World Trade Center 7 stands amid the rubble of the recently collapsed
Twin Towers. (Photograph by New York Office of Emergency Management)
Posted on 08/21/2008 3:19:07 PM PDT by yankeedame
Conspiracy theorists have long claimed that explosives downed World Trade Center 7, north of the Twin Towers. The long-awaited report from the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) conclusively rebuts those claims. Fire alone brought down the building, the report concludes, pointing to thermal expansion of key structural members as the culprit. The report also raises concerns that other large buildings might be more vulnerable to fire-induced structural failure than previously thought.
(Thelink to article's video located at the botton of original article.)
World Trade Center 7 stands amid the rubble of the recently collapsed
Twin Towers. (Photograph by New York Office of Emergency Management)
The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) has released its long-awaited report on the collapse of World Trade 7 following the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. "Our take-home message today is that the reason for the collapse of World Trade Center 7 is no longer a mystery," NIST lead investigator Shyam Sunder told journalists at this morning's press conference in Gaithersburg, Md. "WTC 7 collapsed because of fires fueled by office furnishings. It did not collapse from explosives or from diesel fuel fires." Conspiracy theorists have long pointed to the collapse of the 47-story structure as key evidence that the U.S. government orchestrated or abetted the 9/11 attacks. No planes struck the building, and the commonly available views of the exterior didn't show significant damage.
Yet, at 5:20 pm, 7 hours after the collapse of the Twin Towers (WTC 1 and 2), WTC 7 rapidly fell in on itself. Since WTC 7 housed Secret Service and CIA offices, conspiracy theorists claimed that the building was destroyed in a controlled demolition in order to obliterate evidence of the U.S. government's complicity in the terrorist attacks. "It is impossible for a building to fall the way it fell without explosives being involved," stated actress and TV personality Rosie O'Donnell of ABC's The View in March 2007. "For the first time in history, steel was melted by fire. It is physically impossible," she said.
DIAGRAM: Thermal Expansion Causes WTC 7 Floor
Failures(Diagram by Loel Barr)
DIAGRAM: WTC 7 Support Columns and
Floor Framing(Diagram by NIST)
Today's report confirms that a fire was, indeed, the cause. "This is the first time that we are aware of, that a building taller than about 15 stories has collapsed primarily due to fires," Sunder told reporters at the press conference. "What we found was that uncontrolled building fires—similar to fires experienced in other tall buildings—caused an extraordinary event, the collapse of WTC7." The unprecedented nature of the event means that understanding the precise mechanism of the collapse is important not just to answer conspiracy theorists' questions, but to improve safety standards in the engineering of large buildings.
The final report describes how debris from the collapse of WTC 1 ignited fires on at least 10 floors of WTC 7 at the western half of the south face. Fires on Floors 7 through 9 and 11 through 13 burned out of control, because the water supply to the automatic sprinkler system had failed. The primary and backup water supply to the sprinkler systems for the lower floors relied on the city's water supply. Those water lines were damaged by the collapse of WTC 1 and 2. These uncontrolled fires in WTC 7 eventually spread to the northeast part of the building, where the collapse began.
After 7 hours of uncontrolled fires, a steel girder on Floor 13 lost its connection to one of the 81 columns supporting the building. Floor 13 collapsed, beginning a cascade of floor failures to Floor 5. Column 79, no longer supported by a girder, buckled, triggering a rapid succession of structural failures that moved from east to west. All 23 central columns, followed by the exterior columns, failed in what's known as a "progressive collapse"—that is, local damage that spreads from one structural element to another, eventually resulting in the collapse of the entire structure.
The report clarifies a number of widely debated issues concerning the collapse, particularly the role of the building's many diesel fuel tanks and the importance of structural damage from falling WTC 1 debris. Both of those factors have been cited by investigators as possibly contributing to the collapse; the 2006 Popular Mechanics book Debunking 9/11 Myths: Why Conspiracy Theories Can't Stand Up to the Facts mentions both hypotheses. However, the final NIST report downplays both scenarios, concluding that the diesel fuel stored in tanks (and intended to power backup generators) did not burn long enough or hot enough to account for structural failures. And, while debris damage to WTC 7's southern exterior was considerable (and initiated the destructive fires), the collapse originated in the northeast portion of the building. In fact, the report concludes: "Even without the structural damage, WTC 7 would have collapsed from fires."
The report determines that the actual culprit in the collapse was the combustion of ordinary building furnishings: "These uncontrolled fires had characteristics similar to those that have occurred previously in tall buildings." If the sprinkler system in WTC 7 had been working, it is likely that "the fires in WTC 7 would have been controlled and the collapse prevented." The report also suggests that current engineering standards for coping with fire-induced thermal expansion need to be re-examined, particularly for buildings like WTC 7 that have long, unsupported floor spans. A key factor in the collapse, NIST concluded, was the failure of structural "connections that were designed to resist gravity loads, but not thermally induced lateral loads." According to Sunder: "For the first time we have shown that fire can induce a progressive collapse."
Spurred by conspiracy theorists' questions, investigators did look specifically at the possibility that explosives were involved. "Hypothetical blast events did not play a role in the collapse of WTC 7," the report states, adding that investigators "found no evidence whose explanation required invocation of a blast event." Moreover, the smallest charge capable of initiating column failure "would have resulted in a sound level of 130 dB [decibels] to 140 dB at a distance of at least half a mile." Witnesses did not report hearing such a loud noise, nor is one audible on recordings of the collapse.
NIST will accept public comment on the final report until Sept. 15, 2008.
NIST's press release and other material on the report can be found here. Click here to download the full report in pdf
They’ll just say it was a coverup. They apparently have nothing but time, internet access, and attention deficit disorder affecting their reasoning faculties.
Nothing shuts up Truthers. This certainly won’t.
Very interesting.
This is only the second time in history that fire has melted steel. < /Odonnel>
The fact that nothing suspicious was found just shows how clever they were!
Where’s my tin-foil beanie...
what about the two huge fuel tanks (around 18,000 gallons each) they used for emergency generators that was under this tower?
I see they’ve dragged Loel Barr into this.
Those drawings don’t fool me for a moment.
I bet he’s CIA. I bet he worked on the animation for Flight 800.
Wow, I guess all those big vats of molten steel you see in a steel plant aren't steel at all but some other metal since fire can't melt steel according to Rose O'donut, worlds leading expert on structural collapse./SAR
I have thought since she first said this that this ranks as one of the stupidest statements of all times, not the stupidest but really, really close.
At first I wondered why the author included such a stupid quote and then I realized he couldn’t resist its compelling and all encompassing stupidity.
Quite nice of him to give Rosie her due, really. :0)
I can’t wait for the DUmmie reaction.
—bflr—
I saw a T-shirt that said:
it seems to apply about the 9/11 Conspiracy nuts.
BUMP
This Rosie thing (not person) is astonishingly stupid. I melt steel all the time with my torch and its cutting FLAME.
Why do people even watch/listen to her?
In laymans terms, THE DOMINO EFFECT.
This isn’t going to change anyone’s mind.
Bookmarking. Thanks!!
The troofers know the troof...
The truthers forget that Popular Mechanics is a very highly respected magazine.
FIST BUMP
Your cutting torch is a controlled burn, and it burns at 5800 to 6300 degrees. An open air fire, which is what any office building fire is, burns at between 1200 to 1500 degrees.
The temperature of an open air fire, like what happened at the WTC, is between 1200 and 1500 degrees. At a steel plant, a controlled burn occurs in a closed furnace in order to melt the steel. Much higher temperatures occur in a furnace.
NIST my a$$! Who are these guys at NIST? What qualifications do they have to make this sort of judgment? Have they ever been a nationally syndicated talk show host? Have they?
I rest my case! </Rosie>
Steel melted, trust me. Rosie O’donut is an idiot. What happened was the pins holding the structure together softened and that caused the buildings to fall. Don’t tell me you actually think Bush and the boys brought the trade center down and the planes were just for show?
My point was that her claim that flame had never before melted steel is false. I do realize that the flame is hotter in the torch, but it is a flame.
I will say that it is not necessary for a fire to actually melt the steel for the building to collapse. All that is necessary is for the steel to be weakened enough by the heat so that it cannot support the weight it holds up. This happens all the time during fires in structures with steel beams and columns. It is nothing new.
Underwriter's Laboratories (UL) tested the steel beams from the WTC buildings. They heated it to 2000 degrees for two solid hours, and "it did beautifully". Keep in mind the temp of an open air fire is between 1200 and 1500 degrees. That's the temperature of the FIRE, not the steel itself. The fire in WTC 7 was billowing black smoke, indicating that it was oxygen starved, so it wasn't even 1200 degrees in there. NIST's report on this just leaves more questions.
Oh, I know steel melted. FEMA's report said, "Evidence of a severe high temperature corrosion attack on the steel, including oxidation and sulfidation with subsequent intergranular melting, was readily visible in the near-surface microstructure. A liquid eutectic mixture containing primarily iron, oxygen, and sulfur formed during this hot corrosion attack on the steel… The severe corrosion and subsequent erosion of Samples 1 and 2 are a very unusual event. No clear explanation for the source of the sulfur has been identified." I don't know if Bush was involved or not, but I do know fire alone didn't bring that building down at a free fall speed all at once. If you believe pins failing made building 7 fall at free fall speed, that sounds like more of a conspiracy theory to me.
I have no problem believing a fire, even a black smoking fire as you say was the case at WTC7, caused the collapse.
I am a licensed Mechanical Engineer, was a firefighter for 5 years earlier in my life, and worked at a coal burning power plant where we dealt with fire and flame damage in boilers.
Beams and columns loaded with weight carry stress. Add the stress of restrained thermal expansion and the weakening of the steel with temperature, and you have a perfect recipe for sudden building element failure that will then overload the next element, and the domino effect happens. I have seen single story steel buildings collapse and crumble during a fire due to these effects.
What did the NIST mean by "it did beautifully"? Material tests under lab conditions may not have simulated the actual conditions of the first building element to fail in the field that day.
The bottom line is, I do not see anything but a building failing due to a fire and damage from what went on in adjacent buildings that day. Any other conclusion is bordering on paranoia.
I wouldn't have much of a problem with it either, if it hadn't fallen the way it did, and as fast as it did. I wouldn't have expected such a straight down descent like we see in all the videos. I have no doubt that a domino effect can happen, but each floor would meet resistance when it hit the next floor and that would prolong the collapse. You are right the lab conditions did not accurately simulate the conditions on 9/11. The fire they applied was not oxygen starved and burned hotter. I don't think questioning the official story is paranoia. I think too many questions have not been answered.
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