Read the further statement by Peruggia, referring to Zarillo:
"I told him: "You see Chief Ganci and Chief Ganci only. Provide him with the information that the building integrity is severely compromised and
they believe the building is in danger of imminent collapse." So, he left off in that direction.
Q. They felt that just the one building or both of them?
A. The information we got at that time was that they felt both buildings were significantly damaged, but they felt that the north tower, which was the
first one to be struck, was going to be in imminent danger of collapse. Looking up at it, you could see that, you could see through the smoke or
whatever, that there was significant structural damage to the exterior of the building. Very noticeable. Now you know, again, this is not a scene
where the thought of both buildings collapsing ever entered into my mind."
No, I bet it didn't! And it is utterly unbelievable, too, that it could have entered the mind of Captain Rotanz as a serious thought! How could the
degree of structural damage to either tower inferred from an external inspection ever have made him come to the conclusion that the tower was about to
collapse? Utterly unbelievable! He must have been the only professional fire fighter there who thought that it could happen. In fact, it was so
incredible that Chief Ganci had to ask Zarillo who had told him that! If Richard Rotanz REALLY did hold that opinion - one unwarranted by the evidence
available to him, and if he DID express it to Peruggia (we only have Peruggia's word for that), he was making an extraordinarily unprofessional
judgement unshared by his colleagues. It is just as hard to believe that as it is to accept that the buildings fell because of fire and structural
damage caused by the impact of planes.
Are we therefore asked to believe that someone with all the experience of a Fire Captain, one who had presumably during his career fought fires in
buildings far more fierce than those in the two towers, had judged that fire and structural damage to about TWO floors of a 110-storey building had so
weakened it that he thought it was about to come down?! Had the computer-like brain of Richard Rotanz worked out in a few hours what was likely to
happen, when it took months of official investigation by engineers in NIST to come up with a far-fetched reason for the collapse?! Can you really
believe that? I cannot. Either this opinion was never actually expressed in the conversation Peruggia had with Rotanz or else Rotanz was deliberately
overestimating the seriousness of the situation for some dark reason. (Perish the thought, of course, that he knew the buildings were going to be
demolished and had to come up with a half-baked reason to order withdrawal of his men!). Even his own colleagues had difficulty in believing
Peruggia's message conveyed to them by Zarillo ("who the f-k told you that?", Chief Ganci asked). Was Rotanz really so prescient or clever, or did
he just get lucky in calling it right, when hundreds of fire fighting professionals at the scene never suspected the towers would collapse? I doubt
it.

