# WTC Collapse: Need airtight answer please! **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [January 31, 2014, 7:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wtc-collapse-need-airtight-answer-please/680226 "2014-01-31T19:14:42Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![Skywatcher](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/skywatcher/32/254_2.png) [@Skywatcher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skywatcher)\ **Post date:** [January 31, 2014, 9:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wtc-collapse-need-airtight-answer-please/680226/61 "2014-01-31T21:59:05Z")
> [@Czarcasm](#): > > No. That shit’s already been thrown at the wall, and it didn’t stick the last ten times. Not to mention that the only demolition expert who agreed that any part of the WTC was a controlled demolition\* declared charges in 1 & 2 would have been impossible due to fire. Who to believe? The one who actually implodes buildings for a living or the cold fusion expert working from dust samples that had been sitting around for weeks and obtained with no chain of custody? \*He agreed that 7 _was_ a controlled demolition, prior to being told that it was 7 and that it had also been on fire for several hours. ---
**Author:** ![Great\_Antibob](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e47c2d/32.png) [@Great\_Antibob](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Great_Antibob)\ **Post date:** [January 31, 2014, 9:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wtc-collapse-need-airtight-answer-please/680226/62 "2014-01-31T21:59:17Z")
> [@split\_p\_j](#): > > Are you trying to tell me that only a civil engineer can analyze that data? Didn’t you read my response? Anybody can analyze that data. Everybody is free to do this. But I’ll trust the analysis by the civil engineer more than an amateur’s, just like I’ll trust a doctor to provide diagnosis rather than a biologist. ---
**Author:** ![Capt\_Kirk](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/779978/32.png) [@Capt\_Kirk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Capt_Kirk)\ **Post date:** [January 31, 2014, 10:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wtc-collapse-need-airtight-answer-please/680226/63 "2014-01-31T22:11:04Z")
Read the summary of the NIST report on the collapse of WTC 1&2 or even the whole report(s). Even though the material is complicated a layman can understand most of it. The report clearly details the causes of the collapse. While the genesis of the report was political and social, its findings are not. A large scale failure of a modern engineered structure was entirely unprecedented. The best and brightest in the fields on engineering, design, architecture, metallurgy etc got together and produced an incredibly detailed report that is entirely consistent with large aircraft, laden with fuel and passengers crashing into two rather unique structures, creating large fires and structural damage, eventually causing structural failure. Here is a summary [http://www.nist.gov/el/disasterstudies/wtc/wtc\_about.cfm](http://www.nist.gov/el/disasterstudies/wtc/wtc_about.cfm) The vast majority of “experts” who contradict the NIST Report are trying to sell you something or are willfully ignorant. **Capt** ---
**Author:** ![Shodan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9f8e36/32.png) [@Shodan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shodan)\ **Post date:** [January 31, 2014, 10:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wtc-collapse-need-airtight-answer-please/680226/64 "2014-01-31T22:15:20Z")
> [@split\_p\_j](#): > > I still don’t understand. You need a civil engineer to build for that specific spot, I agree. But we are talking about physics in the most basic way, the acceleration of an object on earth due to gravity. > > We know that value, we know the volume of the space between the floors, and we know the height of the buildings. We also know the speed of the collapse, the speed of the squibs, and the speed of the debris, all calculated from the video footage. > > Are you trying to tell me that only a civil engineer can analyze that data? “Only”? No. Anyone can analyze it, and communicate whatever they think about it. Civil engineers are best qualified to do this, but anyone can take a crack at it if they like. But fault analysis is a big part of engineering, and if someone thinks they have come up with something, an engineer can explain why it is or isn’t anything. Which is the point about all the folks kvetching about this article and how the journal in which it was published was not, really, peer-reviewed in the way a real paper would be, and why it is hard to take it seriously as evidence of anything. You are attempting an argument from authority. That’s a valid approach, as long as your authority is worth listening to. But your authority’s area of expertise does not have a lot to do with the field of finding out why buildings fall down. We go thru this kind of discussion a lot on the SDMB, along with JFK assassination theories and how Obama was born in Kenya and how root canals cause everything from cancer to fallen arches and how cannabis oil can cure everything except a broken heart and the crack of dawn. So this is rather well-traveled territory. If you have anything genuinely new, by all means bring it out. But even without producing a cite, **Skywatcher** could figure out what it was, and give some rather cogent reasons why it might not be either definitive, or even very new. > [@Carl Sagan](#): > > They laughed at Einstein. They laughed at Galileo. Of course, they also laughed at Bozo the clown. We’d like to know if your source is closer to the first two, or the last. Regards, Shodan ---
**Author:** ![split\_p\_j](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e19b73/32.png) [@split\_p\_j](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/split_p_j)\ **Post date:** [January 31, 2014, 10:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wtc-collapse-need-airtight-answer-please/680226/65 "2014-01-31T22:22:17Z")
> [@DataX](#): > > Ever heard of someone being mistaken? Was she in office then? > > If Condoleezza Rice stated that man landed on the moon in 1967 - would that mistake prove the moon landing was a hoax? > > You know Obama once stated there were 57 states. I wonder what that means? > > I don’t even get the point of this conspiracy - you think they bothered to hijack four planes and then fill the building with explosives as well? Isn’t just flying into the buildings enough? > > The bush administration couldn’t keep much secret, but has managed to keep this secret all this time? > > Why not just run the planes into the Capitol, White House, and Supreme Court - you wouldn’t need any extra explosives for that? > > And there is like one or two kooks with a relevant degree that believe this - and everyone else - literally tens of thousands of people with the background who would be able to tell this was fake - they have all shut up? > > Bush couldn’t even get away with hiring a shill reporter for the White House press corp. > > They couldn’t keep even navy seals from discussing the highest classified assassination operation in US history. Where do they find all these traitors to blow up our own buildings and keep quiet? > > How come they are so good at that, but can’t keep the plane on target and not crash in PA? > > Jesus - I think Bush was an awful president, and have no doubt he covered up a few things to make himself look a little better - and get us to go to war against Iraq. But he isn’t THAT evil. > > You know that any scientist in the world could easily do the frame by frame calculations - show it was high powered explosives - and be set for life - any journal would love to print it. You know the same media that doesn’t have a problem publishing everything Edward Snowden took - won’t have a problem publishing those facts either. > > The fact is REAL scientists have looked at it - AND it is OBVIOUSly not what some with ZERO training think it is. > > This is kinda like looking at a dead body full of bullets and thinking Johhny Smith did it because he has a big gun - when we actually have the technology to match the bullets with the guns. > > You, yourself, could actually measure the difference in the frames - and figure out how fast the smoke was going - and compare it to charts of known explosives. > > It requires: > > 1. A program that let’s you do frame by frame advance. > 2. A method to measure distance (use the windows or something else) > 3. A method to measure time - each frame is a specific unit of time > 4. A table to look up how fast various explosives expand - use Google > 5. A calculator > > It isn’t that hard. You think the entire rest of the world that is smart enough to do this is just being hoodwinked? > > I assume most of the people that believe this think it is one of those false flag things. Do they happen - yes. What is the rational reason here? We have OBL admitting to it on video? Is he in on it? He hated the Saudis - not the Iraqis. Why was he in on it? > > I just don’t get how this makes any sense on ANY level. > > At least the moon landing thing makes SOME sense for motive. Ok, so even though the US military had been drilling for years before 911, and was in fact conducting the same drills on 911, you want to give Condoleezza Rice a pass by saying she made a mistake or just forgot. There is really no way for me to respond to that. That you don’t believe the Secretary of State would be aware of what steps are taken, what scenarios are imagined to defend the country is frankly laughable to me. If you want to think that everybody who is in top positions in the country are idiots, what can I say? The rest of your questions are pointless to me. How can I know the whys and how’s of anything? I do know that the official story of 911 is provable BS. Also, most of the world thinks 911 is BS, but there is not much they can do about it. ---
**Author:** ![Great\_Antibob](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e47c2d/32.png) [@Great\_Antibob](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Great_Antibob)\ **Post date:** [January 31, 2014, 10:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wtc-collapse-need-airtight-answer-please/680226/66 "2014-01-31T22:26:21Z")
> [@split\_p\_j](#): > > Also, most of the world thinks 911 is BS, but there is not much they can do about it. Good thing the truth isn’t decided by majority vote, then, isn’t it? By the way, got that cite, yet? ---
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [January 31, 2014, 10:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wtc-collapse-need-airtight-answer-please/680226/67 "2014-01-31T22:31:05Z")
> [@split\_p\_j](#): > > Ok, so even though the US military had been drilling for years before 911, and was in fact conducting the same drills on 911, you want to give Condoleezza Rice a pass by saying she made a mistake or just forgot. Or she lied, or she never knew for some reason, or she was totally incompetent. > [@](#): > > There is really no way for me to respond to that. That you don’t believe the Secretary of State would be aware of what steps are taken, what scenarios are imagined to defend the country is frankly laughable to me. If you want to think that everybody who is in top positions in the country are idiots, what can I say? At that time, many who were in top positions in the country were idiots. > [@](#): > > The rest of your questions are pointless to me. How can I know the whys and how’s of anything? I do know that the official story of 911 is provable BS. No it isn’t. There’s tons of evidence, including material, eyewitness, and recorded accounts, that planes smashed into the towers, and then they fell. There’s no evidence that the buildings were filled with explosives. > [@](#): > > Also, most of the world thinks 911 is BS, but there is not much they can do about it. Cite? And even it is true that most of the world doesn’t buy the official 911 story, it’s irrelevant as to what actually happened. ---
**Author:** ![Shodan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9f8e36/32.png) [@Shodan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shodan)\ **Post date:** [January 31, 2014, 10:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wtc-collapse-need-airtight-answer-please/680226/68 "2014-01-31T22:31:13Z")
> [@split\_p\_j](#): > > How can I know the whys and how’s of anything? I do know that the official story of 911 is provable BS. But you don’t know why or how it is BS. But the point is that we do know the why’s and how’s of the collapse of the WTC. Because many of us, myself included, saw the planes hit, and actual, qualified experts, who spend their lives doing this kind of analysis, back up what I saw. If you are going to say it’s provable, then let’s see the proof. If all you got is somebody in an unrelated field who couldn’t get his ideas published in a peer-reviewed journal, then you don’t got no proof. Regards, Shodan ---
**Author:** ![Skywatcher](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/skywatcher/32/254_2.png) [@Skywatcher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skywatcher)\ **Post date:** [January 31, 2014, 10:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wtc-collapse-need-airtight-answer-please/680226/69 "2014-01-31T22:34:32Z")
> [@split\_p\_j](#): > > the US military had been drilling for years before 911, and was in fact conducting the same drills on 911 The drills _on_ 9/11 _definitely_ were for aircraft (not necessarily airliners) flying nonstop from foreign soil, not airliners originating from domestic airports. By the way, Al Qaeda had one mole, that we’re aware of, in a USAF training base in California. You think maybe he knew about these annual drills, what they consisted of, and when they were going to take place? ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [January 31, 2014, 10:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wtc-collapse-need-airtight-answer-please/680226/70 "2014-01-31T22:35:21Z")
> [@split\_p\_j](#): > > Ok, so even though the US military had been drilling for years before 911, and was in fact conducting the same drills on 911, you want to give Condoleezza Rice a pass by saying she made a mistake or just forgot. > > There is really no way for me to respond to that. That you don’t believe the Secretary of State would be aware of what steps are taken, what scenarios are imagined to defend the country is frankly laughable to me. If you want to think that everybody who is in top positions in the country are idiots, what can I say? > > The rest of your questions are pointless to me. How can I know the whys and how’s of anything? I do know that the official story of 911 is provable BS. > > Also, most of the world thinks 911 is BS, but there is not much they can do about it. Don’t care. Where’s that cite? ---
**Author:** ![CurtC](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ce73a5/32.png) [@CurtC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CurtC)\ **Post date:** [January 31, 2014, 10:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wtc-collapse-need-airtight-answer-please/680226/71 "2014-01-31T22:56:58Z")
Getting back to the OP, those puffs of smoke coming out of the towers after the collapse started are inconsistent with explosive demolition. For one, with explosives, they go off _before_ the building starts to collapse. Next, they don’t make smoke. The smoke puffs coming out of the towers were being gradually pushed out by air pressure. The wave of collapse coming from above was increasing the pressure in the lower parts of the towers, causing the smoky air to be pushed out through broken windows. Explosives would look nothing like that. ---
**Author:** ![Shodan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9f8e36/32.png) [@Shodan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shodan)\ **Post date:** [January 31, 2014, 10:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wtc-collapse-need-airtight-answer-please/680226/72 "2014-01-31T22:59:57Z")
That’s just what _they_ want you to think. Regards, Shodan ---
**Author:** ![Stringbean](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/d6d6ee/32.png) [@Stringbean](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stringbean)\ **Post date:** [January 31, 2014, 11:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wtc-collapse-need-airtight-answer-please/680226/73 "2014-01-31T23:50:10Z")
You have to understand, when structures collapse through the path of greatest resistance, air tends to get displaced. It’s simply physics, really. ---
**Author:** ![Jackmannii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jackmannii/32/311_2.png) [@Jackmannii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jackmannii)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2014, 12:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wtc-collapse-need-airtight-answer-please/680226/74 "2014-02-01T00:31:37Z")
There are no airtight answers on the WTC collapse, where conspiracy gasbags are concerned. Hmm, where has our OP gone to? ---
**Author:** ![Monty](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/monty/32/47_2.png) [@Monty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Monty)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2014, 12:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wtc-collapse-need-airtight-answer-please/680226/75 "2014-02-01T00:34:06Z")
> [@split\_p\_j](#): > > So are saying he is a physicist Do you even know what a freaking pronoun is? ---
**Author:** ![Twoflower](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/twoflower/32/22_2.png) [@Twoflower](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Twoflower)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2014, 12:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wtc-collapse-need-airtight-answer-please/680226/76 "2014-02-01T00:57:17Z")
I’m totally stumped trying to figure out what Condi Rice being a liar has to do with the physics of a collapsing building. ---
**Author:** ![Monty](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/monty/32/47_2.png) [@Monty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Monty)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2014, 1:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wtc-collapse-need-airtight-answer-please/680226/77 "2014-02-01T01:01:09Z")
The more I see this kind of malarkey (read: WONJCT BS), the more convinced I am that Penn & Teller had it right in their suggested method of dealing with same. The reason is that those who hold to the malarkey are immune to reason and fact. Oh, and just in case anyone thinks that’s too cryptic: the malarkey in this thread is what’s been posted by split p&j. ---
**Author:** ![Yllaria](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/yllaria/32/3452_2.png) [@Yllaria](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Yllaria)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2014, 1:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wtc-collapse-need-airtight-answer-please/680226/78 "2014-02-01T01:12:16Z")
> [@split\_p\_j](#): > > Marley, I think it’s in my posts about thermite and nano thermite. Which were dismissed by people saying oh it was jut the steel and the aluminum from the buildings that was found. > > Even though physicist say it’s impossible for the two materials to interact on the microscopic level do to gravity. For materials analysis, you want a materials scientist. Materials Science is also a subset of engineering. And, no, that’s not included in any physics class. The entry level class is usually called Properties of Materials. ---
**Author:** ![dropzone](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dropzone/32/7515_2.png) [@dropzone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dropzone)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2014, 2:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wtc-collapse-need-airtight-answer-please/680226/79 "2014-02-01T02:12:25Z")
> [@split\_p\_j](#): > > Ok, I’ll give you an easy one to start with. Condoleezza Rice stating afterwards that no one could have imagined airliners being used as weapons and flown into buildings. > [@iiandyiiii](#): > > Or she lied, or she never knew for some reason, or she was totally incompetent. Well, she never saw the pilot of _The Lone Gunmen_, which was broadcast the previous March. Hijacked airliner? Yep. WTC? Yep, but I’m rather comforted that she wasn’t up on Pop Culture, and she was far from alone regarding not watching that show. > [@CurtC](#): > > Getting back to the OP, those puffs of smoke coming out of the towers after the collapse started are inconsistent with explosive demolition. For one, with explosives, they go off _before_ the building starts to collapse. Next, they don’t make smoke. Next, they make a helluva bang, which no one heard or recorded. ---
**Author:** ![Mr.Miskatonic](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mr.miskatonic/32/310_2.png) [@Mr.Miskatonic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr.Miskatonic)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2014, 2:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wtc-collapse-need-airtight-answer-please/680226/80 "2014-02-01T02:26:58Z")
If the puffs of smoke are demolition charges, why do they happen after the collapse starts? If the puffs of smoke are demolition charges, why isn’t everyone in Lower Manhattan that day deaf? If they evil conspirators used thermite (nano thermite, ultra thermite, thermate…whatever) how did that work on the vertical columns exactly? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wtc-collapse-need-airtight-answer-please/680226.md?page=3) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wtc-collapse-need-airtight-answer-please/680226.md?page=5)