Just curious. 
The Empire State Building
the tallest building in the immediate vicinity appears to the Woolworth building, but it might be Chase Manhattan Plaza too. Jesus, how depressing is that?
Baraqiyal is correct. The Empire State Building is once again the tallest building in New York. Curiously, it was itself struck by a B-17 bomber in 1946(?) that was lost in fog.
Actually, I think it was a B-25 bomber in 1945. Not that it matters. Seems the engineers are saying that the difference this time was the heat from burning jet fuel, hot enough to melt steel supports.
This is cynical to say, but I bet Trump will propose building a new building at WTC, one that’s probably much higher. He’s been obsessed with creating the world’s biggest erect penis for some years now…
I wonder how he’ll ever be able to get the insurance coverage for that. Just yesterday the news was discussing how insurers are going to less willing to drop the terrorism clause in their policies. And just how many tenants are going to be eager to move into another giant tower, especially one that sticks out so far above the others?
Well, there’s also the fact that a B-25 is a lot smaller than a Boeing 767, and would have been moving a heck of a lot slower.
Okay, here’s an ABC article on the 1945 Empire State Building crash:
The last time a plane crashed into a New York City skyscraper was July 28, 1945. A U.S. bomber flying through thick fog at about 200 mph crashed into the Empire State Building, one of the most recognized structures in the world. Fourteen people were killed, and dozens injured.
Eyewitnesses, aware the United States was in the midst of World War II, feared the worst.
<bulk of copyrighted article deleted by bibliophage. See this link for the rest.>
Today, the building remains structurally sound, say reports.
…
So, it was definitely moving slower than the two planes on Tuesday.
[Edited by bibliophage on 09-13-2001 at 06:07 PM]
It probably should be turned into a memorial park, don’t you think?? This may be the biggest single loss of human life in America in one day.
A question on building engineering - shouldn’t there be a floor or maybe several floors, that are constructed to stop debris falling from above from collapsing the building further.
An example: if, on the 60th and 80th floors, the building was reinforced to prevent the debris from going any further or moved the debris outside the building instead of straight down through the building, wouldn’t may lives have been saved?
Cost factor???
A question on building engineering - shouldn’t there be a floor or maybe several floors, that are constructed to stop debris falling from above from collapsing the building further.
An example: if, on the 60th and 80th floors, the building was reinforced to prevent the debris from going any further or moved the debris outside the building instead of straight down through the building, wouldn’t may lives have been saved?
Cost factor??? **
[/QUOTE]
Excellent suggestion.
Watching a Discovery Channel special on imploding modern buildings when they’ve outlived their usefulness, I believe something was mentioned about how modern skyscrapers have elements of their eventual future destruction incorporated into their design. I wonder if it would be possible to include your idea without circumventing that purpose? Any structural engineers out there?
Watching the news reports the afternoon of the disaster, one of the anchors had the camera pan to the Empire State Building and commented sadly that it was now, once again, the tallest building in Manhatten. It was for I think anyone watching a sad realization and really sent home the magnitude of this event.
Again, IANAE(ngineer), but he WTC had two “support Girdles” 1/2 & 2/3 of the way up. They were the darker bands with no lights in them at night and existed only to support the structure. They were each at least 5 floors deep, probably more, since they were visible from a distance. The weight of the plane + collapsing structure were far too much.
God, I just had to revise my post to put everything in the past tense.
sorry, that’s 1/3 & 2/3.
The empire state building is massively overbuilt by today’s standards. Unfortunately concrete fails differently than steel. Exceed the yield strengh and it doesn’t bend, it crumbles even with steel reinforcement. You could make a concrete structure that would withstand Tuesday’s attack but the Hoover dam would look a bit funny in lower Manhattan.
And concrete fails under high heat as well. An overpass near Toronto had to be replaced after a fuel tanker crached and cought fire under the bridge. The heat of the fire caused the concrete to crumble.
I am assuming those are support for high winds???
My point was that in a situation like this, you have a lot of weight coming straight down. And with every floor that collapses, you add more weight coming straight down. It would be nice to shunt this weight to the side or at least have a floor that could hold this weight.
In a situation where the top of a building collapses, there are more people in the building in danger than there are people on the street below.
Just a guess, but I doubt it would be possible to construct a building like the WTC that could survive the top 20 or 30 floors collapsing. Shunting it to the side would probably be an equally disasterous event. And what if the collapse occurs below the shunt floor?
Jesus Christ, the buildings withstood an explosion equivalent to one kiloton of TNT detonated in their upper floors without falling until most people had the chance to escape, and without falling across all of lower Manhattan. What more should they be designed to withstand?
As for supporting the weight of the falling building, I really don’t think it’s possible to build a skyscraper where a floor could withstand the impact of several floors of the World Trade Center falling onto it from a substantial height.
And in the GD thread on rebuilding the World Trade Center, I already alluded to the possibility of Trump looking at the spot as a location for the world’s tallest building.
Am I being over-sentimental?
Is it just me or is there something almost kinda warm and fuzzy about the Empire State regaining its status as highest building in New York?
The Empire State Building was known throughout the world for years as the worlds highest building. It is one of the symbols of New York that foreigners think of. King Kong finished his days up there.
It was eclipsed by the new modern (boringly designed) skyscrapers and it seemed it’s time had passed. It was a relic of an older age.
But now suddenly (in the most tragic of circumstances) it has regained its past glory. It is the highest building in New York once more.
Maybe its just me.
And also,
the Empire State may be a bit of a grandfather to all the modern buildings around it but it knows how to withstand a plane crash without making a big fuss.
Its still there after all these years.
They built things to last back in those days.
My dad worked in the ESB when I was a little kid, and I’ve always had something of an emotional attachment to it.
BTW, its sturdiness is indeed amazing, but also consider the whole thing was constructed in 18 months. At great risk to the workers, without benefit of OSHA.