The Progressive Collapse Challenge

Originally posted by Shroomery
So a fireball went from above the 70th floor to the third and quite possibly the basement, where it wrinkled up that 40 ton piece of equipmet, throwing marble off the wall. I don't think I have to point out how strange this sounds.

A fuel air explosion is pretty powerful.

The 40 ton part of the “40 ton hydraulic press” refers to the hydraulic capacity of the shop press, not the weight of the piece of equipment itself.



Actually, it looks kind of top heavy to me.

What's more astonishing is that, the wtc consists of those sky lobbies, so those elevator shafts don't continue from top to bottom. The tower is split up in 3 parts, and to reach the top you need to get from one elevator to another. This was to speed up everyday "work-flow" and evacuation should it occur.

Except for the freight elevator, which ran the whole length of the building. Also, the shafts were interconnected to equalize air pressures problems caused by the moving cars.

How about Michael Rodriguez who was head of maintenance in the towers for 20? years was it I believe. Who said there was an explosion in the basement, before any of the planes hit the tower ?

If he was in the basement, how does he know what damage was caused by the airplane impact and what was caused by the fuel air fireball?

The only response to that was something along the lines of "the plane hit first but because of the speed of sound he heared the explosion in the basement first".

WTF are you talking about.

What about the seismographic AND video evidence about the explosion prior to the collapse, don't remember wich tower but I think it was the north.

Oh, lord not the seismic issue again.

Listen, I have been over and over that many times already. There is NO seismic evidence of an explosion before the collapse. Perhaps you would like to read what the head of the seismology department at Columbia (where the original report was issued) said about this.

"There is no scientific basis for the conclusion that explosions brought down the towers. That representation of our work is categorically incorrect and not in context."

I will not get into this argument again. Read the original report for yourself.


As for the video supposedly showing the explosions before collapse, that has been conclusively shown to fraudulent. Someone tampered with a video of the collapse of the first tower to make it look like both towers were still standing.

I hear a lot of people saying "well, explosions are loud, we should've heard them". (Only talking about the charges during collapse now)
That's not true, you're thinking about a bottom to top demolition. This was not the case on 9/11.
The explosions started from the top, meaning, it would have to be very loud to make it that distance, especially with all the sound around you, it could easily be missed.

Plus, you would only be able to hear that first charge go off, after the first one the tower starts falling and creates an immense roar wich could easily block the sound from other explosions.

Spoken like someone who has never witnessed a controlled demolition. The explosive charges are easily loader then the sounds of the collapse. Also, the higher up they were, there would have been less in the way in terms of other buildings to block the sounds.

And don't forget that if there were charges, these were put in by the government, a few bucks more or less wouldn't matter if that meant to cover some of the obvious explosion sounds.

What are you talking about?

Not to forget that all I could hear on CNN that day was "another explosion" "we seem to be witnessing what sounds like secondary explosions" "we believe there was another explosion". ALL day long.

No, I don’t think so. You have a selective memory. But if that is what you want to believe, then go for it.

Howard you're just too much, everything that is presented at you bounced back like you're some know it all or have all the experts working for you.
"I don't think that" "That's been debunked" "That proof is fraudulent".
And then you come up with some shoddy picture of equipment ? Why not post the heavier version someone showed in a reply to yours ? Would it mean your fireball story doesn't hold up ?

Don't forget that we're going into details because the obvious reason this was a demolition (the fact that buildings don't collapse like they did on S11) is swept away by your so called "experts". Why should we take them serious on anything ? If you can't simply comprehend the over-obvious ?

Anyone with any basic knowledge of structural engineering would realize that this "Challenge" is not rooted in reality. In order for one to be able to recreate the events of the towers progressive collapse, one would need to recreate EVERY single factor invloved, down to each specific moment of intertia exerted on each and every structural member in the correct timing sequence... an impossible task as we are literally talking about billions, if not trillions of complex mathmatical eqations that need to be solved almost simulataneously... something that not even the best computer in the world could do.

Anyone with any basic knowledge of reality would realize that if 3 towers collapse within a couple of hours, it wouldn't be very hard to reproduce.
There's no science involved here. Common sense.

Originally posted by Shroomery

"I don't think that" "That's been debunked" "That proof is fraudulent".[/qutoe]

And, your point is?

You are the one who is presenting the video of the so called “mystery explosion” as proof, even though it has been pretty much accepted as being fake

And then you come up with some shoddy picture of equipment ? Why not post the heavier version someone showed in a reply to yours ? Would it mean your fireball story doesn't hold up ?

Why would a building maintenance shop have a production shop version of a seldom used piece of equipment? I have been in many, many high-rise buildings, in their boiler rooms and machine shops. Most don’t even have a hydraulic press; those that did had small, inexpensive shop versions like the one I posted a picture of.

Don't forget that we're going into details because the obvious reason this was a demolition (the fact that buildings don't collapse like they did on S11) is swept away by your so called "experts". Why should we take them serious on anything ? If you can't simply comprehend the over-obvious ?

OK, you claim that buildings don’t collapse like they did on 9/11. Please provide information on a building with a similar design and construction and of a comparable size to the WTC towers that has also collapsed so that we can compare it to the WTC towers.

Originally posted by QuietSoul

According to this line of thinking, this entire "challenge" is a waste of time as well. If you can "prove any outcome especially when information is estimated to fill in the areas which are unatainable" using sims then you can obviously prove "charges" were in the building.

This will not be a problem with the challenge.

If you want to provide a simulation, you have to include your procedures so that we can follow exactly what you did. This means we can also analyze how you got your results and find out if you put in any dirty additions, etc. By the same token, if it works perfectly fine and within the laws of physics, we can try it ourselves and realize that as well.

So this won't work as an excuse for not being able to accomplish the challenge.

I'm still waiting for some simulations or models or something to show progressive collapses are possible without explosives.

[edit on 24-8-2005 by bsbray11]

LeftBehind,

You're right. I didn't browse through much of the site.

Originally posted by LeftBehind
In the pictures I have presented you can clearly see the explosives. Usually starting on the bottom of the structures.

If the WTC was packed with explosives, why don't we see them going off?

In the picture of a tower falling above you can see that the lower levels are not exploding.

What were the squibs? Explosions that you could see going off, because their timing was off (as commonly happens in demolitions, btw) and they stuck out like sore thumbs. And of course it isn't like the size of the explosions could not have been controlled in the least.

You guys can't have it both ways, so which is it? Is it impossible for the tower to collapse from gravity? Or were there bombs on the top which then led to a collapse from gravity?

There were no low level explosions. You can clearly see the windows intact on the lower floor as it collapses.

Detonations can be timed to go off whenever you'd like. It's one of the many miracles of modern technology: they don't have to all go off at once.

In fact, as the building continues to fall, you can continue to see squibs emerging from the building most of the way down. WeComeInPeace has even found one squib that was 50 floors below the collapsing region when it emerged, putting it way down the building on the lower half. You can find pics of this squib on the WTC thread in his in-depth squib post, somewhere around page 30-34 or so.

So really all this gravity talk is just saying that it was impossible for them to fall.

What proves you wrong, is that it did fall.

Impossible for it to fall the way it did without explosives. Big difference.

Originally posted by HowardRoark

You seem to be confusing the exterior column trees with the aluminum façade covers.

Do you have that shows that those are steel columns and not the aluminum façade pieces?

...

thanks to bsbray for finding that picture.

Thanks to me for that response, too.

So now you can no longer claim that the columns were buckling inward, lest you be a hypocrit and show us more pictures of aluminum facades and no actual columns.

Going back to that picture that you claim to shows the “snapped off 12 foot sections,” how did the columns get separated from the spandrel plates?

Explosives? lmao. What do you think we've been arguing? What do you think the point of that issue is? They shouldn't have done that!

Originally posted by HowardRoark
I have personally witnessed 7 building demolitions. I have been as close as a few hundred yards to around a 3/8ths of a mile away.

If you have ever witnessed one of these, you would know that the sounds of the explosives going off are quite loud. If you are close enough, you will actually feel the pressure wave from the blasts hit your chest cavity. The sound carries extremely well also. Think of the 4th of July. Have you ever been a mile away from a fireworks show, yet you could clearly hear the sounds of the grand finale?

If there were explosives in the towers, everyone in Manhattan would have heard them.

How come none of these sounds has ever turned up on the audio portions of the tapes from 9/11?

Maybe Boris and Natasha used hush-a-boom.

What are you talking about? The collapses have been described by many witnesses as steady "roars," etc. (loud) as they came down.

For example, as John Bussey, editor of the Wall Street Journal and a witness of 9/11 recalls:

I heard this metallic roar, looked up and saw what I thought was just a peculiar site of individual floors, one after the other exploding outward. I thought to myself, “My God, they’re going to bring the building down.” And they, whoever they are, had set charges. In fact the building was imploding down. I saw the explosions, and I thought, ‘This is not a good place to be, because we’re too close to the building, and it’s too easy for the building to topple over.’

Other witnesses recalled the sound similarly. They didn't really hear any explosions that stuck out, besides the first (the collapse being initiated apparently, which was reported by witnesses as high-pitched and "eerie"), but after collapse began, there is much witness testimony attesting to a loud, constant roar as the buildings fell. This roar would have included the charges going off all the way down the building, as well as all of the falling material. There weren't just a handful of explosions going off every so often. They were constant. Your ear wouldn't pick out the individual blows, but just hear, as the witnesses did, a drawn-out roar all the way down.

So the alleged lack of sound isn't really a problem. There was a loud, steady mass of sound as the buildings fell, which could certainly fit the theory of a multitude of explosions bringing the building down. And you certainly cannot suggest that the collapses were quiet. That's just a foolish assumption anyway.

Originally posted by HowardRoark
OK, you claim that buildings don’t collapse like they did on 9/11. Please provide information on a building with a similar design and construction and of a comparable size to the WTC towers that has also collapsed so that we can compare it to the WTC towers.

OK, you claim that buildings do collapse like they did on 9/11, without explosives. Please provide information on a building with a similar design and construction and of a comparable size to the WTC towers that has also collapsed so that we can compare it to the WTC towers.

It goes both ways.

The rest of your posts, Howard, all address your unreproducible drivel that you claim to be sound physics, that has absolutely no evidence going for it. You can assert that your theory is how the buildings actually fail, but until you show that your theory is physically plausible, you're just talking out of your butt.

Attempt my challenge!

If you do it, and show us how you did, then the matter will be put to rest. We can all try it for ourselves and have proof that you were correct.

The fact that none of you, except Shroomery, is actually using SAP2000 to test progressive collapses is certainly curious. No faith in your theories? Realize the ridiculousness of the speed of collapse?

Btw - Thanks for the info, WCIP. I get what you were mathematically describing now. And all Howard has to say to the ridiculous rates of collapse is "you just don't understand."

Find one building that has ever collapsed that fast from gravity alone.

Originally posted by HowardRoark
"I don't think that" "That's been debunked" "That proof is fraudulent".

And, your point is?


You assume too much.

Originally posted by HowardRoark
You are the one who is presenting the video of the so called “mystery explosion” as proof, even though it has been pretty much accepted as being fake

I wasn't even talking about that one.
italy.indymedia.org...

I bet it's a bird hitting the tripod huh ?

Originally posted by HowardRoark
OK, you claim that buildings don’t collapse like they did on 9/11. Please provide information on a building with a similar design and construction and of a comparable size to the WTC towers that has also collapsed so that we can compare it to the WTC towers.

Well, seeing no towers ever collapsed from a fire, this is pretty hard don't you think ?
Why don't you show us some proof of a building that does collapse like the towers ? After all this thread is called the progressive collapse challenge.
And according to you, a collapse like this is only normal. It's just another coincidence that we haven't seen it before I bet.

Originally posted by kozmo
Anyone with any basic knowledge of structural engineering would realize that this "Challenge" is not rooted in reality. In order for one to be able to recreate the events of the towers progressive collapse, one would need to recreate EVERY single factor invloved, down to each specific moment of intertia exerted on each and every structural member in the correct timing sequence... an impossible task as we are literally talking about billions, if not trillions of complex mathmatical eqations that need to be solved almost simulataneously... something that not even the best computer in the world could do.

To recreate the collapses exactly, yes, you would need a near infinite amount of variables to reproduce every single event that occured.

Fortunately for the challenge, that's not necessary.

To reproduce the main aspects (ie, reproducing column failures using similar stress and heat) is not so difficult to attempt. There are relatively few variables in applying columns in a similar building, in a similar situation to a similar amount of heat and watching the result.

You could have a similar outcome pretty easily doing just that, if progressive collapses are indeed plausible.

Having sold engineering and analysis software for many years, I can tell you that when we attempted to recreate a progressive collapse of a building using the known variables available to us our results were all over the board. Simply changing one tiny variable (Such as wind speed or direction) has a propensity to change the outcome of the analysis. Also simply changing the material of the fasteners changed the results.

In short, there is no way (Unless completed in virtual reality) that one could accurately simulate all of the conditions present during a progressive collapse. Don't believe me? Simply check with people who specialize in actually creating controlled progressive collapses and they will tell you the same thing.

So wait - there are people that specialize in doing what you claim is impossible, and what I have seen absolutely no evidence of ever being accomplished outside of NIST labs - at all?

In this statement you lose all credibility with me and show signs of being a disinfo agent. I won't outright call you one, because I won't jump to conclusions so quickly, but the above quote is extremely suspicious to me.

Someone who has "sold engineering and analysis software for many years" and knowing so much about the software should not make the mistake of referencing people "who specialize in actually creating controlled progressive collapses." Maybe you meant controlled collapses in general, but again, this is not a mistake someone who actually knows what they're talking about would make.

7) Inconsistent. There is also a tendency to make mistakes which betray their true self/motives. This may stem from not really knowing their topic, or it may be somewhat 'freudian', so to speak, in that perhaps they really root for the side of truth deep within. I have noted that often, they will simply cite contradictory information which neutralizes itself and the author. For instance, one such player claimed to be a Navy pilot, but blamed his poor communicating skills (spelling, grammar, incoherent style) on having only a grade-school education. I'm not aware of too many Navy pilots who don't have a college degree. Another claimed no knowledge of a particular topic/situation but later claimed first-hand knowledge of it.

Makes me wonder.

[edit on 24-8-2005 by bsbray11]

Allright Bsbray I didn't model this myself but people far more knowledgable than me have completed your so-called challenge.

First of all I'd like to say that the challenge is disengenuous to begin with.

No structure made of tooth picks would behave the way a skyscraper would. So making it happen with toothpicks or pancakes would not prove anything other than a talent for making buildings made of toothpicks or pancakes fall down.

This challenge is made to seem easy but in reality it is not.

This article on bomb blast modelling shows some of the real issues in such accurate modelling.

www.gcn.com...

Livermore researchers are using another 3-D hydrodynamics application to examine blast vulnerabilities of various buildings and potential retrofits. It’s common for the design and coding of a blast model to take several months, plus a week to compute results on a supercomputer.

I for one have to work for a living so I doubt I could do these models in several years, and last time I checked I don't have the use of a supercomputer for a week.

Anyway here is the PDF file of a paper on progressive collapse, and they did the models.

www.ptc.psu.edu...

The following image was modified to fit the boards requirements. Look at the PDF to see the whole thing.



There you go, your challenge has been met.

Just picture the collapsing part as the top of the WTC and gravity takes it from there.

Originally posted by LeftBehind
First of all I'd like to say that the challenge is disengenuous to begin with.

No structure made of tooth picks would behave the way a skyscraper would.

Then don't use toothpicks. It's that simple.

You guys are reading too much into the bit about toothpicks, pancakes, etc. What the author was trying to express, was that he didn't care what people used to recreate the collapses. He wasn't seriously suggesting you use toothpicks, or pancakes, or mud...

Anyway here is the PDF file of a paper on progressive collapse, and they did the models.

www.ptc.psu.edu...

The following image was modified to fit the boards requirements. Look at the PDF to see the whole thing.

And then we have...

There you go, your challenge has been met.

Let's review the challenge, shall we?

THE PROGRESSIVE COLLAPSE CHALLENGE

The challenge is in 5 parts, from the easiest to the most difficult.

All five require building a structure that will undergo top-down progressive total collapse -- i.e.: when disturbed near the top, it will collapse from the top down to the bottom, leaving no part standing. The disturbance can include mechanical force, such as projectile impacts, and fires, augmented with hydrocarbon fuels. Explosives and electromagnetic energy beams are not permitted.

Your structure can be made out of anything: straws, toothpicks, cards, dominoes, mud, vegetables, pancakes, etc.

The designers of the Twin Towers were able to meet all 5 challenges using steel and concrete.



CHALLENGE #1:

Build an upright structure that will undergo progressive collapse.

CHALLENGE #2:

Build an upright structure with a square footprint and an aspect ratio of at least 6.5 (6.5 times as high as it is wide) that will undergo progressive collapse.

CHALLENGE #3:

Build a structure as required by CHALLENGE #2 which, in the collapse process, will throw pieces outward in all directions such that at least 80% of the weight of the materials ends up lying outside of the footprint, but their center of mass lies inside the footprint.

CHALLENGE #4:

Build a structure as required by CHALLENGE #2 which is also capable of withstanding a 100 MPH wind without collapsing. The structure has to be closed in the sense that it cannot allow air to pass through it.

CHALLENGE #5:

Build a structure that meets the requirements of both CHALLENGES #3 and #4.

I think they may have met challenge #1, but that's it. I'm still not sure how exactly they set up their model, or how we could go about reproducing their results, but considering they didn't make it past challenge #1, it doesn't matter much anyway.

And here I'll make it somewhat 'official' that I'll accept computer simulations as long as they meet the same requirements, and we are provided with the exact procedures used to get the simulations so that we may recreate them ourselves.

And, hey:

Let's start slow, shall we? Shroomery said he was working on getting a building similar to the WTC towers to collapse from heat using the SAP2000 software. It's certainly a start. If you guys wanna try that approach, it may be a more productive start than trying to jump in with both feet and getting frustrated. We can move on to situations more like the WTC collapses gradually, if you'd like.

Nice of you to not even attempt to read the pdf bsbray.

The framework presented by the challenge is ridiculous, and since it seems they weren't serious about the toothpicks or the pancakes, what parts were they serious about?

Since you want to pick and choose so will I.

Here is the challenge.

when disturbed near the top, it will collapse from the top down to the bottom, leaving no part standing.

If you had bothered to read the pdf you would have seen that my graphic only represented this.



It seems to me that you would ignore anything that would contradict your ideas.

You didn't take my first link serious. This implies that you either weren't interested in what I had to say, or that you weren't interested in actual controlled demolitions.

www.implosionworld.com...

Please explore this site. I would like to know if you can find timed and controlled demolitions that worked as perfectly as you expect us to believe happened at the WTC.

You'll notice that most of them show bottom-up explosions. And that in all of them the explosions blow out windows throughout the structures.

My second link didn't interest you so stop pretending you are actually interested in the science of progressive collapse.

I presented an actual scientific paper on the subject and you complain it doesn't fit your ridiculous challenge.

It may not fit in your eyes, but it definetely shows how such collapses happen. Imagine the structure is the top of the WTC. It is obvious what happens once the collapse is initiated. Expand upon what is shown, or even look at what is shown and it easily fits the conditions.

I have proven with said paper that progressive collapse is possible and that it happens.

Read the pdf posted above and refute that if you must.

Now that I have done so, please show me a demolition that looks even remotely close to what you think happened.

Even better, explain to me how our entire government, three security agencies, the NIST, all of the engineers who support the progressive collapse of the WTC, and the media, were all in on 9-11 and yet no one has come forward.

Originally posted by Shroomery
Howard you're just too much, everything that is presented at you bounced back like you're some know it all or have all the experts working for you.
"I don't think that" "That's been debunked" "That proof is fraudulent".

And then you come up with some shoddy picture of equipment ? Why not post the heavier version someone showed in a reply to yours ? Would it mean your fireball story doesn't hold up ?

Ah yes, Howards little unassuming 40-ton press.

In that original thread i pointed out another 40-ton press (one of many different types, just an example showing how big some can be):


Of course, Howard is an expert on skyscraper machine shops and said in reply:

Uh, dude, the difference is that one is commonly found in a light duty machine shop such as would be present in the WTC basement, and the other would be found in high volume commercial machine shops where its high cost would be justified by its regular use, for production purposes, and not for the occaisonal repair of a pump bearing.

I’ll leave the reader to figure out which is which.

So he admits there that the larger press would be used for production purposes and not occasional repair.
OK, lets look at that.

The original quote about the press:

WTC Stationary Engineer Mike Pecoraro

“There was nothing there but rubble, “Mike said. “We’re talking about a 50 ton hydraulic press – gone!” The two began yelling for their co-workers, but there was no answer. They saw a perfect line of smoke streaming through the air. “You could stand here,” he said, “and two inches over you couldn’t breathe. We couldn’t see through the smoke so we started screaming.” But there was still no answer.

Mike story: www.chiefengineer.org...

OK, so Mike seems to believe it was a big deal that the press was "gone!" yet Howard, the expert, says oh no, that machine press would of just been small like the small one he sites which is the 4th picture when search "hydraulic press" in Google Images and leaves it at that, no explanation as to why Mike believes it worthy of mention.

So let's look at what Mike was working on to try and determine what that press may have been used for. Remember, Howard said the big press, pictured above as an example of the differences in hydrolic presses: "...would be found in high volume commercial machine shops where its high cost would be justified by its regular use, for production purposes, and not for the occaisonal repair of a pump bearing."

Mikes job:

"...where he worked as a Stationary Engineer on a roving crew that serviced all of the buildings at the com plex.

Mike's assignment that day would be to continue constructing a gantry that would be used to pull the heads from the 2,500 ton chillers, located in the 6th sub- basement level of the tower.

"Chillers" are part of the refridgeration units that cool all that needs to be cooled in the WTC. It's important these things work or else computer networks can be affected, air conditioning, drinking water etc etc. It can easily cost well into 6 figures A DAY if this system goes down.

FACT:
"For example, the World Trade Center in New York City uses seven centrifugal chillers. Five new units were installed in 1993 to replace those damaged in the World Trade Center bombing. These new chillers each provide 2,000 tons of cooling capacity."
www.copper.org...



FACT:
"60,000: Tons of cooling capacity generated by the World Trade Center’s refrigeration plant – the largest such system in the world."
www.panynj.gov...

FACT:
"Workers also began extricating the first of the complex's seven chiller plant units, says Peter Rinaldi, engineering program manager for the Port Authority of New York & New Jersey. "We are following a plan to excavate from east to west," working off an area that's solid," he says. Each unit weighs at least 100,000 lb, and will be removed by Hitachi excavator models 750 and 1200."
www.construction.com...
Hitachi excavator model 1200


FACT:
"WTC Workers Deal With Freon — Ground Zero workers are closing in once again on the delicate task of examining and possibly draining freon from chillers which cooled the World Trade Center, officials said. The work will mirror a similar project conducted in early December on a larger chiller complex that was located between Towers One and Two, said Matthew Monahan, a spokesman for the city Department of Design and Construction. The work is described as delicate because freon can be dangerous. As one Ground Zero worker put it last week, "Freon displaces oxygen so it's something that can put you down pretty quickly."

So who could you turn to in order to find out about the WTC Chiller system.
Why who else but HPAC Engineering (Heating, Piping, Air conditioning) magazine!

and look, in 1994 on pg. 32-52 they did an article called:
The World Trade Center: One Year After The Bomb
www.hpac.com...

Complete with diagrams of the WTC Chiller system:
www.hpac.com...

So, all of this plus a lot more responsabilities, taking into account that Mike was part of the team responsable for the ENTIRE WTC complex that suggest the WTC, having the worlds largest refridgeration system plus many other aspects of maintainance, would have a pretty impressive machine shop, yet expert Howard KNOWS that all the machine shop would have is:

“There was nothing there but rubble, “Mike said. “We’re talking about a 50 ton hydraulic press – gone!”

Yeah, Howard knows all.
Actually it's Disinfo Tactic number 8:
"Invoke authority. Claim for yourself or associate yourself with authority and present your argument with enough "jargon" and "minutia" to illustrate you are "one who knows", and simply say it isn't so without discussing issues or demonstrating concretely why or citing sources."
www.benfrank.net...


Oh, and Howard, you may want to get your buddies down at the agency to start removing all reference to the WTC bombing in 93 because that is area of research is a goldmine for finding mistakes in debunker logic, little gems like this for example from a debunkers favourite source:

"After all, the giant buildings are designed to resist a once-in-a-century wind blast of 150 mph. Each tower can sway up to 3 ft. in heavy winds. The instruments that record this swaying registered nothing from the explosion. The structures were also engineered to soak up the impact of a Boeing 707, the biggest plane in the skies when the towers went up in the late 1960s"
www.popularmechanics.com...

And more on the '93 bombing from Popular Mechanics...

"The blast also ripped downward to level B5, a cavernous, 3-story-high machinery area that houses the towers' refrigeration plant."

"Yet, although the slabs were blown to smithereens, they acted as blast deflectors, absorbing the explosion's energy and confining the structural damage."

Not on 9/11 thou, the concreate obsorbed none of the energy, infact, it turned to powder and gave ZERO resistance because of a collapse due to office fires (NIST).

Dude, I looked at the pdf before I posted the first time. I just wasn't clear on how you could possibly reproduce that for yourself from the pdf alone.

It only meets the first challenge, and that's giving you the benefit of the doubt because we don't know how to reproduce their tests from the pdf alone, and the whole point of this thread is to be able to reproduce the collapses of the WTC!

The first challenge was just to produce a progressive collapse. Easy enough.

The second was to produce a progressive collapse from a building with a square footprint and aspect ratio of 6.5. Your post does NOT meet part 2 of the challenge, because it does not have the correct aspect ratio!

Nor does it meet part 3, which is part 2 with the added condition of 80% of the mass laying outside of the footprint with the footprint still being the center of mass.

Nor does it meet part 4 which is part 2 with the condition of being able to also withstand 100 mph winds (as the WTC towers were able to do).

And it does not meet part 5, which is to accomplish parts 3 and 4 simultaneously.

It's not hard to understand: you have NOT completed the challenge!

Even better, explain to me how our entire government, three security agencies, the NIST, all of the engineers who support the progressive collapse of the WTC, and the media, were all in on 9-11 and yet no one has come forward.

People have come forward, silly. This has been addressed plenty enough already.

Here are a few of the whistleblowers being interviewed, etc.:

www.prisonplanet.com...

I wasn't rude when I stated for the first time that you had failed to meet the challenge, so don't get all pissy with me, and stop trying to change the subject by referring to things that a) have nothing to do with the fact that you have failed to meet the challenge, and b) I have already addressed anyway.

You have not met the challenge. Nice try, but no. Not only did you not get past the first part, but there's no way we can reproduce those tests based on the pdf alone.

Once again,

You failed parts 2, 3, 4, and 5, and that's giving you the benefit of the doubt on part 1 being reproducible. There is nothing unfair about this. The challenge was in 5 parts from the beginning. The objective is to prove the WTC collapse is possible without explosives. Learn to read.

Originally posted by bsbray11The objective is to prove the WTC collapse is possible without explosives. Learn to read.

Perhaps you should learn how to reason.

The collapse is completely impossible without explosives.

However the explosion caused by an airliner crashing into it, was plenty enough explosion.

It was plenty enough for the progressive collapse of the building, which is why your challenge is pointless.

You expect us to create a model or computer model to satisfy you?

Why aren't the thousands of proffesional engineers opinions good enough for you?

www.public-action.com...

Look here a 2d model that satisfies the challenge!

news.bbc.co.uk...

Here is a source I'm sure you think is in on it, Architecture Week.

www.architectureweek.com...

en.wikipedia.org...

Here's a quote from Nova, who has advocated Atlantis, and they still accept the real world science.

www.pbs.org...

NOVA: The Twin Towers collapsed essentially straight down. Was there any chance they could have tipped over?

Eagar: It's really not possible in this case. In our normal experience, we deal with small things, say, a glass of water, that might tip over, and we don't realize how far something has to tip proportional to its base. The base of the World Trade Center was 208 feet on a side, and that means it would have had to have tipped at least 100 feet to one side in order to move its center of gravity from the center of the building out beyond its base. That would have been a tremendous amount of bending. In a building that is mostly air, as the World Trade Center was, there would have been buckling columns, and it would have come straight down before it ever tipped over.

Have you ever seen the demolition of buildings? They blow them up, and they implode. Well, I once asked demolition experts, "How do you get it to implode and not fall outward?" They said, "Oh, it's really how you time and place the explosives." I always accepted that answer, until the World Trade Center, when I thought about it myself. And that's not the correct answer. The correct answer is, there's no other way for them to go but down. They're too big. With anything that massive -- each of the World Trade Center towers weighed half a million tons -- there's nothing that can exert a big enough force to push it sideways.

But really there is no reason to attempt your challenge, as they built a full size model called the WTC and it fit your challenge.


Prisonplanet.com is not reliable, do you have any sources that don't change their headlines to fit their agenda?

There now you have info for hours on why the WTC collapsed and none of them need any more explosives than what was in the planes.

Please, if your going to respond to my points at least respond to the ones that tear your argument to peices.

Now please respond with some evidence that points towards controlled demolitions.

Even if we couldn't prove progressive collapse(and I have) it is impossible to prove a negative.

Do you, or 9-11research.com have any real proof other than ideas that are really only misunderstandings of structural engineering?


edit:

Originally posted by Bsbray11Dude, I looked at the pdf before I posted the first time. I just wasn't clear on how you could possibly reproduce that for yourself from the pdf alone.

That sounds like a personal problem, not a problem with my argument. As I have stated before your challenge requires immense amounts of time and resources that most of us don't have.

It's like asking us for a computer model to prove evolution. It is patently ridiculous.

The point is that it takes teams of researchers with access to supercomputers to meet such a challenge. Not some lone humble typist on a BBS.

Just because you don't understand the PDF doesn't make it any less true.

[edit on 25-8-2005 by LeftBehind]

bsbray11 you won't be satisfied until a multimillion dollar company steps up to your challenge with a super computer and a team willing to spend a few years building a model.. for what?

This challenge is ludicris. You're expecting people to make a model and "reproduce it" for you. The only logical way to reproduce a collapse is via computer models. Unless you're REALLY good at building things EXACTLY the same way over and over again. (Which I doubt there is a human on earth that can acheive this) And even if you could, I seriously doubt you can replicate the enviromental effects, the effects from the fires, the effects from the plane damage.. no one can.. hence your argument

Hell, even by your logic, if we reproduced an exact replica of the WTC and smashed a real plane into it, you wouldnt be satisfied.. because we cant do again..

I have an idea.. send some emails to the companies that made/created these models and ask them to reproduce them again for you. I'm willing to bet, after several thousand dollars of payment, and traveling, and hiring a team of experts.. you'll be bitterly dissappointed that the results are exactly what they published before your "challenge". Name me one company that would build a model and make a public claim that is in contradiction their results.. you wont find one.

The ONLY way someone is going to "reproduce" this for you is if you fork over a very large amount of money for their time. And I'm willing to bet that not one person on this message board, or in this nation, really gives a damn enough to do that... because all I'm hearing from the conspiracy kooks out there is "Someone else do the work for me, I challenge you!" When it's already been done a number of times.

Several people have come to this thread with links to models and reports done by companies that have "reproduced" this collapse via models. Companies don't spend thousands of dollars to build models to run them only once and shelve them. They run vigorous tests over and over and over again seeing exactly what the threshold of collapse was. And then they compile all their data in a nifty report for people like you to say 'reproduce' it..

By challenging the average Joe (people like me and you) to do something that is way out of our educational range (Yes, I know you assume you're an "expert" in structural engineering, but you're not.. so stop pretending) is just plain dumb.

Oh, and btw, I've noticed something about you that's really got me laughing inside.. you come off so damn cocky with every single one of your replies/posts, and then whine when someone else does the same to you.. get over yourself and maybe people will be less hostile with you.

I think HR was right when he called you a troll.
And I'm starting to wonder if the bs in your name is short for Bull #? Cause you seem to be full of it.

wtc.nist.gov...
wtc.nist.gov...
wtc.nist.gov...
wtc.nist.gov...
wtc.nist.gov...
wtc.nist.gov...
wtc.nist.gov...
wtc.nist.gov...
www.ptc.psu.edu...
www.luxinzheng.net...
query.nytimes.com...

Originally posted by QuietSoul

I think HR was right when he called you a troll.
And I'm starting to wonder if the bs in your name is short for Bull #? Cause you seem to be full of it.

Hey, screw you man. It's not impossible because these collapses are so hard to simulate. It's impossible because your gravity theory is WRONG,

It's NOT hard to simulate a build like the WTC with a hole in it and columns around the hole being heated to even 1000 degrees Celsius or so. If you can't do it, that's either your fault, or the theory's, and in no case is it mine. I've even encouraged starting out slow even to this already-simple method.

I've never claimed to be an expert on this #, either, but it doesn't take a freaking genius to realize there's something wrong when there are explosions blasting out of the goddamned building all the way down when the collapses hasn't even reached those parts of the building yet.

Just give up and leave the thread if you have nothing else to contribute to the challenge.

Prisonplanet.com is not reliable

Dude, they're linking you to video interviews of whistleblowers. It's not hard to verify those guys with a quick Google search. You're reaching for excuses on this one, too. A simple solution would be to stop saying # unless you're absolutely sure that you're not pulling out of your butt. It might save you the trouble of being corrected over and over again in the future.

Like I said, just leave the thread if you can't do it. Your objections have been noted.

Keep posting the NIST stuff guys .. it's a pdf that almost proves itself wrong.

here's a quote :

B. Thermal Weakening of the Floors:
• Floors 95 to 99 weakened with increasing temperatures over time on the long-span floors
and sagged. The floors sagged first and then contracted due to cooling on the North side;
fires reached the South side later, the floors sagged, and the seat connections weakened.
• Floor sagging induced inward pull forces on the South wall columns.
• About 20 percent of the connections to the South perimeter wall on floors 97 and 98 failed
due to thermal weakening of the vertical supports.

There was no heat, now was there ? Especially not in an increasing way.
Everyone saw with their own eyes how the fires were nothing more but smoke, and like has been pointed out, it started out white, but changed to a thick black soon after the impact. Let me remind you that there were people i the impact holes! The towers "burned" for a mere hour, there's not much room in that time to cool a tower off and heat up again to the extend it would collapse. Especially if you realize that the supposed fire had to bring down an extra 40 core columns!

But lets continue to their analyses of the damage of the core columns.
They did 3 test-cases.
A base case.
A severe case.
A less severe case.

The maximum of failed columns was 10 under the severe case of Tower 2.

10 columns out of 47 (could have failed). Averages vary around 4-6.
Less then 1/10.

Now lets look at the size of the tower. 110 stories.
WTC 1 was hit between the 93rd and 99th floor. Meaning that the remaining part above the collapse, was only 1/10th (generous number) of the total weight. In fact this is a very generous number because we all know that the used materials were lighter/thinner higher up in the tower.

Now, somehow, nist wants us to believe that with 1/10th of the weight of the tower, and with only about 5 core columns gone, the damage is enough to bring the other part of the tower down completely. And not only that, with that tiny part ontop, wich is 1/10th of the weight, you can make it dissapear completely!

Imagine this... there's a traffic block, there are 10 18 ton trucks standing in line, another 18 ton truck is behind that line, with about 20 meters distance (generous again).
Now, this last truck starts (from a complete stop) and drives into that line of 10.

What do you think would happen ?

HowardRoark wrote:
It only makes a difference to people who suffer from an excess of dopamine in the limbic system.

HowardRoark wrote:
BSB, you are a troll.

Typical.

As is your usual m.o., Howard, you've failed to address the majority of the points raised by other members and pick only the ones you think you have a good chance of obfuscating, hoping that the other points will fade into the background. Regardless, the assertions made by you relating to the couple of points you have chosen to address have been debunked in your WTC Challenge thread. I encourage anyone new to this debate (if that's possible) to read through that thread and decide for yourselves, it's a rollicking good ride, round and round and round...

You seem to be confusing the exterior column trees with the aluminum façade covers.

Do you have that shows that those are steel columns and not the aluminum façade pieces?

You raised the same objection in the WTC Challenge thread and I answered it there. Never did I say that the pieces of metal being ejected were ALL pieces of the steel exterior columns and that there were no aluminium covers present amongst them. You have posted the above picture of mine where I used the lengths of the covers on the exterior (12 feet) to show the length is the same for the pieces being ejected with such explosive force, thank you, but you have conveniently neglected to post the enlarged picture that I posted showing the steel beams:



Have a close look at the rust-brown color and the thickness of many of the pieces and tell me that there are not 12-foot lengths of steel present. I've pointed out a few to help you out a little. I have satellite pics of ground zero after the collapses, I can post pics of 12 foot lengths of steel all over the wreckage pile if you like.

Note how each of the exterior column trees consisted of three columns welded to the spandrel plates. Thus there are no 12 foot sections of the columns that are not welded to a spandrel plate.

Yes, 36' long pieces of steel welded and bolted to spandrel plates.




So what's your point? Are you saying that when the column sections were supposedly crushed by the falling debris, that they snapped into 12 foot sections because they were welded to the spandrel plates? That the spandrel plates held to the steel and the continuous steel snapped first, and then, their job done, the spandrel plates fell off? I have no idea what you are implying here. Please explain your theory a little more in-depth, keeping in mind that objects under stress break at their weakest point first.

Going back to that picture that you claim to shows the “snapped off 12 foot sections,” how did the columns get separated from the spandrel plates?

Nice try, but I don’t think that your claim that the columns were “snapped into 12 foot sections” is valid.

Yes I am well aware of your opinions, as we've been through this already in your thread and know each other quite well, I'm sure.

A stable structure will stand up. An unstable structure will collapse.

Column buckling will cause a stable structure to become unstable.

Yes, in the region where the buckling is present. It will not cause the entire building to explode into pickup sticks and nano-dust down to the very ground. Uncountable partial collapses of steel and concrete buildings have been observed throughout history, but never, NEVER have any "global/runaway collapses" been observed...oh, except for the three that did so on the same day in NYC, and all three of which happened to be owned by the same guy, with a record insurance policy taken out on the same buildings a couple of months before they fell down. Funny that, huh?

How in hell can you claim that “the collapse would not progress beyond a few floors before the kinetic energy was spent?” You do understand that the impact force of a falling object is much greater than the weight of that object alone, don’t you? Are you familiar with the terms “live load” and “dead load” as they pertain to building design?

How in the hell can you claim that an object does not lose any energy via transference to other elements in the system when it collides with other objects? You do understand the concepts of energy transference and energy sinks, don't you? Are you familiar with potential energy, kinetic energy, heat energy and sound energy as they pertain to the physics of collisions?

If you want to, we can go further in-depth into this aspect, but before we bite on that hook, just keep in mind that your precious "caps", with all that weight and inertia that you attribute these miracles to, were looking a little light-on by halfway down the collapse...in fact, they are conspicuous by their absence. Seems they couldn't stand the strain of trying to support your theory and just went to pieces on us.



All I see are dust clouds and flying debris where your caps should be crushing down on the lower sections. And look at all the snapped pieces of steel in that cloud. I wonder if they came from your disintegrated cap, or from the intact building itself? Hmm...

And you skipped over all the other anomalies I mentioned. Particularly obvious as being ignored are these ones:

• Pulverization of all of the concrete in the structure into

Originally posted by Shroomery
So a fireball went from above the 70th floor to the third and quite possibly the basement, where it wrinkled up that 40 ton piece of equipmet, throwing marble off the wall. I don't think I have to point out how strange this sounds.

What's more astonishing is that, the wtc consists of those sky lobbies, so those elevator shafts don't continue from top to bottom. The tower is split up in 3 parts, and to reach the top you need to get from one elevator to another. This was to speed up everyday "work-flow" and evacuation should it occur.

Just because the elevators did not extend the full length of the building, the shaft in which they were built did. Therefore, any blast travelling through that shaft would have exited at the bottom of that shaft... just like the muzzleflash from a rifle.

How about Michael Rodriguez who was head of maintenance in the towers for 20? years was it I believe. Who said there was an explosion in the basement, before any of the planes hit the tower ?

The only response to that was something along the lines of "the plane hit first but because of the speed of sound he heared the explosion in the basement first".

Again, read my response above... the explosion would have exited this central shaft at the bottom.

What about the seismographic AND video evidence about the explosion prior to the collapse, don't remember wich tower but I think it was the north.

I am STILL waiting for someone to show me this definitive evidence. The seimogrphs seem to show the actual colopase of the towers, no explosions and the video is non-existent. Any video I have ever seen seems to show lateral ejection of material as a result of the force of downward pressure.

I hear a lot of people saying "well, explosions are loud, we should've heard them". (Only talking about the charges during collapse now)
That's not true, you're thinking about a bottom to top demolition. This was not the case on 9/11.
The explosions started from the top, meaning, it would have to be very loud to make it that distance, especially with all the sound around you, it could easily be missed.
Plus, you would only be able to hear that first charge go off, after the first one the tower starts falling and creates an immense roar wich could easily block the sound from other explosions.

And don't forget that if there were charges, these were put in by the government, a few bucks more or less wouldn't matter if that meant to cover some of the obvious explosion sounds.

Not to forget that all I could hear on CNN that day was "another explosion" "we seem to be witnessing what sounds like secondary explosions" "we believe there was another explosion". ALL day long.

The concept of a top to bottom demolition is ludicrous, especially with a building with the height of the towers. Sucha teqnique would have likely lead to the building listing and/or twisting and falling over to the side. This is clearly the result of a live load accelerating.

Originally posted by kozmo

Just because the elevators did not extend the full length of the building, the shaft in which they were built did. Therefore, any blast travelling through that shaft would have exited at the bottom of that shaft... just like the muzzleflash from a rifle.

Could be, but are you sure about that ?
From reading up on an engineering forum, I've found out that buildings, by law, should consist of different 'blocks' or compartments. Mainly to prevent fire from spreading through the entire building. I'd be surprised if the WTC had a different view on fireprotection.
I'm however not sure that that was the case in the WTC towers however, and I don't know if the fireball theory is at all possible.

What I do know is the following :

Originally posted by kozmo

Originally posted by Shroomery
How about Michael Rodriguez who was head of maintenance in the towers for 20? years was it I believe. Who said there was an explosion in the basement, before any of the planes hit the tower ?

The only response to that was something along the lines of "the plane hit first but because of the speed of sound he heared the explosion in the basement first".

Again, read my response above... the explosion would have exited this central shaft at the bottom.

.. you're the second one to comment on that part without understandig what I'm really saying, wich makes me wonder how much of the other stuff actually reaches your brain in it's original form, no offence.

According to you, this is what happend on 9/11, in chronological order :

-Fireball from plane goes through elevator shaft all the way to the basement
-Explosion of fireball in basement heard
-Plane that causes fireball hits tower

Originally posted by kozmo

Originally posted by Shroomery
What about the seismographic AND video evidence about the explosion prior to the collapse, don't remember wich tower but I think it was the north.

I am STILL waiting for someone to show me this definitive evidence. The seimogrphs seem to show the actual colopase of the towers, no explosions and the video is non-existent. Any video I have ever seen seems to show lateral ejection of material as a result of the force of downward pressure.

Not waiting hard enough, I've pasted the link where you can see the vibrations before the tower falls. And if you open google you'll find the seismographic evidence showing spikes before the collapse.
What's also weird is that when the tower actually hits the ground (if it really does, cause somewhere between story 110 and the ground most of the tower dissapeared) the amount of ground-shaking is less then when the towers start collapsing,

Originally posted by kozmo

Originally posted by Shroomery
I hear a lot of people saying "well, explosions are loud, we should've heard them". (Only talking about the charges during collapse now)
That's not true, you're thinking about a bottom to top demolition. This was not the case on 9/11.
The explosions started from the top, meaning, it would have to be very loud to make it that distance, especially with all the sound around you, it could easily be missed.
Plus, you would only be able to hear that first charge go off, after the first one the tower starts falling and creates an immense roar wich could easily block the sound from other explosions.

And don't forget that if there were charges, these were put in by the government, a few bucks more or less wouldn't matter if that meant to cover some of the obvious explosion sounds.

Not to forget that all I could hear on CNN that day was "another explosion" "we seem to be witnessing what sounds like secondary explosions" "we believe there was another explosion". ALL day long.

The concept of a top to bottom demolition is ludicrous, especially with a building with the height of the towers. Sucha teqnique would have likely lead to the building listing and/or twisting and falling over to the side. This is clearly the result of a live load accelerating.

So when towers start collapsing from the top by a demolition gravity suddenly works different then when it's caused by fire ? Could you back that up ?

Why would it tip over or twist ? The demolition removes the floors below the collapsing part, so there's no other way to go but down ..
It's exactly when there are't any demolitions placed that there is resistance from lower floors and this would cause it to twist/tilt.

[edit on 25-8-2005 by Shroomery]