Problems With “Progressive Collapse” Scenarios

I keep hearing more and more complicated explanations coming forth for why the twin towers collapsed all the way to the ground. To me, these look like increasingly desperate attempts of holding back the tide of those who are starting to realize that this building could not have been destroyed in the manner we were told.


I have heard physicists and engineers trying to explain the collapse perform simple calculations which seem to show that it is possible. What they're looking at is energy. Is there enough potential energy in the building to tear it apart? Well, yes. If you count all the energy required to lift all that mass up in the sky, then there's enough to break all the welds in the building. BUT, and here's a big but... that energy isn't available on tap with 100 percent efficiency everywhere it's needed when it's needed.

Even so, using this energy to tear the building up is evidence that this isn't the energy that WAS used in the actual destruction of the towers. I'll explain...

There is one source of energy from which to derive the destruction of the building below the damage zone - the kinetic energy of the falling material above.

The mass above the impact site falls onto the mass below it, smashing it. The smashing of the floor below requires force to be exerted upon it.

But, for every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction.

If the top sections pressing down on the bottom sections was enough to smash them, then the bottom sections must have pushed back with equal force. So the falling debris MUST have been slowed down.

Considering that every single floor would press back on the floors smashing down on them, it becomes clear that the collapse of the building must have been slowed down by the mere act of collapsing. A brick falling through thin air falls faster than a brick crashing through sheets of glass. The energy to destroy comes from the energy of the fall, and when there is more destruction there is slower collapse.

The speed of the collapse gives away the damning evidence that the energy supply to tear the building apart came from something other than the falling debris.


To restate:

The building can tear itself apart, borrowing some energy of the fall to break itself into pieces, but in doing so, that fall must slow down. The only way for the collapse to progress in ~10 seconds is if the building was being torn to pieces by some energy source other than the energy of the fall.

The peer-reviewed paper referred to in this thread likens the world trade center buildings to that of an inflated balloon. An inflated balloon is like a spring, stretched and tied at one end. When the ends are separated, the spring is free to pull back on itself.

Now I ask you, in what way was the world trade center like a spring being kept in tension? The whole building was under static compression stress. Furthermore, buildings are designed to resist collapses in as many ways possible, with overdesign, redundancy, and safety features.

Look at the Marriott Hotel right after the tower's collapse.

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This building has OBVIOUSLY suffered terrible damage, and yet, once the damage was done by the WTC 1 + 2 falling debris, this building held itself up just fine, as did all the other surrounding buildings. These buildings had to be torn down deliberately by a demolition team later on. Buildings just don't tear themselves apart when they're designed to become one giant, solid, strong piece that holds itself together. It is not a stack of cards or a row of dominoes.

Our experience doesn't give us a sense of the scale of what happened on 9/11. The words “jumbo jet” sound awesome, but when you compare the mass of that aircraft to the mass of the building, it makes the plane look like a gnat. One hundred fifty tons versus five hundred thousand tons. Just one 30 foot section of the outer steel weighed more than the plane itself.

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Let's see that in terms of sports. We'll double the number of tons of the plane to 300, and call them pounds instead. So we have the mass of a stong, heavy football player. Now we double the number of tons in the building, and call them pounds. One million pounds.

One million. What has this kind of mass? A diesel locomotive? 37,000 pounds. Nope. Way too small. How about a tank? 130,000 pounds. Not even close.

How about one of those big trucks they use in mines to haul around ore? Take the largest one ever seen, and make sure it's fully loaded, and we're still only halfway there.

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If we're still using the analogy of the football player, we'll say he's 150 pounds of aluminum and 150 pounds of kerosene. Now, shoot him at that huge truck and see how much the truck cares. Let the diesel fuel burn, and that truck is just going to motor on... There is no way that human-sized amount of aluminum and fuel is going to do any significant damage to a mass of steel and concrete that large.

I hope this helps put it into perspective.

Is there still any argument left to explain the collapse of three buildings on 9/11 that holds any water?

ok

I think holograms and hydrogem bombs are a tad more desperate than a peer reviewed paper, wouldn't you agree ?

how can you say the truth movement is growing ? those truthers got laughed out of the building when they interrupted mahers' show

to be fair, we should compare the conspiracy sides peer reviewed paper that was published in a scientific journal next to the prgressive collapse one.

You posting in the wrong section aren't you?