The History of High Rise Collapses

I am sure someone has already posted this, but this is one of the things about the 9/11 O.S i find the hardest to believe. How many times do we need to show you that FIRE COULD NOT COLLAPSE THE WTC. This isnt a flight of fancy, this isn't making stuff up, this isn't self denial. The WTC buildings would be the only ones ever in the history of high rise buildings to ever collapse from a building fire, odds that are probably astronomical. Im not saying that the towers were brought down by controlled demo (even though i am of a mind to say that they were), im saying what the towers WERENT brought down by, and that would be fire. But just in case you think that fire would bring down the buildings here are some examples throughout history that DIDNT collapse from fire.

Source

The history of high-rise, steel-framed buildings spans only about 100 years. Still, there are a number of very hot, large, and long lasting fires to review. One in particular, the Empire State Building, suffered a severe fire when it was struck by a B-25 bomber. The fire was fueled by high-octane gasoline, when the plane hit the 78th and 79th floors.

So lets go through the history ok?

July 28, 1945—The Empire State Building—New York, NY
The B-52 that crashed into the empire state building

A 102-story building. The 79th floor endured most of the impact, but fuel reportedly ran down stairwells as far as the 75th floor. The blaze was extinguished by N.Y. firefighters after about three hours and remained isolated within those floors. Most of the plane’s wreckage remained inside the building. There was no collapse.

Say What? A B-25 Crashed into it and it didnt collapse?
What the Wiki Says about a B-25...thats a pretty interesting story. A Bomber flew into a building...yet no collapse..



Pretty good fire too..

August 5, 1970—One New York Plaza—New York, NY
Source

A 50-story building. Two people died. Only the top two floors were involved. Still, the fire burned for more than six hours. There was no collapse.

Source 2

1 New York Plaza is a 50-story office tower less than a mile from the World Trade Center site. It suffered a severe fire and explosion on August 5, 1970. The fire started around 6 PM, and burned for more than 6 hours.

WOWSERS! It burned for 6 Hours and No Collapse?

Ohhh and this is where it gets realllllyyyyy juicey

February 13, 1975—World Trade Center—North Tower—New York, NY
Source

A 110-story building. Twenty-eight firemen were reported injured. The fire began on the 11th floor shortly before midnight, spreading to limited portions of six other floors via electrical wiring and through small openings in floor slabs for telephone cables. The fire burned for approximately three hours. FDNY Captain of Engine Company Six Harold Kull later said, “It was like fighting a blow torch.” There was no collapse. As a result of this fire, sprinkler systems, elevator shaft dampers and electrical system fireproofing were installed in both towers.

Did that say it burned for 3 hours, no collapse and that fireproofing was installed on BOTH TOWERS? Surely this is a fluke, and its not mentioned anywhere else right....well except maybe here

So, this was a very serious fire which spread over some 65 per cent of the eleventh floor (the core plus half the office area) in the very same building that supposedly "collapsed" on 9/11 due to a similar, or lesser, fire. This fire also spread to a number of other floors. And although it lasted over 3 hours, it caused no serious structural damage and trusses survived the fires without replacement and supported the building for many, many more years after the fires were put out. It should be emphasized that the North Tower suffered no serious structural damage from this fire. In particular, no trusses needed to be replaced That the 1975 fire was more intense than the 9/11 fires is evident from the fact that it caused the 11th floor east side windows to break and flames could be seen pouring from these broken windows. This indicates a temperature greater than 700°C. In the 9/11 fires the windows were not broken by the heat (only by the aircraft impact) indicating a temperature below 700°C

Lets continue shall we?
May 4, 1988—First Interstate Bank—Los Angeles, CA
Source

A 62-story building. The fire broke out late in the evening starting on the 12th floor. The blaze gutted four floors and damaged a fifth. Due to the combined efforts of 64 fire companies and a total of 383 firefighters and paramedics, the fire was extinguished in three hours and 40 minutes. There was no collapse

More on this ....do...do those buildings look like what i think they look like?

Moving on
February 23, 1991—One Meridian Plaza—Philadelphia, PA
Source

A 38-story building. Three firefighters died and 24 more were injured. Until 9/11, this had been the most devastating fire in U.S. history. This blaze burned for 18 hours and gutted eight floors (the 22nd-29th) before being halted by an upper floor equipped with an automatic sprinkler system. There was no collapse.

More on that

On February 23, 1991, at about 8:23 PM, a fire began on the 22nd floor of the building. It was a Saturday night and there were only three people in the building at the time, an engineer and two security guards.[1] Workers had been refinishing woodwork in a vacant office earlier in the day and workers left a pile of rags soaked in linseed oil on the floor. The linseed oil generated enough heat to ignite the rags which then set fire to other solvents nearby.[10] Smoke detectors did not cover the entire floor and by the time the fire alarm went off the fire was already well established. After the fire alarm sounded in the building the engineer went up to the 22nd floor to investigate. When the elevator reached the 22nd floor the engineer found heavy smoke and heat which prevented him from reaching the elevator controls he needed to return to the lobby. The engineer escaped after radioing to a security guard in the lobby to recall the elevator using fire safety controls there. The second security guard was on the 30th floor when the alarm went off and used the stairwell to get to the ground floor.[1]

October 18, 2004—Parque Central—East Tower—Caracas, Venezuela
Source

A 56-story building. There were no fatalities but 40 firefighters were injured. This fire broke out shortly before midnight on the 34th floor, burned for over 17 hours and spread over 26 floors, reaching the roof. There was no collapse.“Engineers have gone up there and inspected,” Caracas Fire Chief Rodolfo Briceno later said, adding, “It is very solid.”

It was dubbed the Towering Inferno of Caracas
Linky
Burned for 17 hours and and spread over 26 floors

The blaze began before midnight Saturday on the 34th floor of the East Tower in the complex, Briceno said. By Sunday afternoon, it had burned for more 17 hours and spread over 26 floors, reaching the roof. The complex was built in 1976 and is considered a Caracas landmark.

That smoke pattern looks familiar



And Just Recently
February 9, 2009—Mandarin Oriental Hotel—Beijing, China

A 44-story building (photo at head of story). One firefighter died and seven other people were injured, six of them firefighters. The nearly completed hotel was reportedly set ablaze accidentally by fireworks.

Source 2

The most recent example of a spectacular skyscraper fire was the burning of the Hotel Mandarin Oriental starting on February 9, 2009. The nearly completed 520-foot-tall skyscraper in Beijing caught fire around 8:00 pm, was engulfed within 20 minutes, and burned for at least 3 hours until midnight. Despite the fact that the fire extended across all of the floors for a period of time and burned out of control for hours, no large portion of the structure collapsed.

Daaang...THATS a fire!! So. All these buildings, all these sources.....do you still think that the 3 WTC buildings were the ONLY ones to ever collapse into their own footprints due to fire? But hey, maybe im crazy, well...so are the victims families that want a new investigation then huh? Or maybe the firefighters on the scene were crazy? The paramedics? The architects that want a new investigation? Maybe its just mass hysteria right? I mean, no self respecting person would ever question the official story....thats just crazy talk! FIRE DID NOT BRING DOWN THE TOWERS. Maybe, JUST MAYBE if they had been burning for days and days and days, the fire could have gotten hot enough (un-likely), but to say that the fires got hot enough to

Collapse WTC South Tower (2WTC) in approx 56 minutes? Link
Collapse WTC North Tower (1WTC) in approx 102 minutes? link
Collapse WTC Bldg 7 (wasnt even hit by a plane) in 7hrs? Link

reply to post by itbenickp


You're not crazy, you're just reposting something that's been posted constantly for nearly a decade.

Perhaps when you're not so busy copying and pasting conspiracy websites, you could actually research the facts of the case, rather than claiming that because other buildings didn't fall, no building can fall.

For example, no building on 911 fell into its own footprint. Every collapsing building did significant damage to buildings around it, and in all cases required at least one of those buildings to be demolished.

These facts have also been known for nearly a decade, how have you missed them?

Originally posted by itbenickp
The WTC buildings would be the only ones ever in the history of high rise buildings to ever collapse from a building fire,

Funny how any high rise building hit by a high speed jet airliner has collapsed, a fact that you totally ignore as it destroys your conspiracy theory....

do you still think that the 3 WTC buildings were the ONLY ones to ever collapse into their own footprints

Why do truthers persist with that lie? They did not fall into their own footprint, how do you think the other WTC buildings were damaged?

Funny how the 9/11 commision solves the problem of Bldg 7 by not even mentioning it wouldnt want obvious things standing in the way of a good investigation now would we lol.

reply to post by exponent

Might wanna click some of those links. Not all from "conspiracy websites".

Originally posted by itbenickp
Funny how the 9/11 commision solves the problem of Bldg 7 by not even mentioning it

wouldnt want obvious things standing in the way of a good investigation now would we lol.

Funny how you don't even know what the 911 commission was for. Why are you just parroting claims you've read on a website without trying to think things through for yourself?

You don't think other people have been to these sites and copied the arguments here in the last 9 years? Did you even bother to do a search before posting?

reply to post by exponent

Orrrrrr....we could shut everyone up on both sides of the arguement by doing a new investigation? Hey, truthers and debunkers alike could call for it. I mean that would be the fair thing to do right? Right? Tell me why we cant have another look see into it. Let the government at least release all the evidence that they have locked up, all the vids from around the pentagon, the CVR's, all the supposed wreckage they found from the pentagon, put EVERYTHING out on the table. Go over it piece by piece by lil piece. Be nice if we could look at the rubble from the WTC's...aw crap, cant do that its in china. Why so quick to get rid of it? Why did they cover the lawn of the pentagon with dirt and gravel afterwards? Why did they confiscate all the video from around the pentagon and then release only 5 frames of a security video? I mean surely if a plane had hit the pentagon and it got captured on video that would prove thier case wouldnt it? Shut all of us whacko truthers up right? Thats what gets me about all of this. It dont matter what POV you have on it, a new investigation and declassifying everything from that day would solve alot of issue, questions and problems in one fell swoop. So why wouldnt they do that? Why hide anything about that day if there is nothing to hide?

Originally posted by itbenickp
reply to post by exponent

 

Orrrrrr....we could shut everyone up on both sides of the arguement by doing a new investigation? Hey, truthers and debunkers alike could call for it. I mean that would be the fair thing to do right? Right? Tell me why we cant have another look see into it.

Who's going to run it? How will secret information be kept secret? What authority will be conferred?

aw crap, cant do that its in china. Why so quick to get rid of it? Why did they cover the lawn of the pentagon with dirt and gravel afterwards?

Ding ding ding! More copying and pasting without doing any fact checking.

Why did they confiscate all the video from around the pentagon and then release only 5 frames of a security video? I mean surely if a plane had hit the pentagon and it got captured on video that would prove thier case wouldnt it? Shut all of us whacko truthers up right?

Sure, but if they don't have that video, they don't have that video. They can't release video that doesn't exist now can they?

Thats what gets me about all of this. It dont matter what POV you have on it, a new investigation and declassifying everything from that day would solve alot of issue, questions and problems in one fell swoop. So why wouldnt they do that? Why hide anything about that day if there is nothing to hide?

There already have been several investigations, in my opinion truthers will never stop calling for another investigation until they get the 'correct' result.

reply to post by exponent


We wont stop unti EVERYTHING is disclosed. Every photo, every scrap of material, every witness testimony, til Bush and Cheney get on the stand in public to answer questions, til absolute everything is out in the open. And are you telling me that there is NO film from the pentagon other than those 5 frames? Really? So what is the government doing with my tax money that they cant afford more than one camera at the pentagon lol. If it was such a clear cut case then why are people still saying "whoa, something aint right here folks". The fire fighters at the scene knew something was fishy. Are you trying to tell me that fire fighters dont know what they are talking about? Im not a fire fighter but im pretty inclined to believe what a fire fighter on the ground, during 9/11 has to say about what they saw......

you are absolutley right the towers wasnt brought down by fire. So what could have caused the towers to collapse? you dont think an aeroplane flying straight into it at over 500mphs could have caused any structural damage, which weakened the building and then fire heating the steel girders softening them up, causing the 1000tonnes plus of weight bearing down on it from above to collapse......(Sarcasm included....)

reply to post by itbenickp

Be nice if we could look at the rubble from the WTC's...aw crap, cant do that its in china. Why so quick to get rid of it? Why did they cover the lawn of the pentagon with dirt and gravel afterwards?

" Be nice " if you people would stop repeating the same old lies over and over again .The steel from the rubble was not 'rushed' off to China . A significant amount of it is still being stored at JFK . The scrap that was sold did not all go to China , either . Do yourself a favor and do a little bit of research before coming on here to simply repeat what you have heard from other truthers .

"Why did they cover the lawn of the Pentagon with dirt and gravel " ?

That right there is a real classic . Have you ever tried to drive heavy equipment across a lawn ?

If a significant amount of it is still being stored a JFK, have they let anyone go do any kind of metalurgical analysis on it? Look, i know you guys are sick and tired of us truthers. I get it. We ask way to many questions, we dont believe the official story, but dangit, if the official story made sense we woulndt need to question it.

-How is it that we have ever only seen 5 frames from the pentagon?
-Where did the film from all around the pentagon go and why cant we see it?
-Why did some of the steel from the WTC look like it had been cut?
-Why was there no fighter intercepts that day? Besides the convenience of all the war games going on
-Why did Bush stick around for a photo op when his nation was under attack?
-Why did the fire fighters in the WTC's think they could hande the fire then all of a sudden it collapses?

There are more questions. If it wasnt an inside job then there was an absurd amount of luck that 19 terrorists with box cutters had. If it wasnt an inside job then our national security was a joke at that time and it was an audacius amount of imcompetance that lead to many lives being lost. Yet no one has been fired, suspended or brought up on charges of criminal negligence. There are victims family members that want more answers as well. You cant keep saying move along, we've discussed that already when there are still people that want more information. Geesh, if i was the presidant, and the people i worked for were asking for more information about why so many of our american citizens lost their lives, what led up to it, what all happened, before during and after, i would make every single peice of information i had available to them, i wouldnt sit with my BFF in a closed session and not let anything that was talked about in there a state secret. Its called transparency in government lol. And we lost it along time ago. I weep for our children, my neices for what kind of police state they will live in if we cant change the way things are. I will never shut up about what i believe until it is proven to me beyond all doubt that the official story actually happened they way they say it happened. In an honest investigation there is no closed door sessions, witnesses are totally dis regarded. Its an affront to the american people to not disclose everything from that day. Period.

reply to post by itbenickp


Wow another "genius" posting same old crap.....

Why am I not surprised.....

reason most high raise dont collapse from fire is that they dont have jet airliners with 10,000 gal of fuel rammed into them at 500 mph

Do you forget that little fact?

Take the Empire State Building - the B25 which hit it weighed less than 1/15 that of the 767 that hit WTC - also
traveling at estimated 1/3 the impact speed. The impact forces at ESB where less than 1% of the WTC

Wonder why ESB still standing ?

Fire - the fuel load of the B25 was than 1/10 that of WTC. Also in 1945 the office fuel load was much less
than today do to synthetic materials in modern buildings.

The fire at ESB had almost burned itself out by time FDNY reached impact floors.

Which is another point -

NO Firefighting at WTC - do to fact all the elevators were smashed on impact preventing FF from getting to impact floors

In the other buildings sited - Meridian Plaz/Interstate Bank - the fire fighting systems were intact. That is the standpipes that deliver water in buildings were operable. In WTC were smahed by aircraft impact. Sprinkler systems were intact - at Meridan Plaza it was sprinklers that extinguished fire after Philadelphia FD spent 11 hours and lost 3 men trying to supress it. One floor with sprinklers (30th) put out fire

Another factor was in these cases the incident occured "after hours" (ESB on Saturday), others at night)

FF did not have to evacuate building as already empty and contend with getting thousands of people out of the way.

Your facts are bogus and logic is faulty

About par for "truthers"

-How is it that we have ever only seen 5 frames from the pentagon?

There is several minutes out there you just have to look. But only the first few show the plane, the rest is fire and smoke.

-Where did the film from all around the pentagon go and why cant we see it?

The others are interior shots or exterior ones that don’t show the impact.

-Why did some of the steel from the WTC look like it had been cut?

The cleanup crews cut beams.

-Why was there no fighter intercepts that day?

8:46 The first plane hits everyone is wondering what happened. No one had used passenger planes as flying bombs. Had you thought of doing that before 911? There is no reason to issue anything from the White House at that point in time. It could have been a tragic accident.

9:03 The second plane hits. Ok now you know something is going on. Are there others? You don’t know. So now’s the time to scramble some fighters. Where do you send them? Over the water? Down south? Obviously you send them to NYC since both towers have been hit. Boston? Washington? Miami? Where? Where do you send the planes??

9:33 The tower at Reagn tells the secret service “There a plane heading at you and he’s not talking to us”. Less than 1 minute later the towers reports “the plane had turned and is approaching Reagn Int Airport”. Looks like it’s landing doesn’t it? If there were fighters in the area would you have issued orders to shoot it down? How does the tower tell the fighter EXACTLY which passenger plane they want shot down? Washington has a lot of airspace.

9:37 It hits the Pentagon.

9:45 US airspace is closed. Imagine the change in flight patterns as all planes head to airports. At this point they have good suspensions about flight 93 but it’s a long distance from any major targets like NYC or Washington. Was there a fighter nearby? I don’t know. If you shoot it down and it’s not related, someone is in big trouble.

10:01 Flight 93 is seen to be waving it’s wings. Ahh it’s giving up! No reason to shoot it down now.

10:03 It crashed.

From the time they (government) know it’s an attack until the last plane crashed it’s exactly one hour. Just what do you expect to know and do in one hour.
For all of those with itchy trigger fingers, here is a good timeline.
en.wikipedia.org... 11_attacks
If the enemy is behind your front lines you can’t respond very quickly even if you know it’s coming.

As to a previous post about planes hitting and fuel and fire.
The B25 that hit the Empire State building in ’45, had 670 gallons of gasoline, when full and not on a training flight. Realistically 300 gallons
The B767 had taken off with 24,000 gallons of jet fuel.

So that’s 10 trashcans of gas vs 800 trashcans of jet fuel. Just a wee bit of difference.

reply to post by itbenickp


This is very good accurate and pertinent information. Of course you are going to be bashed by THE SAME guys that bash any claim countering the OS in every other thread (no kidding exactly the same guys). They will attack you personally, ignore facts and pretty much derail the thread. But I concur that NO steel core cement buildings in history ever collapsed expressly due to fire.

..Ex

Originally posted by v3_exceed
reply to post by itbenickp

 

This is very good accurate and pertinent information. Of course you are going to be bashed by THE SAME guys that bash any claim countering the OS in every other thread (no kidding exactly the same guys). They will attack you personally, ignore facts and pretty much derail the thread. But I concur that NO steel core cement buildings in history ever collapsed expressly due to fire.

..Ex

Actually, it's the same guys usually because only these same guys seem to see the details you guys are missing.

It's been pointed out time and time again that the towers at the Trade Center Complex were extremely unique in their design, as well as the fact that they were impacted by something no other similar high-rise had ever been impacted by, and then assaulted by fires IN A WAY no other towers had been subjected to.

Plenty of buildings have caught fire. Even a trade tower had a fire years ago, remember? It didn't fall because FIRE ALONE will NOT cause the towers to come down. They have fireproofing for that. But when there is impact + fire + inability to fight the fire + fire not burning itself out (evidenced by the massive amount of smoke pouring out of the buildings) it has to equal collapse.

The Empire State Building can't be compared for a hundred and a half reasons. I've a link in my signature that explains it.

This is not a great thread for evidence that there is more to 9/11 than meets the eye in the collapses (and keep in mind I DO think something is being hidden from us about the collapses), but as it is, the OS does provide a logical explanation for what happened. I haven't found anything in it that contradicts what I saw happened that day.

I remember when I was younger, I saw something about the WTC and the architect, and after the Empire State Building disaster, all skyscrapers in NYC had to be built to withstand an impact from a jet airliner. I don tunderstand how people can insult others by saying "Well a 500mph plane crashed into it, therefore weakening it, duh!"

What, no one ever thought a plane might hit a building before 2001? No one ever, anywhere planned for that contingency? Or for a fire for that matter?

Originally posted by aching_knuckles
I remember when I was younger, I saw something about the WTC and the architect, and after the Empire State Building disaster, all skyscrapers in NYC had to be built to withstand an impact from a jet airliner. I don tunderstand how people can insult others by saying "Well a 500mph plane crashed into it, therefore weakening it, duh!"

What, no one ever thought a plane might hit a building before 2001? No one ever, anywhere planned for that contingency? Or for a fire for that matter?

With some research, you would learn that it's not that simple. The buildings were aged and built before planes of the size and caliber of the airliners existed. They were built to withstand impacts, and they did quite successfully. They stood for an hour after the impact, and probably would have continued standing if there wasn't jet fuel fire and fireproofing blown off.

Id also like to comment about the "Footprint". People are claiming that the footprint theory is a lie, because "other WTC buildings were heavily damaged." So what? How tall was were the Twin Towers? If those bent and collapsed, they would have destroyed entire city blocks. Considering their size, how they came down was completely in their area, or footprint. Actually this is one of the most damning parts of the official story. There was a problem - the WTC was losing buckets of money by the day, and full of asbestos......but you cant just get a permit to bulldoze the most famous NYC landmark.

reply to post by Varemia


I'm not going to get into the argument that the trade center towers were built to withstand exactly this (plane impact). I'm not going to get into the argument that the trade center towers had fires burning that were far below the tolerances for steel to melt/weaken significantly and I'm not going to get into the argument that each floor of the trade center was built to support itself plus the two floors above it. The OS of that day is a fairy tale used to allow the USA to attack anyone it saw fit in retaliation for an attack on it's nation. One would have to be a total moron to believe the OS and I believe you are not that, so I will not argue the point.

I believe that certain OS crusaders are in place to derail any actual debate of the OS. This is a very basic dis informational strategy using rudimentary psychology. As you are a new user, I am certainly not accusing you of being one of these plants, but I believe you will be exposed to them in short order if you haven't already.

..Ex