compared to conventional (micronscale) thermites. This paper presents a mathematical model for the combustion wave propagation of consolidated and confined MIC pellets. In addition, a review of the current understanding of MIC as related to ignition and combustion mechanisms is presented and organized into four basic categories. Results of published and unpublished investigations on combustion mechanisms, such as ignition and burn rates are compiled and discussed so as to provide a single source of information for the technical community.

From AMPTIAC Quarterly, Vol. 6, No. 1: DOD Researchers Provide A Look Inside Nanotechnology

In recent years researchers have found that energetic materials/ingredients that are produced on the nanoscale have the promise of increased performance in a variety of ways including sensitivity, stability, energy release, and mechanical pro p e rties. As such, they represent a completely new frontier for energetic material research and development with the potential for major payoffs in weapons systems. Very simply, nanoenergetics can store higher amounts of energy than conventional energetic materials and one can use them in unprecedented ways to tailor the release of this energy so as to maximize the lethality of the weapons. The field of nanoenergetics R&D is quite young, but is already undergoing rapid growth. The goal of this article is to give the reader a sense for the physical and chemical characteristics and properties that make these materials so promising.

Thermite is primarily just aluminum and iron oxide. Superthermite or nanothermite is just thermite with super-fine particles, created and put together with modern technology, so that more surface area makes contact between the aluminum and iron oxide, making for a more efficient reaction. It's also more rapid and releases more energy per volume of material.

could we find out the approx. strength of nano thermite so we could estimate how much may of been required to melt the towers? Also I doubt nano thermite alone may of been the culprit, thermite doesn't explode (think concrete) it melts and corrodes materials. The concrete would of just melted away rather than exploding like it did (given enough of it), it doesn't make steel beams fly either. What do you think?

I don't think it was used alone, but I don't think the other devices were conventional, either. There's not much else I would name specifically as far as what exactly was used, in any probability. I think I know something else you have in mind though, Insolubrious, and I tend to lean in that direction too.

[edit on 3-2-2007 by bsbray11]

Theres more than one type of thermite and there is more than one type of super thermite.

The common thermite recipe uses very fine aluminum and iron oxide. The Super thermite i believe you are referencing makes uses of nano-sized aluminum particles. Nano-aluminum is, in and of itself, a high explosive. When mixed with iron oxide it becomes very explosive molten metal.

Nano-thermite also makes a great ingredient for thermobaric devices. Nano-thermite can be dispersed through the air as a dust, then ignited. It is similar to how flour silos explode from the dust in the air.

Some argue that it is difficult to mix the right proportions in the air, and this is non-sense. Thermite contains its own source of oxygen, iron oxide. So once ignited it no longer needs air. Thermite is difficult to ignite, typically, but airborne nano-thermite dust is difficult not to ignite. Even in very small quantities dispersed into the air, it ignites easily. When mixed with potassium perchlorate, a very strong oxidizer, super-thermite becomes explosive flash powder thermite which is WAAAAAY too easy to ignite.

There a a number of ways to ignite it. There are solutions that will ignite thermite from cold. You can use hydrochloric acid and sugar. You can use nano-magnesium dust dispersed through the air.

There are also other thermobaric mists that can be dispersed into the air that will react and ignite themselves. For instance, you can take the bare ingredients for RDX or Nitroglycerin and spray them into the air, at room temperature they will immediately begin to react with each other in a totally out of control fashion forming Nitro or RDX. The temperature will continue to climb during the reaction until it explodes.

Thermobarics are very interesting explosives. There is nothing conventional about them.

The chief difference in Thermobaric design over traditional explosive devices moves away from a densely packed explosive core towards a large volume of highly explosive but low-density mass in the form of a gaseous cloud or colloidal suspension. In the normal bomb all explosive energy comes from a tightly packed core and must drive outward against air pressure and objects it encounters. It rapidly bleeds off energy at the square of the distance as it accumulates a wall of pressure resistance and a mass of heavy debris, which it must continually re-gather and push along.

Thermobarics are a lot like flour silo explosions, A dust of mist is dispersed into the air, then ignited. Resulting in huge pressure waves.

The new design starts as a small device but rapidly transforms itself through simple means (either a small explosive device, or compressed air, or spring loaded mechanisms, or fans, ect.) from a dense-core technology to a much larger gaseous-cloud or colloidal suspension state. Igniting the explosive cloud at any peripheral or central point creates a chain-reaction-like and progressively growing explosive force. As the force of the explosion moves outward, it continues to ignite fresh explosive materials as encountered and gains momentum rather than loosing it. It’s kind of like a super sonic boom effect. Further, because the gaseous cloud is efficiently mixed explosive materials combined with abundant free-air oxygen, ignition is far more complete and productive - leaving little or no chemical residue or traditional flash evidence (other than a burn signature, which any investigator would presume to be from ordinary fire) on immediately encountered objects.

The net result is as if a significantly larger central core device had been detonated, with the complete and even combustion making difficult any aftermath analysis as to the true nature of the explosives used. Finally, the shape of the cloud and the ignition point within the cloud, if properly controlled, provides an extremely easy means to create shaped charge effects despite a relatively free-form original cloud shape.

secondsightresearch.tripod.com...

Thermobaric explosions tend to last longer, and burn slowed, than traditional explosives. This generates higher sustained blast pressures in confined spaces. Explosives burn more completely, and leave little or no tell-tale signs of explosive residue.

Fireballs and blast waves can travel around corners and blast can travel around corners and penetrate areas inaccessible to bomb fragments. Blast waves are extensively intensified when reflected by walls and other surfaces.

Jet fuel cannot melt steel, but some Thermobaric devices can. Thermobaric design can be focused between two extremes; extremely high heat and low pressure, to moderate heat and extreme pressure.

Thermobarics can make use of numerous chemical solutions to use as an aerosol explosive material. Many of these ingredients do not need to be tagged with chemical markers like ingredients used in conventional explosives.

Thermobarics can also make use of colloidal suspensions of metal powders like aluminum and magnesium. It’s kind of like when a flour silo explodes due to all the dust in the air.


As mentioned above, there are other forms of thermite. I am not talking about thermate. All are mixtures of metal dusts, most do not use iron oxide or aluminum. I will not list there ingredients because this post may already draw unwanted attention. However, i will say that these mixtures are incredibly explosive and very very very hot. For those that say it was somehow not possible to use explosives to knock the towers down, its retarded. There are way too many different possibilities of explosives technologies that could have been utilized to even begin to speculate.

To those people that believe small, cold fires can totally shred two large towers, but a small quantity of well placed explosives couldn't.... dont you get tired of contradicting yourselves? Like the people that say WTC7 fell because fires burned out of control because they werent being fought, then turn around and say larry silverstein meant "pull it" was in reference to the firefighters that they just said were not in the building.

I realized anything like C4 or RDX packed into a floor wouldn't have caused the puffs coming out like they were, but I couldn't think of anything that could have caused it either until your post above. That is some nice info for us to follow up on, man.

Btw, WATS.

[edit on 3-2-2007 by bsbray11]

i am still inclinded to believe the thermite we see was a by product of the crash, all the ingredients are there. Aluminium filings and iron oxide (rust). The filings could of been created from the impact then gone on to mix with rust knocked off the building. I would imagine the friction in the crash generated such huge amounts of heat that it was possibly hot enough to trigger the reaction.

Still it does seem a little suspicious, in this scenario you would expect the thermite reaction to start immediately yet it was approx an hour before the thermite was observed. Still that doesnt mean it wasn't there from the start, perhaps it just made its way out in the final moments before the collapse. The thermite only appears to be present in/around the crash zone. Also, if it were a cutter charge then why put it at the edge of the building and where it is in risk of being observed, like it was? If they used it then I would expect it to be on the main core columns or support trusses out of sight, not at the edge.

Its worth reminding you about thermite fire hazards brought about from drilling rusty surfaces with aluminium drill tips. I would like to be able get a reference for that but haven't found one yet. Still if its true this is very similiar to what is happening with the thermite at WTC i think.

Still i do not totally rule out the thermite cutter charge theory, it does seem like they could of used it, possibly.

One major problem with your theory, no rust. A36 structural steel is a High Strength - Low Alloy (HSLA) steel that is alloyed with materials to make it corrosion resistant. Steel is always alloyed with materials such as molybdenum, chromium, nickel, manganese, phosphorus, copper, silicon, zirconium, etc etc etc.

If you were building the tallest skyscraper in the world, would you take the risk of letting it rust and fall apart? Seriously?

Even if there were rust present, the aluminum and rust would need to be powderized. It must be VERY fine for a continued thermite reaction. Now, is it possible for aluminum drill bits to give off dust and create heat that reacts on a rusty surface? Sure, but only in very small amounts.

Why would there be thermite concentrated in that one area? Because they needed to weaken the area around the crash site so as to make it look like the crash was the collapse initialization. If you watch the videos, you will see a very definitive straight dark line below the crash zone with concentrated orange fires right above it. This is a line of thermite being used to weaken the supports.

According to the official story, the thermite you see dripping out of the towers is just aluminum from the plane, since it melts much much lower than steel. However, aluminum is a very very poor source of black body radiaton. Aluminum does not glow orange unless in direct contact with a heat source. When removed from a heat source it turns silver, like mercury, and within seconds hardens.

Aluminum is an excellent radiator of heat. Please, dont try this at home, but if you put aluminum foil in the over under the broil for ten minutes, anything on top of it is very very hot, but you can take the aluminum out with your bare hands. I do it all the time. But please, dont try it at home, id hate to see somebody not know what they're doing and get hurt. I mean, its not rocket science but i just dont want to get sued. The Iron racks in the over will be very very hot too.

On second thought, i think the steel they used in the WTC was designed to build up a very thin oxide layer on the outer surface to protect the internal metal.

Still, i highly doubt this would have been enough rust in the right concentration to cause the types of thermite reactions that we saw.

Do not forget thier is also a Thrmite Fuel Air mixture device.

Its called a HELLHOUND.

THERMITE FUEL-AIR EXPLOSION: This is a very dangerous device. Ask yourself if you really truly want to make it before you do any work on it.

It is next to impossible to give any dimensions of containers or weights
of charges because of the availability of parts changes from one person to
the next. However here is a general description of this device affectionately known as a HELLHOUND.


EXOTIC THERMITES: Thermites can also be made from teflon-magnesium or metalflourides-magnesium or aluminum. If there is an excess of flouride compound in the mixture, flourine gas can be released. Flourine is extremely corrosive and reactive. The gas can cause organic material to burst intoflames by mere contact. For teflon-magnesium use 67% teflon and 33% magnesium.A strong first fire igniter should be used to ignite this mixture. Both theteflon and the magnesium should be in powdered form. Do not inhale anysmoke from the burning mixture.

Yes, the hellhound...

You take a big oil barrel, fill it with kerosene. Place a smaller container with thermite inside of the barrel, and put a small explosive charge at the end of the thermite charge.

Once the barrel is sealed, you ignite the thermite charge which will super heat the kerosene. When the thermite is done burning, the small explosive charge goes off sending shrapnel through the big barrel.

The super-heated kerosene will explode out of the barrel and immediately vaporize. A huge cloud of super-heated kerosene gas mixes with the surrounding air, and when the proper ratio of fuel-air is met, it immediately explodes in a humongous fireball.

I know this is an old thread, but I find the nano-thermite theory pretty reasonable. The recent published article on journalof911studies points out the connection of NIST to nano-thermite. With this information, it's pretty obvious why NIST wouldn't test for explosives. They already knew what they would have found if they did, and it wouldn't have allowed them to come to the conclusion they were supposed to: two planes and ensuing fires brought down three buildings.
Here is the link for reference: www.journalof911studies.com...

Definitely worth considering and on reflection I tend to agree that it is highly unlikely that the plane+rust+impact friction caused a natural thermite reaction since really it would of occurred almost immediately.

Something I heard a few times now as a reason for the presence thermite in the towers (and at the pentagon) is that the military use incendiaries to protect sensitive documents containing classified information, which I can't confim but it wouldn't surprise me if they did. I can see lots of issues with that idea though, one being hazards and second being law. But I guess if the military think its ok to test nukes and build bioweapon farms near populated areas i guess a distributing a few tons of nanothermite painted on their equipment and filing cabinets for security reasons won't matter too much.

Yes the molten metal pouring from the building has yet to be debunked. NIST said it was aluminum but aluminum does not glow orange, even when mixed with organic compounds.

Exactly, I would have to look around again but I had just read where a professor and students tried to prove NIST's claim about aluminum pouring out of the building. They found that NIST was wrong, aluminum is silver even at the temperature that steel melts at and the office debris will not mix with it. They found that wood shavings and other materials would separate out and float on the top, so it is impossible for molten aluminum mixed with office materials to uniformly glow orange like we saw.
Try again NIST...

Edit: here is a link to what I was talking about - www.911review.com...

[edit on 20-7-2008 by PplVSNWO]

reply to post by sp00n1


So in other words, you need to change your story. Funny that.

Originally posted by PplVSNWO
Exactly, I would have to look around again but I had just read where a professor and students tried to prove NIST's claim about aluminum pouring out of the building. They found that NIST was wrong, aluminum is silver even at the temperature that steel melts at and the office debris will not mix with it. They found that wood shavings and other materials would separate out and float on the top, so it is impossible for molten aluminum mixed with office materials to uniformly glow orange like we saw.
Try again NIST...

Edit: here is a link to what I was talking about - www.911review.com...

[edit on 20-7-2008 by PplVSNWO]

This is a perfect example of NIST pulling theories out their arses and claiming them as truth without even trying to do a lab experiment to conclude if they are right or wrong.

Also to note is that this professor and his students were trying to prove NIST correct. But did the exact opposite.

I came across this interesting document earlier, thought I would share it. Some debunkers were claiming no such methods for demolition exists using thermite, and that there was no melted concrete at ground zero since concrete is very hard to melt (The melting point of concrete varies between 1800-2500°C (3272-4532°F)). However I stumbled upon this - from what I can gather it outlines a method of demolition using thermite and a gas source creating a plasma arc to systematically demolish a building in a controlled fashion (less noise too).

US Patent 5532449 - Using plasma ARC and thermite to demolish concrete

www.patentstorm.us...

reply to post by Insolubrious



aluminum tipped drills?? thermite to cut steel beams??
the ignorance in this forum is astounding.

Freefall speeds and molten pools of steel.

Why assume exotic explosive compounds were used when common demolition explosives fit the video and physical evidence?