20 9/11 Questions Remain Unanswered over 8 Years Later

It seems I've come to the end of NIST's presentation of their modeling of the collapse. The next thing that they show is the much quoted text about the three phases of the collapse, the middle of which was the free fall period.

I was hoping to find their "evidence, methodology, and computer simulations" of this "negligible" resistance, as I think if we could find that it might be able to explain how the building fell in free fall for 2.25 seconds. But I could not find their "evidence" nor their "methodology" nor their "computer simulations" of this time period. Woe is me.

[edit on 3-11-2009 by NIcon]

[edit on 3-11-2009 by NIcon]

Originally posted by jthomas
I can only again point you to the answer and reality you so desperately avoid:

www.abovetopsecret.com...

The ball remains in your court.

The ball was never in my court and is never going to be. I'm the one asking questions, NIST was the organization responsible for investigating this collapse.

If NIST can't answer my question, and you can't find specifically in the report where my question is answered, then that's not my problem. That's NIST's problem, that their report sucks and does not settle anything at all about WTC7, just like the towers report didn't settle anything, either. And you just don't know what you're talking about and keep distorting and misconstruing the original question I had and that remains.

Originally posted by jthomas

Originally posted by Jezus
Are there any other examples of buildings falling like this?

Or even anything near freefall?

Besides controlled demolition of course...

"This was the first known instance of the total collapse of a tall building primarily due to fires."

NIST NCSTAR 1A p. xxxv

So it is a coincidence that the first building to fall from fire also had an anomalous rate of collapse?

Originally posted by Fitzgibbon
Sorry but where in my post did I suggest that every explosion-like noise was a body hitting the ground? I just cited that as one possibility in a litany of non-explosion explosion-like sounds.

And why, in your mind, do all these different excuses you can come up with always trump the possibility of them actually having been exactly what they sounded like?

Originally posted by bsbray11
How exactly was the building designed to suddenly give way all of its support of everything above a certain floor instantly, so the floors above could just free-fall down a considerable distance?

My recollection of the basic building support structure is that the design was asymmetrical creating a large gap.

A "large gap" as in one that an entire building could free-fall through for 2.25 seconds? If you have no intention of answering my question about how its being "unique" allowed it to free-fall, then don't worry about it, but don't give me a half-assed answer and expect me to accept it as a reasonable one.

Does that mean you're not going to explain how it was able to free-fall because of being "unique"?

I'm not an architect but my understanding of basic physics allows me to accept that what Truthers like to deride as the OV/OCT is consistent with the observed phenomenon. If you don't accept it then it is up to you to come up with a workable, non-Rube-Goldbergish explanation that explains it.

So.. does that mean you're not able to explain how it was able to free-fall because of being "unique"?

Originally posted by bsbray11

Originally posted by Fitzgibbon
Essentially because it was a hollow building. Kind of unique, wouldn't you say?

Hollow except for the massive columns going up through it with bracing on every floor?

See answer above

See, it started off reasonable enough, but now you are entering jthomas' "rational world" by weaseling out of reasonable answers and then shrugging off completely valid issues as a difference of opinion, when they are not.

If you can't support statements, then you shouldn't make them in the first place. Or at least leave room in your argument to accept that you aren't prepared to prove them, that it's just how you choose to perceive things.

Btw it is not my responsibility to come up with x number of working theories as to why so many things happened. That's why I'm just criticizing the government reports. If you don't like that, then just leave it be and don't worry about trying to defend the government reports.

Are you a structural architect

You mean an architect or a structural engineer? No. But neither of those people are experts in building collapses. I explained in my last post that they deal only with static structures holding static loads, where either nothing moves, or all movement is extremely predictable. I'm not an SE myself but I do have a massive textbook that contains everything needed to pass the PE exam for professional licensing, and SE's are not required to know any science related to dynamic and chaotic "collapse" systems.

then your argument about "energy required" is just so much quacking.

You are entitled to your opinion, but you clearly cannot refute the very basic and obvious idea that an object that has to perform work as it falls will not accelerate at the rate of gravity. I have had college physics classes, and understood what "free-fall" meant before I even had to take those. You can think whatever nonsense you want about it. Agree to disagree is apparently the best you can do here. Btw what are your own qualifications, again?

Your attempt at deflection suggests my assertion was correct, that you're no better versed in the mechanics of the collapse than any other person on the street.

If you think you can determine that without even bothering to discuss actual physics, then that just shows me the same thing about yourself. And I am strongly led to believe that you know less about what we are talking about than I do. But if you have any information to contradict the things I've said about free-fall, that doing any physical work is going to blow your chances of following a free-fall curve since it uses up kinetic energy, feel free to post whatever sources or experts will disagree with that statement. I can even verify it with a free-body diagram if you really need to see one.

I'm sorry but you compare yourself and your situation to that faced by Copernicus. Yet your comparison is hollow because while (on the surface) Turthers face a Copernican struggle against conventional wisdom, what they universally lack is the Copernican ability to demonstrate the conventional wisdom to be incorrect.

And what you fail to realize is you are following exactly in the foot steps of the "experts" who constantly disproved Copernicus until he died, and continued disproving his theories for many years afterward.

You're the one trying to appeal to your perceived experts

Not at all. The experts on the non-Truther side of the equation ARE experts and repeatedly acknowledged as such by their peers.

You mean mutual masturbation?

Again, no different than in Copernicus' day. You say you don't rely on experts but then in the very next sentence you claim they are the only experts and repeatedly acknowledged by other experts... I thought you said your opinion didn't hinge on your perception of "expert opinion"? Which is it? Your own free-thinking or your blind acceptance of who you perceive to be "experts"? If it's your own free-thinking, you should be able to answer every question I give you on this thread yourself. And if you are unable to do that, the least you can do is admit the possibility that you and all these other experts are wrong. Because that possibility is real.

Expert opinions offered up in the heat of a particular moment without all the relevant information can be forgiven for being incomplete.

I guess that's what you'll be saying to yourself to justify this conversation so many years down the road from now, too, then? If all the controversy still surrounding 9/11 is not a 'heated moment' then I'm not sure what is.

After eight years, I think we can reasonably expect that the answers extant are the answers that'll stand the test of time.

Not a single one of the 20 questions in the OP has been successfully answered, besides personal conjecture. No government reports address them and certainly not with facts. That is why they are still unanswered questions 8 years later. And that's what "inspired" me to post this thread to remind you that no, you don't have all the information and answers you THINK you do.

What percentage of relevant professionals agree with you?

What is a "logical fallacy" and more importantly how is where you're going with this not a logical fallacy?

And why have these Neo-Copernicans not sallied forth to enlighten their confused brethren by proffering professional texts to the withering glare of their equals?

It happens all the time. I have seen a good number of technical papers from very educated people, engineers and tenured (or formerly tenured) professors of physics and engineering. Why have these papers not enlightened their professional "equals"? The answer I will give you is because they are not truly equals.

That said, would you care to provide examples of demolitions of any size that didn't eject any material?

That didn't eject any more material than WTC7? I could post videos showing "squibs" or puffs of dust popping out of WTC7 but you would tell me it was something different I'm sure. But yes I can post large-scale demolitions of buildings where this is all that you can see coming out of them, and nothing larger. The rest just drops right down to the ground, to the footprint of the building, the building just falling straight into/through itself. Remember I am talking about demolitions, not EVER steel-framed buildings on fire. The Landmark Tower demolition is one such example.

Perhaps you should acquaint yourself with actual controlled demolitions of buildings of any size and note the order of sounds as well as their relative loudness.

You are going at this from the opposite direction I am. I am not trying to prove WTC7 was a conventional demolition, by comparing it to a bunch of conventional demolitions using conventional explosives. That is not at all what I am trying to tell you. I am coming from the opposite direction, saying there is nothing at all about this building's "collapse" that fits with what happens when you set steel-framed buildings on fire, nor can you firmly establish why this should have been any different.

The WTC buildings went down and there weren't the requisite sounds that would provide the desired sonic fingerprint.

Again, you totally ignore all the sounds known to have come from that building.

Originally posted by bsbray11
The explosion SFX was added in stereo to a mono item.

Please. If it was edited in then why do the firefighters suddenly jump and turn around when you hear it, the camera turns and looks in the same direction, and then more firefighters walk up arguing about stuff "exploding" and they have to get back there? Any ideas?

A low distant rumble is proof of nothing except a low distant rumble. Just on the surface, the sound is lacking some of the qualities that one would expect from an explosion

You are quite the investigator, aren't you?

"Well, it's a low rumble, and uh, it doesn't sound like I think an explosion should sound like. So....?"

[edit on 3-11-2009 by bsbray11]

Originally posted by Fitzgibbon
Originally posted by bsbray11
It's in the FEMA report, appendix C, which coincidentally enough, is sourced in the OP on the first page on this thread.

You should be able to break it down and a layman's lexicon explanation of why this is relevant. Have at it.

Why do I need to dumb it down?

It was a eutectic reaction. Not just any form of corrosion, that just happened in the debris pile. Eutectic reactions are a very specific kind of reaction and aren't formed very many ways. Thus, when I ask for an explanation, it would have to be pretty specific, and there is no easy explanation to be had. The easiest and most realistic appears to be that someone put the eutectic to the steel intentionally. I have yet to see it explained how a eutectic can form "naturally." If you remember, Frank Greening tried to say this happened in the Twin Towers and caused the molten steel seen spewing from WTC2 and also led to its collapse, but he was refuted by showing the impossibility of a powerful eutectic reaction being able to form on its own. Yet this is the exact same reaction that FEMA verified severely corroded and melted steel from the WTC.

You can look up "eutectic reaction" yourself if you are unprepared to respond, or even go read the original FEMA analysis to see what they had to say about it. They didn't offer to say where it came from or how it got there, but only verified that it was indeed a eutectic reaction, with sulfur added which lowered the steel's melting point considerably.

Because by going on and on about free-fall, you imply to the passing layman reader

What are you scolding me now for not assuming everyone is on the same page? I couldn't care less. Chastise me when I say it free-fell for the whole time. It doesn't make a damned bit of difference anyway, like I keep saying, whether it happened for 1/3 of the collapse or the whole thing. The very instance of it happening during "collapse" is the problem. Because you can't crush a building and accelerate at gravity simultaneously, when the building is supposed to be what's doing all the work by itself. All that energy would go somewhere, and would no longer be purely kinetic energy as was measured. It would be ripping and tearing columns and beams and all of those sorts of things, but that didn't happen. The structure was already completely compromised when the upper mass began its literal free-fall.

The average person is going to take away from your phraseology an impression that is spurious and which you do nothing to disabuse them of.

The average person, especially in America, frankly, is very stupid. And I know it's easy to think, "Well, you're the stupid one," but what I would really like to see is the maturity to demonstrate this in clear and scientific terms like I have been asking all throughout this thread.

reply to post by Fitzgibbon


Btw you seem to have missed all of these again:

Originally posted by Jezus
So it is a coincidence that the first building to fall from fire also had an anomalous rate of collapse?

If it's the first instance of something, how can you decide that the rate of collapse is "anomalous" or not?

Originally posted by Fitzgibbon
If it's the first instance of something, how can you decide that the rate of collapse is "anomalous" or not?

Let's see if we can't make this super-clear.


First of all, what does free-fall mean in physics, technically?

Originally posted by Fitzgibbon

Originally posted by Jezus
So it is a coincidence that the first building to fall from fire also had an anomalous rate of collapse?

If it's the first instance of something, how can you decide that the rate of collapse is "anomalous" or not?

Because it is anomalous in terms of physics not in terms of fire induced building collapses...

reply to post by bsbray11

Forget it, bsbray, I've asked many times what their definition of "free fall" was and I never got an answer.

But you did include "in physics, technically" which I never did. And I also never asked Fitzgibbon directly.

So maybe you'll have better luck getting an answer.

The Shanksville crash is pretty easy to explain. You have an aircraft that is basically flying out of control. During this time the airframe is overstressed, probably several times. The airframe ruptures and items from insde the aircraft are sucked outside. In the mean time one of the engine mounts is overstressed as well causing the engine to depart the aircraft. Then the aircraft impacts the ground in a near verticle attitude.

When I was a kid, one of my chores was to burn papers in a steel oil barrel. Every few years we would have to get a new barrel because the old one had corroded. The first time I burned papers, the barrel was clean, bright and shiney inside. As soon as I was done, about an hour later the inside of the barrel was rusted. Heat will accelerate the oxidization of steel.

Every so often I had to clean out the inside of the barrel. When I did that, several times I ended up with things that resembled the "meteor". Heat, pressure and a bunch of junk will create the "meteor" very easily.

It is impossible for anything to fall without air resistance outside of a perfect vacuum. There was no way to create a vacuum around the buildings. Therfore the buildings didn't fall without resistance.

Personally I have about had enough of the 9-11 discussion. Sooner or later people are going to realize that these questions and others like them can never be answered to the truther's satisfaction. Anybody who gives an answer, no matter how good the answer is, will be accused of supporting the conspiracy or being a government stooge. There can never be an investigation, because any investigation that doesn't come back with their answers is considered tainted.

I have a very simple idea. Let's stop answering the truther's questions. When they can come up with cold hard provable facts supporting their allegations, then I'll listen. Untill then the burden of proof is on them. I wish them luck. They will need it.

reply to post by JIMC5499


Hey, that was great, but can you link me to an official report that says the same thing?


That's the problem. You act like we are all supposed to already know this stuff, but you just pulled it out of your bum and there is nothing on official record that says anything about the plane being ripped apart in the air before it crashed to explain all of those things. Instead, they just ignore anyone who asks the questions. What you are saying could be totally correct, but it doesn't change the fact that we are either being left out of the whole story, or intentionally lied to, or both. And that is regarding 1 question out of 20 originally posted.

Originally posted by bsbray11

Originally posted by Fitzgibbon
Sorry but where in my post did I suggest that every explosion-like noise was a body hitting the ground? I just cited that as one possibility in a litany of non-explosion explosion-like sounds.

And why, in your mind, do all these different excuses you can come up with always trump the possibility of them actually having been exactly what they sounded like?

'Scuse me? "Excuses"? Plural? I gave but one example of an explosion-like noise, not multiple. And absent other indicators that need to be present to support there having been an explosion, whatever the noise may have been, it wasn't an explosion.

Originally posted by bsbray11

Originally posted by Fitzgibbon

Originally posted by bsbray11
How exactly was the building designed to suddenly give way all of its support of everything above a certain floor instantly, so the floors above could just free-fall down a considerable distance?

My recollection of the basic building support structure is that the design was asymmetrical creating a large gap.

If you have no intention of answering my question about how its being "unique" allowed it to free-fall, then don't worry about it, but don't give me a half-assed answer and expect me to accept it as a reasonable one.

I'm sorry my recollection doesn't measure up to your standard. I don't believe my response was in the slightest disingenuous. If you find the structural reality to be notably different than I described, please feel free to correct.

Otherwise, please don't be abusive; I believe that contravenes the ATS MA.

Originally posted by bsbray11

Originally posted by Fitzgibbon

Originally posted by bsbray11
Does that mean you're not going to explain how it was able to free-fall because of being "unique"?

I'm not an architect but my understanding of basic physics allows me to accept that what Truthers like to deride as the OV/OCT is consistent with the observed phenomenon. If you don't accept it then it is up to you to come up with a workable, non-Rube-Goldbergish explanation that explains it.

Umm.. does that mean you're not able to explain how it was able to free-fall because of being "unique"?

In architectural syntax? No. I've only ever claimed that my recollection of the building's general design made the nature of the building's collapse not particularly surprising. You feel otherwise but seem steadfast in refusing to state why you have a greater claim to accuracy.

Originally posted by bsbray11

Originally posted by Fitzgibbon

Originally posted by bsbray11
every floor?

See answer above

See, it started off reasonable enough, but now you are entering jthomas' "rational world" by weaseling out of reasonable answers and then shrugging off completely valid issues as a difference of opinion, when they are not.

If a question has been answered once within a post, why go through the trouble of retyping the same thing a slightly different way? That's hardly "weaseling". You seem to want an answer to a question I wasn't answering.

Originally posted by bsbray11
If you can't support statements, then you shouldn't make them in the first place. Or at least leave room in your argument to accept that you aren't prepared to prove them, that it's just how you choose to perceive things.

I have and I do. I acknowledge shortcomings and the possibility that I might not be correct. I can't say that I've seen that from you.

Originally posted by bsbray11

Originally posted by Fitzgibbon
Are you a structural architect

You mean an architect or a structural engineer? No.

Good. Then you're a layman. Just like I am and as most reading this post are. Glad we've straightened that out.

Originally posted by bsbray11
But neither of those people are experts in building collapses.

Perhaps not. But they're certainly better schooled in the mechanics of structures than any layman, wouldn't you agree?

Originally posted by bsbray11
I'm not an SE myself but I do have a massive textbook that contains everything needed to pass the PE exam for professional licensing, and SE's are not required to know any science related to dynamic and chaotic "collapse" systems.

That's nice. But a textbook is only as valuable as the reader's comprehension.

Originally posted by bsbray11

Originally posted by Fitzgibbon
then your argument about "energy required" is just so much quacking.

You are entitled to your opinion, but you clearly cannot refute the very basic and obvious idea that an object that has to perform work as it falls will not accelerate at the rate of gravity.

That's basic high school physics. I wouldn't expect that we'd need to delve into such basics. But you continue to dispute the mechanics of the collapse without offering up any alternative. Clearly for the moment in time that the building free-fell, there was no significant resistance and I believe it's jthomas who's repeatedly cited expert opinion as to why that should be.

If you feel such expert opinion to be suspect, then it's incumbent upon you to demonstrate reasonably why that should be.

Originally posted by bsbray11
I have had college physics classes, and understood what "free-fall" meant before I even had to take those.

I didn't have to go to college to understand the concept of free-fall. I guess we all progress at our own rates.

Originally posted by bsbray11
Btw what are your own qualifications, again?

Layman. Same as yours.

Originally posted by bsbray11

Originally posted by Fitzgibbon
Your attempt at deflection suggests my assertion was correct, that you're no better versed in the mechanics of the collapse than any other person on the street.

If you think you can determine that without even bothering to discuss actual physics, then that just shows me the same thing about yourself.

But there's the rub. You aren't discussing the mechanics or the physics and you've already admitted to being a layman. You appear to be insisting that things shouldn't have happened the way they did but you aren't offering a reasonable alternative that bears scrutiny.

Originally posted by bsbray11
And I am strongly led to believe that you know less about what we are talking about than I do.

Your opinion and you're welcome to it. I'll let my posts stand or fall on their own merits.

Originally posted by bsbray11
But if you have any information to contradict the things I've said about free-fall, that doing any physical work is going to blow your chances of following a free-fall curve since it uses up kinetic energy, feel free to post whatever sources or experts will disagree with that statement. I can even verify it with a free-body diagram if you really need to see one.

But the rub of it is that you seem obsessed with that one issue while apparently naysaying other points that explain it in a perfectly rationale manner.

Originally posted by bsbray11

Originally posted by Fitzgibbon
I'm sorry but you compare yourself and your situation to that faced by Copernicus. Yet your comparison is hollow because while (on the surface) Turthers face a Copernican struggle against conventional wisdom, what they universally lack is the Copernican ability to demonstrate the conventional wisdom to be incorrect.

And what you fail to realize is you are following exactly in the foot steps of the "experts" who constantly disproved Copernicus until he died, and continued disproving his theories for many years afterward.

But the part you're missing is that the status quo required a terribly complex convolution to justify itself while the neo-Copernican Truthers are the ons introducing complex convolutions to justify themselves.

Bit of a difference there.

Originally posted by bsbray11

Originally posted by Fitzgibbon

Originally posted by bsbray11
You're the one trying to appeal to your perceived experts

Not at all. The experts on the non-Truther side of the equation ARE experts and repeatedly acknowledged as such by their peers.

You mean mutual masturbation?

Well that certainly spoke volumes about your perceptions.

Originally posted by bsbray11
Again, no different than in Copernicus' day. You say you don't rely on experts

Really? Did I say that? Where?

Originally posted by bsbray11
If it's your own free-thinking, you should be able to answer every question I give you on this thread yourself.

I believe I proffered that the explanations offered up by accepted experts jives with what I would have expected to happen. I don't feel any overwhelming necessity to drill down to inconsequential minutiae in the manner that seems to satisfy you.

Originally posted by bsbray11
And if you are unable to do that, the least you can do is admit the possibility that you and all these other experts are wrong.

Yet you seem likewise incapable of it and have yet to demonstrate a counter-argument that can't be (so to speak) demolished in short order without gainsaying the actual experts.

Originally posted by bsbray11
Because that possibility is real.

There's always a possibility. And pigs might yet fly. But I'm not rushing out to buy protective headgear against such an eventuality.

reply to post by bsbray11


Nope. That's just a theory I have come up based upon my ten years as an aircraft assembler and mechanic.

The heat accelerating the rusting of steel is probably in any chemistry book.
The "meteor" statement is just something that I observed. If it wasn't illegal to burn trash where I live, I'd go home and flip over my burn barrel and take pictures for you.

Here's a question for you. You said that you had access to structural drawings for the towers. Do they show the change in the grade of steel used in the upper levels? I'd love to find the book that I had in high school that documented the construction of the towers. I believe that there is a Government conspiracy where the collapse of the towers is concerned, but I think you guys are going in the wrong direction.

reply to post by bsbray11


Hey bsbray, I 'retired' from posting on here ages ago, mostly because I keep myself busy in my personal life and so sometimes I have very little free time.

However, throughout this thread I've noticed you saying "absolute free fall speed in a vacuum" or similar.

This obviously does not make sense, as no mechanism could remove the air inside the building before it collapsed, and indeed there could be no situation where WTC7s structure would feel absolutely no resistance.

So my question to you is this, what are the error bars associated with this measurement? You seem to take it primarily from NIST, who give you the details of their method. So how much resistance can the building have felt but not be expressed in the measurements?

Originally posted by Fitzgibbon
After eight years, I think we can reasonably expect that the answers extant are the answers that'll stand the test of time.

Fitzgibbon has tried to disguise a 30% (his number) time period as being momentary, when it is in fact significant. WTC 7 fell for 2.25 seconds at free fall rate.

Now, he's trying to disguise an artifical time frame of eight years for so called 'answers' being available.

I'll leave it to Fitzgibbon to tell all of us when the NIST draft reports and final reports on WTC 7 were released.

Here's a clue, they were not released eight years ago. The so called 'answers' have not been in the public domain for eight years.

So how about it, Fitzgibbon, will you let us all know how long those 'answers' have been in public circulation???

Originally posted by Fitzgibbon
"Excuses"? Plural? I gave but one example of an explosion-like noise, not multiple. And absent other indicators that need to be present to support there having been an explosion, whatever the noise may have been, it wasn't an explosion.

So you are claiming either (a) every "explosion" was a body hitting the ground, or (b) was not anything at all? Just trying to clarify what you are saying all of these things people are hearing consist of.

I'm sorry my recollection doesn't measure up to your standard. I don't believe my response was in the slightest disingenuous. If you find the structural reality to be notably different than I described, please feel free to correct.

The way you described how the building was "unique" meant absolutely nothing in terms of how to allow a building to free-fall into itself for 2.25 seconds, unless I am missing something you would like to elaborate on.

I've only ever claimed that my recollection of the building's general design made the nature of the building's collapse not particularly surprising.

Yes, I'm sure you "recalled" the structure's design the first time you watched it collapse. You still have not explained how its structure allowed it to free-fall in the first place. All you're telling me is that its behavior wasn't "surprising" after you read a bunch of nonsense doublethink propaganda waving hands but not really explaining anything about it. Or at least if anything was explained clearly, you haven't been able to reproduce it here.

You feel otherwise but seem steadfast in refusing to state why you have a greater claim to accuracy.

It will be self-obvious when you realize what "free-fall" means in physics, technically, and particularly from the viewpoint of a conservation of energy problem. I asked that question above btw.

If a question has been answered once within a post, why go through the trouble of retyping the same thing a slightly different way? That's hardly "weaseling". You seem to want an answer to a question I wasn't answering.

That's right, and no one can seem to even comprehend the questions I am asking. I asked how WTC7's design allowed it to free-fall, and how it qualified as "hollow" despite the massive columns running through it, but got a straight answer to neither of those questions.

Good. Then you're a layman. Just like I am and as most reading this post are. Glad we've straightened that out.

But we aren't talking about structural engineering or architecture. That's why 'straightening this out' doesn't make a damned bit of difference in this case. I've explained twice already that the phenomena we are discussing does not fall under either field of study.

Originally posted by bsbray11
But neither of those people are experts in building collapses.

Perhaps not. But they're certainly better schooled in the mechanics of structures than any layman, wouldn't you agree?

They are themselves laymen on the subject. So the answer to your question is "no." Why do you think someone who deals only in statics would know anything about a dynamic system? A metallurgist could tell you more about what happens to steel under strain and heat than a structural engineer could. Have you ever even seen the kind of curriculum civil engineers study?

But a textbook is only as valuable as the reader's comprehension

And let me guess how much of it you would understand. I'll ask again, have you ever even seen the curriculum CE's and SE's study? You are the one insinuating they are somehow experts on dynamic collapse systems. Can you tell me under what category in the book will I find the closest information relating to that?

You are entitled to your opinion, but you clearly cannot refute the very basic and obvious idea that an object that has to perform work as it falls will not accelerate at the rate of gravity.

That's basic high school physics. I wouldn't expect that we'd need to delve into such basics.

I expect we really should though, since the numbers we are talking appear to suggest the opposite and you don't even see where there is an issue.

What does free-fall mean in physics again? In terms of conservation of energy, even? What specifically, technically, does it mean? Just what I just said, right?

you continue to dispute the mechanics of the collapse without offering up any alternative

Why should I offer an alternative theory? Are you going to pay me money? I paid for NIST's report, btw. Not the whole thing obviously, but my money did go into that bastard of a report and this is me saying I'm not happy with that. This is not me offering you another report as a consolation prize for nothing. What do I have to prove to you? I am just here asking questions that apparently no one can answer.

Clearly for the moment in time that the building free-fell, there was no significant resistance and I believe it's jthomas who's repeatedly cited expert opinion as to why that should be.

And what exactly was the explanation given, again? Because they measured it and that's obviously what it fell at? Again, I'm not disputing the fact that it free-fell or even for how long. jthomas has only been distorting th

If you feel such expert opinion to be suspect, then it's incumbent upon you to demonstrate reasonably why that should be.

Originally posted by bsbray11
I have had college physics classes, and understood what "free-fall" meant before I even had to take those.

I didn't have to go to college to understand the concept of free-fall. I guess we all progress at our own rates.

Yes, and we all having different reading comprehensions. Did you notice that I also said I didn't have to attend college to understand what "free-fall" meant? And I'm still confused as to how you can say you understand it yet don't see anything wrong with a building free-falling into itself, and no reason given as to how.

You aren't discussing the mechanics or the physics and you've already admitted to being a layman.

"Layman" means I don't do physics for a living. It doesn't mean I don't understand physics.

I have explained the technical definition of free-fall using technical terms. I am just asking the question, though. The answer is where you come in (with NIST hopefully), and that's where I haven't seen anything technical, or even anything for the "layman", either.

but you aren't offering a reasonable alternative

Well I guess that just totally invalidates everything I say. Again, I have no responsibility to replace a failed theory.

you seem obsessed with that one issue while apparently naysaying other points that explain it in a perfectly rationale manner.

Such as what? Are we going to go back to the "unique design" thing that you also can't validate? What, are you actually going to validate it this time?

But the part you're missing is that the status quo required a terribly complex convolution to justify itself while the neo-Copernican Truthers are the ons introducing complex convolutions to justify themselves.

..."complex convolutions to justify themselves."

You know it better than I do, that's for sure. So your points, by contrast, are extremely simple and clear, right? Is that why you still can't answer my questions, and we are still arguing? Because your case is so simple and easy to understand? All I am doing here is asking questions, remember, with the expectation that they WILL be intelligently answered, with proof, not just a sorry run-around and a handful of excuses for it.

Originally posted by bsbray11
Again, no different than in Copernicus' day. You say you don't rely on experts

Really? Did I say that? Where?

When I accused you of it and you responded along the lines of 'not at all'. But to be clear now you are saying that you pretty much just conform your own opinions to whatever you perceive the "experts" to believe?

I believe I proffered that the explanations offered up by accepted experts jives with what I would have expected to happen. I don't feel any overwhelming necessity to drill down to inconsequential minutiae in the manner that seems to satisfy you.

What you are calling "inconsequential minutia" is where I asked you to prove anything you were saying. That's not inconsequential. It means you literally have no case.

Again, can you demonstrate how WTC7's "unique" design allowed it to free-fall for 2.25 seconds? This is the kind of crap you come up with and then you back away from it when I ask you to prove it. Then you say later you already answered me and I just didn't like it? I don't think so. You never answered me to begin with.

Originally posted by bsbray11

Originally posted by Fitzgibbon
Expert opinions offered up in the heat of a particular moment without all the relevant information can be forgiven for being incomplete.

I guess that's what you'll be saying to yourself to justify this conversation so many years down the road from now, too, then?

8 years after the fact hardly qualifies as "heat of a particular moment". That said, are the experts you decry still saying precisely what they said on the day of and in days shortly afterward?

Originally posted by bsbray11
If all the controversy still surrounding 9/11 is not a 'heated moment' then I'm not sure what is.

But that's the problem. The "controversy" as you frame it doesn't exist anywhere except within a tiny minority of fevered brows. It doesn't even qualify as a tempest in a teapot.

Originally posted by bsbray11

Originally posted by Fitzgibbon
After eight years, I think we can reasonably expect that the answers extant are the answers that'll stand the test of time.

Not a single one of the 20 questions in the OP has been successfully answered, besides personal conjecture. No government reports address them and certainly not with facts. That is why they are still unanswered questions 8 years later. And that's what "inspired" me to post this thread to remind you that no, you don't have all the information and answers you THINK you do.

They aren't "unanswered" in the slightest. You just refuse to accept the answers provided by others with far greater expertise than you, I or anyone on this board has. You seem to be the one thriving on "personal conjecture".

Originally posted by bsbray11

Originally posted by Fitzgibbon
What percentage of relevant professionals agree with you?

What is a "logical fallacy" and more importantly how is where you're going with this not a logical fallacy?

Is that your way of saying if even one professional agrees with you, then his/her opinion trumps all others? 'K

Originally posted by bsbray11

Originally posted by Fitzgibbon
And why have these Neo-Copernicans not sallied forth to enlighten their confused brethren by proffering professional texts to the withering glare of their equals?

It happens all the time.

And the results thus far have been......?

Originally posted by bsbray11
I have seen a good number of technical papers from very educated people, engineers and tenured (or formerly tenured) professors of physics and engineering. Why have these papers not enlightened their professional "equals"? The answer I will give you is because they are not truly equals.

Ah! Is that a fact? Then certainly such an explosive revelation (so to speak) with such far-reaching implications would reach the attention of the general populace, would it not? And if not, why not?

I breathlessly await said revelations.

Originally posted by bsbray11

Originally posted by Fitzgibbon
That said, would you care to provide examples of demolitions of any size that didn't eject any material?

That didn't eject any more material than WTC7?

Uh...no. I was looking to you to provide an example of a controlled demolition that was anything like the WTC building collapses. You know...top-down and/or silent.

Originally posted by bsbray11
I could post videos showing "squibs" or puffs of dust popping out of WTC7 but you would tell me it was something different I'm sure.

I'm sure I wouldn't be the first and certainly not the last.

Originally posted by bsbray11
But yes I can post large-scale demolitions of buildings where this is all that you can see coming out of them, and nothing larger.

No explosions either? This should be interesting.

Originally posted by bsbray11
The rest just drops right down to the ground, to the footprint of the building, the building just falling straight into/through itself. Remember I am talking about demolitions, not EVER steel-framed buildings on fire. The Landmark Tower demolition is one such example.

But what's the missing component that those have that WTC7 lacked? And I wasn't aware that the Landmark Tower had an 8-storey gash or an unfought major fire.

Originally posted by bsbray11

Originally posted by Fitzgibbon
Perhaps you should acquaint yourself with actual controlled demolitions of buildings of any size and note the order of sounds as well as their relative loudness.

You are going at this from the opposite direction I am. I am not trying to prove WTC7 was a conventional demolition, by comparing it to a bunch of conventional demolitions using conventional explosives. That is not at all what I am trying to tell you. I am coming from the opposite direction, saying there is nothing at all about this building's "collapse" that fits with what happens when you set steel-framed buildings on fire, nor can you firmly establish why this should have been any different.

But then why did you in a previous post link YouTube videos with 'explosions' if comparing WTC7 to a conventional demolition wasn't in play?

And you're still not being any more forthcoming with details of what you actually think the mechanics of the collapse were.

We're long past the stage where 'just asking questions' is a reasonable excuse for not answering a question.

Originally posted by bsbray11

Originally posted by Fitzgibbon
The WTC buildings went down and there weren't the requisite sounds that would provide the desired sonic fingerprint.

Again, you totally ignore all the sounds known to have come from that building.

Not at all. I just point out that the sound order and sound quality eliminates the controlled demolition hypothesis so long favoured by some. That's not to say that there aren't explosion-like sounds happening. But as I pointed out earlier, all explosion-like sounds are not explosions.

Originally posted by bsbray11

Originally posted by Fitzgibbon
The explosion SFX was added in stereo to a mono item.

Please. If it was edited in then why do the firefighters suddenly jump and turn around when you hear it, the camera turns and looks in the same direction, and then more firefighters walk up arguing about stuff "exploding" and they have to get back there? Any ideas?

I don't believe I suggested that there wasn't a sound for them to respond to. Clearly there was. IIRC, that shot was taken shortly after the first tower went down and everybody was clearly jumpy.

I just pointed out that the original upload of that clip included a stereo explosion SFX on what was otherwise a mono clip. In short, it was a fake.

I really wouldn't hang your hat too much on that clip if you expect to be taken seriously.

Originally posted by bsbray11

Originally posted by Fitzgibbon
A low distant rumble is proof of nothing except a low distant rumble. Just on the surface, the sound is lacking some of the qualities that one would expect from an explosion

You are quite the investigator, aren't you?

"Well, it's a low rumble, and uh, it doesn't sound like I think an explosion should sound like. So....?"

I'm a television editor by trade. It's my business to know and analyse these things to make what I do better and to point out obvious fakes when I come across them.

I'm sure a sound editor would be even better at explaining these sonic shortcomings.

Originally posted by JIMC5499
Nope. That's just a theory I have come up based upon my ten years as an aircraft assembler and mechanic.

And it could very well be correct. But why have I never heard that on TV? Why have I never read that in the Kean Commission report? Why was it totally neglected from being mentioned in any official report whatsoever, and no real investigation done at all into Flight 93's crash? Not to mention any follow-ups from the people who testified to hearing jets and missiles being launched in the area, or multiple explosions. When those kinds of questions are left open-ended on the table and the government reports are silent, what do you think people are going to say about that?

Here's a question for you. You said that you had access to structural drawings for the towers.

And here's a follow-up question for you: where?


To clarify, no, I didn't say that. I can find two different sets of architectural drawings, but those are different. The structural documents still are unavailable to any member of the general public so far as I am aware.

Do they show the change in the grade of steel used in the upper levels? I'd love to find the book that I had in high school that documented the construction of the towers. I believe that there is a Government conspiracy where the collapse of the towers is concerned, but I think you guys are going in the wrong direction.

There was definitely some funny business around the construction of those buildings. Defying building code would have been made easier considering the Port Authority was not subject to the state of either NY or NJ's building codes, as it was its own entity. However that could also implicate NIST in a cover-up for repeatedly asserting that the buildings were up to code and then some (which they also may very well have been).

[edit on 3-11-2009 by bsbray11]

reply to post by Fitzgibbon


I notice specific questions are being ignored so before I continue responding to the point-by-point posts, let's go over this first so we can be totally sure of ourselves:


What technical definition of "free-fall" can we agree upon? Can we make it related to the conservation of energy, please? How about this for a start: a free-falling object is doing no work and conserving all of its kinetic energy. Agreed?