The science of why it had to be controlled demolition, in laymen's terms

reply to post by ZeuZZ


Unfortunately, nothing you have stated is proof of controlled demolition. I won't claim to have the same educational backing as you, I will admit I'm about as layman (I had to wonder what lamens meant. According to the dictionary: a tool of the ritual magician, a symbolic device meant to embody the spirit of it's owner's magical intent, or, as in many magical orders, a badge of rank or grade.), even I can see that you are only attempting to support those facts that could support your view and then inserting your own hypothesis of events as facts. In your ignorance on certain subjects, you are damaging your argument more than you are helping it.

First, from the opening post is the comment about the top of the building tipping to the side, then beginning to drop straight down since the support below it is gone. This does not prove that explosives were used, it only proves that the floor below (or more specifically, where the two sections of the building had remained in contact) was no longer providing support. While an argument for explosives can be made here, and argument can also be made for fatigue, stress, and simple failure of the structure. With the impact of the aircraft, this would have created multiple fractures in the cement of the affected floors plus expanding of all the expansion joints already existing from the time of construction. Even with rebar reinforcing that cement, those fractures will increase in length, width, and depth, reducing how much weight each section will support. With the ongoing stress of gravity plus other forces (for example: wind), you have forces that are adding strain onto an already damaged structure. I would even hazard a guess that while we were all watching the building burn, it was rocking to and fro. It didn't need to sway more than an inch for that motion to increase those cracks and cause failure.

Next, we have David Griffin's content:

1. He is correct about the sudden heating of steel and the melting/sagging, but we are not talking the steel melting. We are talking about the affect of heat and how in contributed to the loss of strength it had and Malleability. With that steel being heated, it was less resistant to being bent and twisted as the structure struggled against collapse. With the structure warping, it could not efficiently spread to load throughout the rest of the structure, again leading to collapse.

2. Your opening argument conflicts with this statement. The upper floors did begin falling/leaning toward the damaged area. When the support was lost, it did drop down, but the section was at an angle, not sliding down the core, thereby damaging the core on it's descent.

3. A really poor statement and lack of understanding about the mass involved and resistance. As the building is falling, the upper mass impacting the lower mass is increasing adding to the downward force working on an already damaged structure. In the case of the WTC collapsing, the force was increasing exponentially, which each floor was not designed to support. During the collapse, I'm sure there was resistance, but an overwhelming force meeting weak resistance it not going to show much affect.

4. Again, with your opening argument, the buildings did not fall parallel to the core. The upper structure was tipped, tearing down the core as it fell.

5. The dust clouds were a cumulative affect of the many different materials. As was pointed out by Aim64C, you have the blown on fire proofing (which is a mulch of material and has the strength cardboard) and sheetrock (pulverized gypsum and paper. Brittle and easily broken). We can also include all the ceiling tile, printer/copier dry toner, years of accumulated dust and dirt, fiberglass insulation, etc.

(continued below)

reply to post by ZeuZZ



6. Again he's making a blanket statement without presenting all the facts. Take a look at the many pictures of the debris. I sure can see many big chunks of concrete in that mess. Yes, some of the concrete would be "pulverized". With the mass involved in the collapse and the force when it hit the ground, the larger pieces are going to crush the smaller ones.

7. What horizontal ejections are we talking about? Are we talking pieces of the exterior structure falling away or are we talking about debris that flew out exploding windows because of the bellows effect as the buildings collapsed?

8. A sound is not proof of an explosion. Every human being has heard a familiar sound only to find out the cause was something different. Old Time Radio and old movies are a great example of sound being open to interpretation. They didn't have recordings of each sound effect you were hearing. They didn't have a horses gallop on tape, they tapped coconut shells on a table. The didn't have thunder on tape, so they shook a thin piece of sheet metal. The effect was still the same for the audience, they heard horses galloping and thunder during a storm.

Now, lets move onto how each floor was designed to hold the weight of five more. I'll just consider weight for the moment. The estimated live load weight of a floor at the WTC is 3000 tons. Now, in the case of WTC1, the lowest point of impact was the 93rd floor. So, just taking the undamaged live load weight of 17 floors, that would mean that the 92nd floor would have had to support 51,000 tons, which means the floor would be overloaded by 36,000 tons. For WTC2, the lowest point of impact was the 77th floor. Again, floor 76, designed to hold 15,000 tons (5 times it's live load by your claim) could have had 99,000 tons to support, meaning it was overwhelmed by 84,000 tons. Just considering this dead weight and not the force added to it by the collapse, it's no wonder it appears that it is collapsing with little resistance. The true fact is the resistance is there, but it is minor compared to what is falling on top of it. It's like stretching a piece of saran wrap between two chairs. Hold a golf ball an inch above and drop. The saran wrap will probably hold it. Now hold a bowling ball an inch above it and drop. The ball will go through it like a hot knife through butter. It did provide resistance, but the effect was so minor that you will not notice the momentary and minute change in acceleration.

Now, before you decide to go on the attack, consider this:

I am a pretty open minded person when presented with real evidence, not poorly presented physics and conjecture. Most of the time, the physics presented is compared to textbook, controlled conditions, or simply not including all factors involved. Newtons Third Law of Motion is quite commonly quoted and the other factors involved ignored. For example, the planes smashed into the towers with "x" force and the building pushed back the same amount. What is ignored is the material involved and it's ability to withstand that force. If I put my 250lb behind in a chair designed to support 50lbs, the chair will collapse. The law isn't ignored, the chair does try to push back with equal force. Unfortunately, the material and design are just not made to support it, so the chair fails.

Originally posted by sheetrockerr
reply to post by ZeuZZ

 

I am a pretty open minded person when presented with real evidence, not poorly presented physics and conjecture.

I trust you've seen this then?


A Higher Resolution version of it here...


Like somebody said earlier, it's scary that people can look at that and dismiss controlled demolition.

Originally posted by twitchy

Originally posted by sheetrockerr
reply to post by ZeuZZ

 

I am a pretty open minded person when presented with real evidence, not poorly presented physics and conjecture.

I trust you've seen this then?


A Higher Resolution version of it here...


Like somebody said earlier, it's scary that people can look at that and dismiss controlled demolition.

Ahhh yes WTC7 The the truthers ace in the hole that trumps any a debunker effectively putting a whole shoe store in their mouths chocking on the dust of ther own regrets having said a word. Not even NIST could come up with anything remotely scientifically possible to explain it without ruining what little credibility they have left regarding this topic

Wheres the flaw in my thinking ( directly linking to WTC 1/2 AND physics)?

Suppose a 10LB table has 4 metal legs and each can hold 25LBs and you attach a 90LB weight to the center of the table with screws. Then you cut one leg off and heat the others up so thier LB capacity is now 20LBs. The table will level its self and loose about 90+10LBs of potential energy into the table below it. The table and legs below it has been heated, that table has another 90LB's on it (like the table above it) and although it has all its legs intact, they are now at 20LB capacity. The corner leg of the table below the upper table still fails but does so SLOWER then the fall of the FIRST tables corner/leg. Now the lower table has a capacity of 80LBs and must support 90+10(its weight) and 25LB shocks of potential weight put on it. the lower table fails but remains more LEVEL then the upper table.

As long as the center of mass is not over the edge or anwhere near it, it will not tip.

[edit on 12-12-2007 by SilentGem]

First off, let me make it clear - I'm no structural engineer, not by a long shot. Beyond a rudimentary grasp of physics, I'm lost.

However...

I'm not so sure that top portion of the WTC does stop tilting. It seems to me that the tilting upper section continues to tilt, but that it becomes obscured by the matter ejected during the collapse.

But that does raise another problem, of course: what caused the intact structure below to collapse if the majority of the upper section had been displaced?

Originally posted by coughymachineI'm not so sure that top portion of the WTC does stop tilting. It seems to me that the tilting upper section continues to tilt, but that it becomes obscured by the matter ejected during the collapse.

Well, if it continued to tilt.. It would have tipped over, following it's own rotational plane, and landed outside of the footprint, and quite possibly even gone through 180 degree's, or more, and landed on it's top. But, it didn't. The object that was in motion, did not continue to stay in motion - it was affected by an outside force, that being the structure underneath "disappearing" and thus taking the route of least resistance - straight down. It was obscured by matter but I do not believe there is evidence showing it landing far outside of the footprint, as logical thought would dictate as you see it tilt. In fact, I believe the video evidence shows it peaks on its rotational tilt, and teeters back a little, as it drops to the groundl.

Originally posted by coughymachineBut that does raise another problem, of course: what caused the intact structure below to collapse if the majority of the upper section had been displaced?

Exactly. How many floors of "undamaged" tower were beneath this section that became critical? Are we to assume each and every floor gave way, before it was even hit by anything above it? According to the "official story", yes.

Originally posted by ZeuZZ

.....but it seems I have some reading to do.

I agree. What happened was explained long ago and not disputed by anyone other than a handful of believers of the OTMCT. You have to understand that you need to refute the actual evidence and physics of the collapses. You also have to explain why the world's authorities in different sciences do not contest the overall conclusions on the collapses.

So you understand why not many are paying attention to the OTMCT, you can start with these papers:

www.royalsoced.org.uk...
www.911-strike.com...
www.arup.com...
www.911myths.com...
www.structuremag.org...
www.911myths.com...
www.civil.northwestern.edu...
www.911myths.com...
www.era.lib.ed.ac.uk...
www.debunking911.com...

Originally posted by adjay
Well, if it continued to tilt.. It would have tipped over, following it's own rotational plane, and landed outside of the footprint, and quite possibly even gone through 180 degree's, or more, and landed on it's top.

I accept this, but my point is that we cannot say for sure what happened to the tilting section since it was completely obscured by the debris cloud.

Originally posted by coughymachineI accept this, but my point is that we cannot say for sure what happened to the tilting section since it was completely obscured by the debris cloud.

Yes. Perhaps my point wasn't clear - but I believe that section was found on top of the footprint, as opposed to outside it (where I think it may have caused considerable damage to surrounding buildings). If anyone has any photo's of this section on the floor outside the footprint, I for one would like to see them.

Also, my point about it teetering back seems to confirm it did in fact not follow through on the rotational plane. But your point about the debris cloud obscures this from being tested also.

Here's a pretty good video showing what looks to me like the continuing tilting/rotation of the upper section. The onset of the collapse occurs around 1:58. Watch as the fabric of the building itself disappears into the debris cloud. The cloud swells at the point where the building would be predicted to be, almost embossed.

reply to post by adjay

Don't get me wrong, adjay, something stinks. Whether it stops tilting or continues to tilt, serious questions need answering. I guess I just want to be clear about what questions we really ought to be asking.

sheetrockerr, that seems a much more level headed resopnce than the previous debunker, however i dont think that your points hold up to close scrutiny. When i have more time I will respond later today, meanwhile;

The link in my origianl post seems to have been taken down for some reason, i'll upload it here; (can an administrator add the picture to the original post for me? that was the enire reason for my posting, that is really annying , and the picture will work now, i see what i did wrong. The link is; img208.imageshack.us... )

here it is anyway,




Notice how the centre of gravity is overhanging the building, which should create nothing other than rotational motion. Claiming that the 100 completely undamaged floors below the impact would not provide resistance, is the strangest observation i have ever heard. What on earth do you think happened to the building below? 47 solid steel columns, supported by parrallel trusses do not suddenly collapse, every floor was designed to take over five times the weight of the floors above.

The collapse should not have even initiated without the centre columns being taken out. And the fact that the falling section does not continue to rotate as the law of conservation of momentum states it should, shows that there was next to no resistamce as it fell. A slight amount of resistance would have made the top section continue to rotate and fall outside, leaving the bottom section standing up. It clearly did not.



[edit on 12-12-2007 by ZeuZZ]

Hey I got a warning - if the esteemed mods and members had read that line correctly they would see I was not pointing at the OP - it was a general comment but if the shoe fits as they say so be it.

Ok mr phyisics major, lets compare brain pans I (U of Chicago for me, so I feel qualified to comment) and look at the assumptions in the original post.

Assumption 1. You conjecture that the sideways force is greater than the 9.8m/s2 gravitational pull. Prove it with hard data. Guess what, you don't have any and neither does anyone else and don't spoon feed me some crap about - "ooh i analyzed a picture" as that is not hard data. If the fall that started to go sideways was not greater than 9.8 in acceleration, it will come straight down when the downward force overcomes the sideways one (mechanics 101)....

Assumption 2. You conjecture that "the only force is the gravitational force." Your physics class ever teach you about potential energy..?? That potential got turned into kinetic and started to accelerate all that material on 9.8m/s2 train - going down. Um, that was a boat load of energy being released and ACCELERATED by gravity as well....

Assumption 3. You conjecture that a buckling force would be offset by tension force and so it could not come down straight. Ever study torsion boxes in physics..?? Guess what, when a side goes in compression, there is also an upward force in tension on the other side. Concrete is great in compression, not tension so the tensioned side will snap, removing that rotational center, thereby balancing the buckling force and causing the structure go - guess what, go straight down again.

Assumption 4. You conjecture that the design loads in the building were the "as built" loads. Buildings don't break that often and are not tested as whole systems in terms of failures. Small parts are, and over time safety factors are developed so that we all assume that the loads will hold for some xyz condition. The events on 9/11 with a massive energy input combined with heat and fire throws out all the so called design specs. You now have a chaotic system with main failure points forming to reach a condition that overwhelms the design loads of the buildings. To make extraordinary claims beyond that requires extraordinary proof and you have not supplied any.

Assumption 5. You conjecture that the powers that be have significant brain power and abilities to organize and pull off an inside job. Nice - last time I checked the gov was full of underpaid, less than stellar hacks at all levels and in all departments. My contacts with the government have never proven that conjecture to be true - quite the contrary in my experience. Remember - these are the same people that can't organize a vote without issues....

Assumption 6. You rely on data and sources that have limited to no hard data and are making their own conjectures. Simply because a movement has a popular opinion does not make it true. This has been played out time and time again in the sciences as I'm sure you are well aware. The 9/11 swirl fed off of vague comments and pulled every nut looking for a buck and a ear out of the woodwork. Some of those people even had credentials that made them seem worthy of attention but there is no hard data to back up any of their claims. It's conjecture on top of conjecture and while it may sound good and push forward someones agenda, it is not scientific fact and worthy of serious thought. Prove it otherwise please....

Assumption 7. You conjecture by implication that what I saw happen was different than what you saw happen. I saw a simple (though complex) failure of a building. Materials loose tensile strength when heated - check. Massive external force that led to stress and strain cracking of structural members - check. Building came down under the influence of gravity and nothing else - check. Massive potential energy was converted to kinetic energy just like physics said it would and it obliterated that structure - check. Um, what am I missing to bring down a building. In my world you don't need any extra inputs - you pretty much got all the ingredients of a bad day with what I just mentioned.

Again, I come back to "what's the point" as it's 6+ years later..?? Move on. Bushy will be gone, congress is Dem now, so what..?? NWO, aliens - ok, I'll entertain those as I've been accused of being an alien and I am a card carrying NWO member. We NWO types did not call a special session to make this happen so look elsewhere. If the gov wanted to obliterate 3000+ people, there are easier ways - planes and wiring up a building are too complicated to carry out on a timetable with any certainty. I have never bought into any of the arguments from the sublime to the ridiculous that have been made about how these buildings failed. There was ample visual evidence to show that physics as we know it - works, without having to rely on conjectures. Sure you could say that I have to prove things, but I did not make any new claims viz a viz that the buildings did anything more than simply fail....

Originally posted by sheetrockerr
reply to post by ZeuZZ

 

Unfortunately, nothing you have stated is proof of controlled demolition. I won't claim to have the same educational backing as you, I will admit I'm about as layman (I had to wonder what lamens meant. According to the dictionary: a tool of the ritual magician, a symbolic device meant to embody the spirit of it's owner's magical intent, or, as in many magical orders, a badge of rank or grade.)

I'm not sure where you got that defintiion from. Try searching for the definition of what i actually said 'laymens terms', which means to put it simply. I think thats a British phrase, so i can understand if you have not heard it before.

Thanx for that responce, UofCinLA, I am going to rewrite my original post in more scientific terms in a bit, as i did drastically oversimplify it by putting it in Laymens terms for people to understand. however There are still many problems with your observations, even to my simplified explanation.

Originally posted by UofCinLA
Assumption 1. You conjecture that the sideways force is greater than the 9.8m/s2 gravitational pull.

I did no such thing. That is your own (quite incorrect) conjecture. The actual sideways force would start at zero, but would gradually increase as more torque is applied as the building falls. As is clearly evident that the building did start to topple sideways from numerous video tesimony, this sideways force would only beable to increase as time progressed. I presume that you know that the resultant force acting on a body works exclusively through its centre of gravity? and that a body that is leaning at an angle would have its centre of gravity displaced from the centre of the building?

Originally posted by UofCinLA
Assumption 2. You conjecture that "the only force is the gravitational force." Your physics class ever teach you about potential energy..?? That potential got turned into kinetic and started to accelerate all that material on 9.8m/s2 train - going down. Um, that was a boat load of energy being released and ACCELERATED by gravity as well....

Precisely. The energy that is has is called its GPE (gravitational potential energy). Which = mgh, the Mass x gravity x the height. The very maximum energy this falling section could have is that amount of energy. Thankyou for verifying my own statement by default, that will prove a useful point in later posts.

Originally posted by UofCinLA
Assumption 3. You conjecture that a buckling force would be offset by tension force and so it could not come down straight.

Where did i ever mention 'buckling force' or 'tension force'? You are seeing things that are not there.

The events on 9/11 with a massive energy input combined with heat and fire throws out all the so called design specs. You now have a chaotic system with main failure points forming to reach a condition that overwhelms the design loads of the buildings. To make extraordinary claims beyond that requires extraordinary proof and you have not supplied any.

I have supplied fundamental laws of physics, and apllied them to the collapse. Whereas you would much prefer to say that the system is chaotic, and so the laws of physics can suddenly not be applied, i would much prefer to stick to basic laws of physics. If you cant apply laws of physics to the collapse what the hell can you apply to the collapse?

You conjecture that the powers that be have significant brain power and abilities to organize and pull off an inside job.

I believe you are reffering to the popular misconception that everyone in the govenment knows about this. Quite to the contrary, it would have been performed by a small group of people, no more than 100 or so would have needed to have known. I'm sure that a small rogue element of a secret intellience agency would be able to keep this secret if needs be. They keep other black projects secret.

You rely on data and sources that have limited to no hard data and are making their own conjectures.

How is direct video evidence of the collapses limited data? by my books video evidence is just about as precise as you can get.

Assumption 7. You conjecture by implication that what I saw happen was different than what you saw happen. Building came down under the influence of gravity and nothing else

I have highlighted the part of that sentence that i can easily mathematically disprove, which i will do in my next post, later. (keep in mind that GPE = MGH, so the total amount of energy available can be easily calculated)




[edit on 12-12-2007 by ZeuZZ]

Originally posted by jthomas
You have to understand that you need to refute the actual evidence and physics of the collapses. You also have to explain why the world's authorities in different sciences do not contest the overall conclusions on the collapses.

So you understand why not many are paying attention to the OTMCT, you can start with these papers:

www.royalsoced.org.uk...

Search that document for the word 'momentum'. They use it twice. And they do not do one calcualtion of momentum in that paper, it is specifically about fireproofing. That is quite an amazing ommission from a paper as detailed as that.

www.911-strike.com...

That paper does not once calculate what should have happened and compare it with what did happen. They simply model what did happen, and then state that that is what should have happened. Two quite separate issues. I fully agree with his first statement;

This paper3 presents a simplified approximate analysis of the overall collapse of the towers of World Trade Center in New York on September 11, 2001.

Yes, far too approxiamte for publication in any scientific journal, i fear.

Assume the center of the floor at the base of the upper part (Fig. 3b) to move for a while neither laterally nor vertically, i.e., act as a fixed pivot. Equating the kinetic energy of the upper part rotating as a rigid body about the pivot at its base (Fig. 3c) to the loss of the gravitational potential energy of that part (which is here simpler than using the Lagrange equations of motion), we have equationb.gif where x is the vertical coordinate (Fig. 3c).

He is assuming that it is acting as fixed pivot, and he also is misusing Lagrange's equations of motion by using only approximate data and assumptions, as he clearly states himself.

www.arup.com...

Another paper, which quite amazingly, ignores any calculations after the collapse initiation, and seems fixated on the obscure topic of fireproofing.

www.911myths.com...

That site is well known for distortions of the truth, misquotes, ingoring evidence, Ad Hoc assumptions, afer the fact observations. What they do not mention, once, is any laws of physics and how they apply to the collapses. If you can find any, please post them here.

www.structuremag.org...

Give me a break, the title of that paper is:

How the loss of one column may have lead to the collapse of WT7

The loss of one column from a building with hundreds of supporting trusses could cause it to collapse? what sort of science is that? My house is made of concrete, metal and bricks, not strutural stell like WT7, if you removed a quarter of the supports in my house, it would probably not collapse as quick as WT7 did.

www.civil.northwestern.edu...
www.911myths.com...
www.era.lib.ed.ac.uk...
www.debunking911.com...

The rest are no better. Please could you be more precise and give some direct quotes from these sites in relevance to laws of physics. That would be much appreciaited. Thankyou.

[edit on 12-12-2007 by ZeuZZ]

Originally posted by coughymachine
Here's a pretty good video showing what looks to me like the continuing tilting/rotation of the upper section.

Ah, we appear to be talking about different towers in this moment. Your points are still somewhat valid, but this video shows the rotation which Zeuzz kindly illustrates with his white picture (which I do recall was in his OP):

Google video embed is playing up, click here for clip

The commentary and annotation is thought provoking in conjunction with the papers I outlined earlier, and many of Zeuzz points. But that aside, you can clearly see the angle which the radio tower rotates to, and conservation of momentum dictates this should continue, unless there is no resistance underneath in which case the mass and gravity would continue to pull it straight down. I believe the radio tower is sufficient in length to have caused considerable damage had it continued in its rotational plane.

Another point of interest, is the behaviour of the same radio tower upon collapse initiation, as demonstrated here. Note the radio tower in fact starts to descend in frame 6, independant of the facade, which initiates descent in frame 8.

I found another angle for the (South Tower) collapse you posted, which warrants a further look:



I believe this shows more clearly a huge chunk of building that went through a similar rotation, and yet clearly is pulled down by gravity, which should be nigh on impossible given the amount of floors, support, and structure intact at the lower levels. One would expect a lot of mass to move this out of the way - but not in an instantaneous fashion, unless all columns on all floors gave way at precisely the same moment in time - see the excellent paper "Hand Waving the physics of 9/11" by David Griscom PhD.

And, I don't get you wrong coughymachine, your pursuit of truth is more than obvious and I commend and encourage it. Knowledge is empowering.

I don't believe in the conspiracy, I may be biased but.... Almost nothing works in real life exactly like it does on paper. The toppling swing back you speak of could just be spring-back inherent to steel. In theory everything should work as designed the first time but anyone that has been around engineers knows that rarely happens. There are many things not ever mentioned like the fact that the Aircrafts fuel and fluids combined with the onboard oxygen for emergencies would have created a very hot fire. Also many of the plastic/synthetic items in the building may have altered the fire properties. Lots of seemingly small thing combine into anomalies not expected or explained by paper calculations..