NIST Releases Report On WTC 7 Collapse

photonic writes "After three years of study, the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) finally released its report on the collapse of World Trade Center building 7. The main conclusion is that the building came down due to fire, not due to debris damage or some conspiracy demolition team. The fire started pretty small after the collapse of WTC 1, but was left to burn several floors out completely. The important finding is that the collapse was triggered by thermal expansion of beams, which could detach asymmetrically loaded girders from the main columns. Some limited pancaking of floors then caused a lack of lateral support and buckling of a single column. This triggered the failure of the entire core of the building, which finally fell down as a single piece. Crackpot theories can be discussed elsewhere; please limit the discussion to the science here. All documents can be found at NIST's WTC page, which read like a porn magazine for finite element junkies. Simulation movies are also available. And yes, they used Beowulf clusters to do the simulations, some of which lasted for several months."

Comments

Re:This is not supposed to be a restricted forum.

[Chas]

It's the difference between arguing "facts" and "beliefs".

"I believe THUS" is not subject to any form of rational proof or disproof.

"But this only happens because people don't just stand there and accept blindly what is told to them especially when it goes against commen sense."

That's the thing about "common sense". It just ISN'T that common.

A NIST engineer, somebody who's actually studied the debris, seen the site, and understands the physics involved says "According to the evidence, it happened THUS".

Bert Armchair, with a lousy example of a third-grade education, is sitting in front of his boob-tube chucks back a Schlitz and goes "Sounds hokey to me. I think Alien Ninjas from the gub'mint blew it up!"

Now what is YOUR "common" sense telling you at this point?

Simply having an opinion and an alternate theory on how something came about doesn't make you an authority.

The only conspiracy theory that makes sense

[catchblue22]

The idea that these buildings were brought down by explosives is patently absurd. Period. However there is a "conspiracy theory" that is, to me at least, plausable and believable. Namely that Bush/Cheney and the other neocons allowed 9/11 to happen by looking the other way, and by not doing enough to stop it.

It is a well known fact, as outlined in the "Project for a New American Century", that Cheney and the other neocons wanted desparately to go into Iraq. It is also a fact that the Patriot Act had been written several years before 9/11, and was sitting in a drawer, waiting to be enacted. It doesn't seem too much of a stretch to me to think that Cheney would allow America to be attacked in a hugely symbolic but ultimately non-devastating way, as a way of pushing the country into Iraq, and of foisting laws like the Patriot Act on congress.

However, I fear that what I propose here will be lumped in with all of the other crackpot conspiracy theories about demolition teams in the twin towers. There is really no compelling evidence to support what I say. Only a strong suspicion based on what was written in the Project for a New American Century document, and observation of how far the neoconservatives seemed willing to go to enact their policies. America under Cheney and his neocon thugs has been a profoundly unsettling place. I often feel that there is a war being waged right under our noses, against freedom and the ideals of American democracy.