From: Allin Cottrell (cottrell@WFU.EDU)
Date: Sun Apr 01 2007 - 20:15:29 EDT
On Sun, 1 Apr 2007, Howard Engelskirchen wrote: > Hi Allin, > > I have thought the focus on conspiracy was always a diversion > from getting sensible information about a mass homicide. Why > was the crime scene not subject to a really searching forensic > examination? That's a good question. I don't know the answer. > But put that aside. Since you have explored the issues can you > please explain to me how these three buildings fell to their > footprint... Baically, no, I don't claim to have the expertise. If you have an hour to spare you could listen to the podcast on the Popular Mechanics site and see what you think. I will say one thing that I gathered from that site. It seems the World Trade (WT) towers were of a unique construction, unlike other Manhattan skyscrapers. They were build around a central core, with tubular steel supports on the outside of the building, and with 60-foot unsupported steel beams connecting these two structural elements. Most skyscrapers have more of a steel grid structure, and more dispersed columns. The WT design choice was explained partly in architectural terms (the need to minimize weight per floor, given the unusual height of these things) and partly on financial grounds (the desire to maximize rentable square footage per floor, and hence not to have columns protruding through the floors other than at the core). I gather -- though, once again, I can't claim to confirm this -- that this structural pattern helps explain the rapid catastrophic collapse. I also gather that some experts, on first seeing video of the collapse, thought it "looked like" controlled demolition, but on learning about the structures did _not_ claim that it actually was such. Finally, I gather that various conspiracy sites cited these experts' first impressions without adding their subsequent disclaimers. Allin.
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