Talk:Collapse of the World Trade Center/archive9

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Implemented consensus on controlled demolition (?)

My above suggestion for dealing with the CD section seemed to be accepted (if largely tacitly). I've put it in. Please note that all the information that has been removed is available in the main CD hypothesis article. I will start implementing some of my other ideas (at a reasonable pace) over the next few days, time permitting. These should not affect this section.--Thomas Basboll 19:35, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

That looks good. I made a couple of changes. Comments welcome. Tom Harrison Talk 19:56, 6 January 2007 (UTC)
We need some sort of adjective on the amount of adherents. "significant"? Or something about a widespread belief. And can we perhaps avoid the theory/hypothesis argument by using "Controlled demolition controversy"?--Thomas Basboll 20:47, 6 January 2007 (UTC)
What do the sources cited call it, and how do they characterize it? Tom Harrison Talk 21:05, 6 January 2007 (UTC)
The Scripps Howard source counts CD among a "widespread" and "growing" resentment of the US gov't. I've gone with the former. The only real alternative is to say 16%, but this is only the US stats. I'll find the international survey also.--Thomas Basboll 22:06, 6 January 2007 (UTC)
But the word widespread isn't used in the CD context at all....it's just not accurate. RxS 00:16, 7 January 2007 (UTC)
Yes, I see. It says, "Widespread resentment and alienation toward the national government appears to be fueling a growing acceptance of conspiracy theories about the 2001 attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon." Unless you want to call them conspiracy theories, I don't see how you can justify "widespread" and "growing." Tom Harrison Talk 22:16, 6 January 2007 (UTC)
That was my worry (as per my edit summary). The article on the poll didn't have our particular angle on it, but I think it is fair to say that (the poll shows that) the CD hypothesis is subject to the same trends as the other aspects. We could move the conspiracy theory association to the front of the section and then say "As part of a growing acceptance of conspiracy theories surrounding the events of 9/11, the belief that the World Trade Center was brought down by controlled demolition, not the fires that the resulted from the impacts of the planes, has found increasing support among members of the public."--Thomas Basboll 22:24, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

I'm sorry but the word widespread is just not appropriate, here's how it's used in the source (as Tom pointed out):

Widespread resentment and alienation toward the national government appears to be fueling a growing acceptance of conspiracy theories about the 2001 attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon.

It's clearly used in terms of resentment and alienation. Concerning CD, the source says "The poll also found that 16 percent of Americans speculate that secretly planted explosives..." Nothing about actual beliefs. If the section is about controlled demolition let's use what the poll found. This is more accurate: A recent poll found that 16% of the public speculate that the World Trade Center was destroyed by controlled demolition, not by the effects the airplane's impact. RxS 00:13, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

The new engineering issues section

I outlined my ideas for the top of the article above. The idea is to explain what the specific engineering puzzle was that the NIST report eventually solved. This means going back to the initial shock among engineers and focusing the design details to make understanding the collapse mechanism easier. Please give me a few days, and feel free to help out. We can always go back to the way it was.--Thomas Basboll 19:28, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

We need to ensure that we don't call the events unprecedented as that is POV. Early descriptions of the issues aren't very interesting in themselves at all. All we need to do is utilize the most widely understood basis for the collapse mechanisim, as exhaustively detailed in the NIST reports.--MONGO 19:38, 7 January 2007 (UTC)
Even Bazant and Verdure introduce their recent 2006 with a remark about how puzzling these collapses initially were. Its a way of acknowledging the enormous and admirable amount of work that goes into explaining these sorts of things. But you have to start with a sense of the puzzle, the difficulty. You can't just say, it was an engineering thing and engineers did a good days work doing their thing and figured it out. You have to try to explain what the problem was. That's what I'm working towards and it's going to be fine. I've already changed the heading (no revert was needed to that) to address your concern. But I don't think "unprecedented" is POV--everyone agrees that nothing like this has ever happened before.--Thomas Basboll 19:49, 7 January 2007 (UTC)
The scale of damage was unprecedented, but it is POV to say that no building has ever collapsed before because no buildings have ever endured this amount of destructive force before aside from those destroyed during wartime. Engineers have had to do lots of analysis of events when things have happened they didn't expect...though it is poorly detailed in the article, the Baldwin Hills Reservoir dam disaster took some time to understand how it happened, but it's not the first time a dam failed, anymore than the WTC collapse was "unprecedented"...the only difference is scale, not the event overall.--MONGO 19:57, 7 January 2007 (UTC)
Engineers had no precedent for understanding this disaster. That was part of the reason it was so difficult to explain (FEMA got it wrong, remember). But is there anything wrong with the section as it now stands (as I read it, it doesn't make any of the claims you suggest: i.e., "no building has ever collapsed before" (from fire, I take it).--Thomas Basboll 20:01, 7 January 2007 (UTC)
FEMA got some of it "wrong". Lots of buildings have collapsed from fire, and no other buildings in modern history have endured the stresses these did...the issue is about scale...and many of the earlier analysis were right to some degree. The only analysis that isn't right is those that support a conspiracy theory regarding the events.--MONGO 20:06, 7 January 2007 (UTC)
Please review this discussion and the edit you reverted and identify the relevance of bringing CTs in. Also, you last sentence is obviously nonsense (right?). Any analysis that does not support a conspiracy theory is right?--Thomas Basboll 20:16, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

What do RS's say on the 'unprecedented' bit?

Who can we source on this? F.F.McGurk 20:46, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Most of the mainstream reporting and investigating on this proceeds from the idea that the collapses were at least unexpected. The "unprecedented" idea entered this article a long time ago as part of the "early attempts" section. I simply moved it forward in the article. I've now removed that word (even though it is more or less accurate) to avoid unnecessary conflict.--Thomas Basboll 22:22, 7 January 2007 (UTC)
Do any RS's refer to it as unprecedented? If so it should go back in. F.F.McGurk 00:34, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

Who was audited/reviewed the NIST report?

Unless the NIST report has been audited/confirmed by valid third parties as reported by reliable sources their opinions should be noted as their hypothesis opinion. We can't give the NIST undue weight. F.F.McGurk 20:46, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

There isn't really an alternative source of "weight". There are a few papers out there by people not directly involved in the NIST investigation. (Bazant, for example; I don't think he contributed to it.) They all confirm the conclusions of the report. Everything else seems to be being published outside engineering circles.--Thomas Basboll 22:25, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

There isn't any other authoritative and valid source for major information on this issue. Most of the rest are conspiracy theories and a lot of poeple only wrote them to make a buck.--Beguiled 21:17, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

Isn't that his point? ALthough NIST is the largest organization out there, there have not been a large amount of published scientific reviews of the study (since it is a 500+ page document, there are bound to be sooner or later). He brings up an issue worthy of disscusion. As you pointed out, it is the only source, thus claiming its findings as truth rather than NIST's hypothesis/claims would probably give the NIST report undue weight in my opinion. DerwinUMD 04:12, 11 January 2007 (UTC)
I think the cost of investigating such a big disaster has been prohibitive. It would be very difficult for university-based engineers to generate data that could compete with NIST's. The best we could hope for is a review (or, as FF notes, an actual audit) of the NIST investigation and report. My suggestion is to first trace the history of the NIST investigation (back through the FEMA and ASCE investigations) and try to understand how it was carried out, and what sort of quality controls/consultations were built into the investigation process. Much of what we discover can be usefully added to this article.--Thomas Basboll 08:23, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

Proposed move of structural details section

I'd like to move most of the information from the structural details section into the main World Trade Center article, just above the "Engineers & Contractors" section (where this information actually seems to be missing). [1] Since no detailed account of how the structure collapsed globally exists, and Bazant and Zhou showed that any such account is unnecessary (with their "order of magnitude" calculation), the structural details (like the amount and tapering of the columns) seem irrelevant here. In its place I want to add some materials about the extent to which the towers were designed to survive aircraft impacts, which it what the reader probably wants to know something about. Your thoughts?--Thomas Basboll 20:44, 9 January 2007 (UTC)

Perhaps it could be trimmed down. I think that an explanation of what "core columns", "perimeter columns", "spandrel", "floor truss" etc. mean is necessary to have a meaningful discussion of the collapse, though. Toiyabe 21:05, 9 January 2007 (UTC)
That was my initial impression too. And the core/perimeter structure must of course be noted because of its role in the collapse mechanism. But on closer examination, with the demise of Eagar's truss theory, and, more generally, the pancake collapse theory, the rest of it seems really not to have made a difference. The columns simply failed. The top (a rigid box) fell onto the bottom (another rigid box) and crushed it. The WTC was perhaps especially vulnerable to column failure by fire (due to the open floor spaces--which remains in the next section) but once the top starts to move downwards, any (reasonably efficient) structure (no matter how the columns are distributed and connected) will, as I understand it, fail. The structural details section make them seem decisive, despite the fact that the report makes very little out of them.--Thomas Basboll 21:20, 9 January 2007 (UTC)
Thats bordering on original research so lets stay away from that. We can quote them only, not make judgements about their work or derive our on conclusions from it.--MONGO 21:33, 9 January 2007 (UTC)
What is bordering on OR? I am proposing to trim this section drastically. That is, I'm trying to decide what parts to select from the (pages and pages) of quotable descriptions of the WTC structures. I'm not deriving any conclusions at all.--Thomas Basboll 21:39, 9 January 2007 (UTC)
The NIST report doesn't discuss how the buildings collapsed?--MONGO 22:37, 9 January 2007 (UTC)
Nope. Just how the collapses began. That means that pretty much any (ordinary) structure would suffer the same fate. (Which is why there was so much concern about new building codes, etc.) The total progressive collapse (after initiation) was not the result of unique structural features of the WTC.--Thomas Basboll 22:43, 9 January 2007 (UTC)
Not sure what more is needed though...the initiation of the collapse led to the full collapse. Not sure why they would detail every second of the event, which would be virtually impossible anyway. No, not every building might react in the same manner, especially since buildings are built differently. No doubt, you take almost 300,000 pounds of aircraft and ram it at over 400mph into anything and you'll create a huge amount of destruction.--MONGO 22:55, 9 January 2007 (UTC)
That's more or less what NIST says. So the structural details here are superfluous.--Thomas Basboll 23:04, 9 January 2007 (UTC)
That's right. Not every building would react in the same way to the impacts. But once collapse has initiated, it really doesn't matter how the floor trusses, core columns and spandrel plates are arranged. According to NIST the "enormous weight" will just crush the building below (unless the building is ridiculously overdesigned). That's why the structural details provided in this section are superfluous.--Thomas Basboll 23:09, 9 January 2007 (UTC)

Okay, I see where you're going with that. I don't see a problem with doing some trimming, so long as we don't remove anything that is substantially verifiable.--MONGO 06:51, 10 January 2007 (UTC)

Factual discrepancy between the NIST report and FEMA on aircraft impact design

There seems to be an error in the aircraft impact section. FEMA (intro, p. 17) did offer the "lost in fog"/180 mph idea as mentioned in the article (which is pretty much Leslie Robertson's version of it). NIST, however, found a reference to a study involving a plane hitting at 600 mph (NCSTAR 1-1, p. 70-1). Given the issue of whether the 490 mph and 590 mph impacts exceeded design expectations that immediately follows this claim, it seems an important problem to deal with. NIST seems to say that no conclusions about the design in relation to aircraft impacts can be drawn. Any ideas?--Thomas Basboll 22:24, 9 January 2007 (UTC)

Which report are you looking at? This is the one I am looking at[2]--MONGO 22:35, 9 January 2007 (UTC)
Sorry, I should have linked. It's this one: [3] (PDF). And here's a Google cached and highlighted version of the FEMA report's intro. [4].--Thomas Basboll 22:40, 9 January 2007 (UTC)

That report by NIST clearly indicates that the report they found from 1964 was a three page report and they cannot do anything more than speculate about it since the engineering specs are not available. If you ask me, it has no relevence here since even NIST cannot draw any conclusions from it or render whether it was based on sound engineering and kenetic studies since they don't have the specs.--MONGO 22:48, 9 January 2007 (UTC)

So you agree we need to remove FEMA's "lost in fog" speculations from the article?--Thomas Basboll 22:53, 9 January 2007 (UTC)
Not if FEMA's study is based on a more relaiable report that was done during the design stage of the WTC. The one NIST mentions can't be further evaluated by them since they don't have any of the specs available that the report from 1964 was based on.--MONGO 22:57, 9 January 2007 (UTC)
Both FEMA and NIST are talking about what the buildings were designed for. NIST did a document search and did not find whatever FEMA was referring to (probably based on Robertson's recollection in an interview). NIST is the most recent statement and they say we can't really say anything very specific about what sort of impact the WTC's designed imagined, only that they did consider the possibility of an impact. So we should remove the idea that the impacts were seven times worse than expected.--Thomas Basboll 23:03, 9 January 2007 (UTC)
I'll look over thr reports later and get back to you in about 8 hours. The studies I have seen involved a 707 flying at approach speed (roughly 140-180 mph) and a 707 was lighter weight than a 767. I'll see what I can dig up.--MONGO 23:12, 9 January 2007 (UTC)
OK. Thanks. Just keep in mind that we generally give NIST the last word. I imagine you're thinking of Robertson's calculations (He provided a version of it in 2002, here [5], - PDF - see page 8, esp. figure 3). NIST seems to have been unable to confirm that these studies were made.--Thomas Basboll 23:29, 9 January 2007 (UTC)
Can we just report both FEMA and NIST ("FEMA says..., while NIST says..."), rather than trying to decide among ourselves who is more right? If, for example, we decide to include only NIST, then someone will come along in a few months and say, "Hey I just the FEMA report and this article is wrong!". Surely its better if we report both from the start. I can also see OR issues with us trying to decide which agency is more credible. ... Kafkaesque Seabhcan 23:52, 9 January 2007 (UTC)
Perhaps something like "While it is has been argued that [FEMA/Robertson], NIST was unable to document these studies, finding only a reference to study that suggested a 707 travelling 600 mph. NIST therefore characterized all attempts to compare the building's performance during the impact to design expectations as 'speculation'."--Thomas Basboll 00:01, 10 January 2007 (UTC)

Independent of FEMA and NIST, if we can find a reliable source that is the actual report that examined aircraft impact design issues, then we should cite it. I know it's out there but the question is, can it be found.--MONGO 06:49, 10 January 2007 (UTC)

Next project: history of the investigation

The next thing I want to do is to rewrite the "NIST report" section as a history of all the investigations that led up to it, and how they came about. Reports like this one [6] in the New York Times and the Skyscraper Safety Campaign in general provide a lot of good info to this end.--Thomas Basboll 23:21, 10 January 2007 (UTC)

I also want to merge this with the "early attempts" section. Call it either "History of the investigations" or simply "The investigations".--Thomas Basboll 12:32, 23 January 2007 (UTC)

Controlled demolition rejected by the engineering community

I have a minor concern in regards to the section, Controlled demolition conspiracy theory. The section cites a Journal of Engineering Mechanics publication as rejecting the theory. However, I am wondering if that warrants stating that the entire engineering community necessarily rejects the idea. Sure it was published in what I presume is a prominent engineering community publication. However, the presence of such a publication does not mean that everyone in the community would agree. There are probably many reasons to believe that the authors of the publication would not want to agree with the controlled demolition theory. Imagine the negative response they would receive if they did. So, they may just be responding to requests for such an article and avoiding controversy. I'm not saying the article is incorrect, I'm merely pointing out possibilities. I believe the article should state that this publication has rejected the theory and not label it as an idea belonging to the entire community. I'm not the most elegant writer, but this is along the lines of how I think it should be written: "The hypothesis has been explicitly rejected by both NIST and a prominent publication of the engineering community, and is pursued mainly as part of larger conspiracy theories about the events of 9/11." Or perhaps the publication can be named directly. Either way, I don't believe we should loop all engineers into their rejection of the demolition theory. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 24.150.203.74 (talk) 20:12, 14 January 2007 (UTC).

Bazant and Verdure's rejection of controlled demolition passed peer review of the prominent journal in question. No other journal I'm aware of has mentioned controlled demolition as a possibility. The Chronicle of Higher Education aksed a number of engineers and met with an unambiguous rejection of the theory.[7]. (This article is cited in the main controlled demolition hypothesis article to establish the fact you raise concerns about.) The engineering community does reject the hypothesis, what all (individual) engineers believe is not really the issue. The "community" stands precisely for the imaginary "negative response" one would meet if one brought it up.--Thomas Basboll 21:33, 14 January 2007 (UTC)

Controlled Demo - A fair way to balance the article

I found another article on Wikipedia which I feel could serve as a good example of how to balance a controversial issue. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mind_control, under the "MC in conspiracy theories" section. Despite the overwhelming sentiment against conpsiracy theories regarding mind control, the article strikes a fair balance of presenting the arguments of both sides, one section labeled as arguments for, and another section labeled as arguments against. I think the community associated with this page may benefit from reviewing that page's approach to fairly presenting a controversial issue. DerwinUMD 23:43, 15 January 2007 (UTC)

Reality and fantasy are not two sides of an issue. The "controlled" demolition hypothesis has no technical merit. Peter Grey 00:34, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

....but it is a widely-known theory. Ours18 02:45, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

It is widely-known folklore, and it already has its own article. Peter Grey 04:14, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

I found this on a talk page for another controversial subject here on Wiki. This person said it better than I could have, but here is this quote to try and explain why we do need to address the CD theory:

The issue is that fear may be irrational and nonsensibile, but you can't deny that it's real. An encyclopedia exists to describe the real, and these fears fall into that category. They should be explained as irrational and effectively debunked, but they should still be described, otherwise those with those fears are going to assume that you're just ignoring the other side. Robert Rapplean

Thanks. DerwinUMD 03:41, 20 February 2007 (UTC)

Removed images

Ground Zero debris with markup showing building locations.
Ground Zero debris with markup showing building locations.
Portions of the outer shells of the South Tower at right and the North Tower at center left, as well as damage to all the other buildings at the WTC site are shown
Portions of the outer shells of the South Tower at right and the North Tower at center left, as well as damage to all the other buildings at the WTC site are shown

I took these pictures out because they didn't supplement the text very well. If anyone can find better use for them...--Thomas Basboll 21:30, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

Dissenting engineering opinion?

Here's a direct challenge to the progressive collapse theory, which has been published in an appropriately peer-reviewed publication (Z.P. Bazant is a regional editor of the Int. J. of Fracture and has published several articles in it himself.)

Abstract: Two theories of the WTC collapse are examined. The first one is the theory of progressive failure, and the other one is the theory of fracture waves. The collapse in the regime of progressive failure is shown to occur at an acceleration, which is several times less than the gravitational acceleration and, hence, this theory contradicts to the observed free fall. Evidently, the WTC towers were disintegrated at the very beginning of each collapse. To explain this fact an alternative model based on the theory of failure waves is proposed. (Cherepanov, G. P. "Mechanics of the WTC collapse". International Journal of Fracture. Volume 141, Numbers 1-2, September, 2006. PP. 287-289.)

I have to say that his longer (rather poorly/mechanically translated from Russian it seems) treatment of this subject is a bit, well, peculiar. (PDF file here [8]) but his critique of Bazant's calculations apparently passed peer-review. Along with Torero and Lane, there might be enough here now to start a section on criticism of the NIST theory. Any thoughts?--Thomas Basboll 21:00, 12 February 2007 (UTC)

We already have that covered in daughter articles...if not, add it to them. If part of his treatise is questionable, then we don't cherry pick the parts we "like" to promote our biases. We accept it all or refute it all.--MONGO 21:43, 12 February 2007 (UTC)
Actually, the whole point here is that his community (the engineers who know something about fracture mechanics) have accepted (it seems) only this little chunk of Cherepanov's ideas about the WTC collapse. Peer review routinely "cherry picks" the good ideas people have, leaving their less well-considered speculations on the side. Cherepanov is allowed to be wrong about great many things on his own time while still making a contribution to human knowledge about the WTC collapses. His peers, apparently, believe his critique of Bazant is sound. As a critique of the progressive collapse theory, this paper seems to be unique.--Thomas Basboll 22:42, 12 February 2007 (UTC)
Looks like what we have here are a few dissenting voices that are not generally accepted by the mainstream. I say stick them in the hypothesis article.--MONGO 04:51, 13 February 2007 (UTC)
What hypothesis? Controlled demolition? Cherepanov's article does not suggest it. Nor do Torero and Lane. I'm just suggesting that we collect criticism of the mainstream theory, in so far as it has been published in mainstream sources, in a separate section in this article.--Thomas Basboll 06:17, 13 February 2007 (UTC)
In looking through what the findings are by these persons, I don't see that adding their information is beneficial to this article. They might be better placed in the Controlled demolition hypothesis for the collapse of the World Trade Center article.--MONGO 06:21, 13 February 2007 (UTC)
I think it would be a bit unfair to these people (and our readers) to lump their rather moderate critique of NIST's findings with the much more controversial and speculative controlled demolition hypothesis. A lot of people are turning to Wikipedia these days to find out whether there has been any moderate criticism of NIST, i.e., criticism that doesn't demand that we radically rethink the whole 9/11 event, but just challenges some of the scientific details. I'll draft a section to follow the NIST report in the history section. Then we'll have something more concrete to talk about. Thanks for your input.--Thomas Basboll 07:59, 13 February 2007 (UTC)
Do you have access to the actual published journal article? Tom Harrison Talk 15:19, 13 February 2007 (UTC)
The abstract can be found at the publisher's website - [9]. They want $42 for the actual article. If you happen to live near a University with a decent Engineering school, you may be able to find it in that school's library. Toiyabe 16:11, 13 February 2007 (UTC)
Yes, I saw that. Has anyone read the actual journal article? Tom Harrison Talk 16:23, 13 February 2007 (UTC)
It'll take me a couple of days to get a hold of it. I have hunch it's going to look like the progressive collapse vs. fracture section of Cherepanov's longer version that I linked to before ([10]). Note that it's only about 3 pages long.--Thomas Basboll 16:32, 13 February 2007 (UTC)

It's not clear what the element of 'dissent' is. These are not mutually exclusive options, and an idealized one-floor-at-a-time progressive collapse simply isn't likely when so many floors are involved. Particularly if the structure is sturdy enough to transmit impact loading (travels at speed of sound) to the lower floors. Peter Grey 17:21, 15 February 2007 (UTC)

As I understand it, Bazant's theory is that the structure was destroyed in relatively small section (a few floors at most) as the rigid block of top floors reached the undamaged part. It then buckled a few floors more, free-fell down to the rest of the (undamaged) building, buckled a few floors, ... etc. Cherepanov believes that the triggering event released (or simply was) a fracture wave that disintegrated the whole structure in a split second right at the beginning. If we take Bazant as "the received view" on the collapses, then Cherepanov, as far as I can tell, is a dissenting opinion. Or am I missing something?--Thomas Basboll 19:22, 15 February 2007 (UTC)

Summary of Cherepanov's article

Okay, I got a hold of "Mechanics of the WTC Collapse". Keep in mind that I'm not an engineer, so I'm in no position to assess the paper's quality (especially the soundness of the calculations). I presume peer review has ensured that there isn't anything obviously wrong with his work.

It's a very short paper. 3 pages in all. It is divided into four sections. The first is a three sentence introduction that cites Bazant and Zhou as having "presented a theory of progressive failure of the collapse of the WTC towers" and names his alternative, viz., "fracture waves". The last is a two sentence conclusion claiming to have "proved that the collapses of the WTC towers in the regime of progressive failure would take much more time than the free fall time observed on September 11, 2001," and suggesting "disintegration" by fracture waves (basically what the abstract quoted above says).

Section 2 offers calculations that "prove that the collapse in the regime of progressive failure is much slowers than the free fall even if we ignore the resistance of the underlying, intact structure" (my emphasis). Endnotes add two observations (unsupported): that taking into account a standard safety factor where R/(Mg) is between 3 and 5 "makes progressive failure absolutely impossible"; that even leaving R = 0, the critical floor would be much lower than the floors that were actually hit on 9/11.

Section 3 offers his alternative account, which basically proposes that "the distribution and accumulation of the thermal stresses in the WTC during the fire" (which has not yet been accurately determined, he says) triggered a fracture wave that disintegrated the structures in less than 0.1 s at the onset of each collapse. He says a fracture wave theory would also more accurately predict the size and kind of debris.

Finally, there are references throughout to another paper of his, in print at the Journal of Applied Physics, that seems to offer a more detailed and empirical approach. (Cherepanov's approach here does not require any estimations of the actual physical properties -- weight, strength, etc. -- of the towers.)

In my opinion, we have here a notable peer-reviewed critique of the progressive collapse theory that (interestingly) jibes nicely with NIST's findings overall since NIST did not model the part of the collapse that Bazant and Cherepanov disagree about. Theirs seem to be the only detailed statements of mainstream engineering opinion about what happened after collapse initiation. (Remind me if there are others.)--Thomas Basboll 19:49, 14 February 2007 (UTC)

Titling the new section is an issue. I can't say that I would agree that calling this information a criticism is accurate...maybe adding it to the collpase mechanisms and only by stating something like "Cherepanov has examined the collapse and determined that Fracture waves may explain another mode of the collapse. His calculations indicate that the fracture waves would have made the collapse happen quicker than progressive collapse, and would explain why the buildings fell as quickly as they did once initial failure occurred." Bear in mind that the issue of freefall speed is not based on fact as there is no proof of exactly ghow long the buildings took to fall. We have some seismic readings and related material, but they are not proof of free fall anyway. The reality is that the lower floors, especially of the north tower continued to collapse for several minutes. The "free fall" was from floor 110 to about 30th levels.--MONGO 21:45, 14 February 2007 (UTC)
I hadn't heard that about the lower 30 levels. It's very interesting and should be in the article. Where've you got it from?
Cherepanov says that the progressive collapse theory contradicts the observed facts. I would call that "criticism". But I think I'm just going to add a section after the NIST report in the history section. The limits of the NIST report (no simulation of the full collapse) will transition nicely into the Cherepanov/Bazant dispute over what happened to structure under the impact zones. "Others have criticized NIST's account of the initiation of the collapse..." which brings Lane's concerns in.--Thomas Basboll 22:13, 14 February 2007 (UTC)
The lower floor issue was based on survivor reports of further tower collapse that was probably more akin to settlement of the debris. I have seen it written in reports about the incident but not sure it is published...I doubt it is. It wouldn't be that important to the case itself as far as the attacks but would be of interest to engineers that are examining the collapse timing issue. I'm not convinced that criticizing the NIST account is what our goal here should be...not that cross examination isn't prudent, just that without more information that is well published and accepted, such critcism doesn't appear to follow our undue weight aspect of the NPOV policy.--MONGO 06:56, 15 February 2007 (UTC)
I think settling debris (i.e., internal collapse of "the Pile" of already smashed floors) is most likely. Neither Bazant nor Cherepanov offer any reason why the free-fall-speed progressive collapse would stop at the thirtieth floor. As I undertand it, the mechanism works, once initiated, because the crushing force only grows. I'm not suggesting making criticism of NIST a goal, BTW. I am suggesting that the scientific investigation into the collapses be covered, and that questions that remain open (i.e., about which engineers disagree) should be noted as such.--Thomas Basboll 07:16, 15 February 2007 (UTC)
Yeah, neither of us are engineers, so we have to be careful when we phrase terminology that they understand and we have "tranlated" into laymens terms. In my uneducated estimation, the collapse took much longer than has been noted since debris was simply in the way once the building got to to a lower point, and even though the dust and smoke obscures the view of what happened on the lower floors, some videos of the event do clearly indicate that there were other floors that collapsed well after that 8-10 seconds that is oftentimes used to misrepresent the timing of the actual event...and of course, I think we can agree that there was some settling of the debris as well...this settling was oftentimes attributed to one reason (amoung many others) that rescues of potentially trapped victims was somewhat delayed...I have seen in news opts the comments by rescuers that they were told to not go into the area immediately because the structures were still collapsing...this is kind of common knowledge I guess to me. Basically, I don't see a few marginally accepted counterpoints as mentioned sufficient enough to create a criticism section...the window for even more marginal criticisms then become wider. I think a short mention that others have further or slightly different information might be noteworthy from an engineering perspective.--MONGO 07:41, 15 February 2007 (UTC)

I don't think there is any need to worry about the size of the window for criticism. Confining ourselves to mainstream engineering journals ought to sufficiently narrow the range of possible criticism. Introducing Cherepanov doesn't establish any new precedent in that regard. Also, since, like I say, Bazant (, his co-authors,) and Cherepanov seem to be the only people who are arguing about the progressive collapse itself, I can't see any undue weight problem. You're right about the layman's translation, of course. The hope is that an engineer will pop by at some point.--Thomas Basboll 08:25, 15 February 2007 (UTC)

I've ordered the journal article, so this is subject to change after I read it. At this point, I don't think one journal article warrants a new section or subsection to present it. I would say remove the subsection headings from Collapse of the two towers, and add a couple of lines mentioning Cherepanov. Tom Harrison Talk 15:13, 15 February 2007 (UTC)

It looks like he's going to have two out before long. Interestingly, that's about as many as there are on the other side (Bazant and Zhou, Bazant and Verdure). It is true that Bazant somehow seems to have more authority, but what's really most striking is how little this particular issue is being discussed. As far as I know, NIST has done no calculation to prove that progressive collapse would happen at the rate of the observed collapse. Bazant says they didn't have to because he and Zhou had already proven that it would. So at this point it's pretty evently matched, one expert against another. Most of the others remaining silent.--Thomas Basboll 19:39, 15 February 2007 (UTC)
Interestingly, even the "authoritarian" expert himself (Bazant) insists on more experiments being made, more data being gathered (i.e. from controlled demolitions) on the collapses. (btw: it's great to get back from holidays and to find such an interesting discussion to read, full of scientific issues, nice) SalvNaut 20:10, 18 February 2007 (UTC)

Collapse of the World Trade Centre

Just a quick question.

Since the WTC towers were the tallest buildings in Manhattan - a very populated area - surely the architects that built it would have included in the design a method of demolishing the building once it had outgrown its useful economic life without risking damage to neighbouring buildings. In other words, built into the design would have been a method of demolishing the towers in the future when they eventually became old and unstable. Is there any evidence that such a demolition strategy was incorporated at the design stage?217.38.254.254 23:03, 15 February 2007 (UTC)

Prior to 9/11, the tallest building ever demolished was the Singer Building, it was half as tall as the WTC, was demolished 60 years after it was constructed, and which was only demolished because it wasn't large enough[11]. I think it's fair to say that the designers of modern skyscrapers expect their buildings to last hundreds of years, and I doubt that they give much consideration for how to destroy them. Cogswobble 16:28, 16 February 2007 (UTC)


The issue that should be addressed is the demo of WTC 7, and yes it is all confirmed(watch the interview, silverstein says clear as day: "the fire department made the decision to go ahead and pull it.") Pull means controlled demolition. The WTC tower 7 was a 49 story office building, one of the largest in the area. That building was "pulled" only 6 hours after the demolition of the North and South tower. No demolitions expert in the world could design the demoliton of a nearly 50 story steel structure in that amount of time. These demolitions are in the planning stages for months. Computer models are created which predict how the building will collapse and then must be modified until the desired implosion is modeled.

Open questions?

SalvNaut, above (at the end of the Cherepanov discussion), makes an interesting suggestion. With the publication of Cherepanov's paper, and along with Bazant's previous call for further study of the "mechanics of progressive collapse" in order to put alternative hypotheses "to rest" (he mentions controlled demolition and fracture waves, though without citing Jones and Cherepanov by name), it now seems clear that the collapse sequence beyond collapse initiation is, scientifically, an open question. So I propose the following: remove the "progressive collapse" subsection from the collapse section and move it to the end of the history section under the heading "open questions". Here the lack of any detailed study by NIST of the progression of the collapse (beyond initiation) can be emphasized and the three alternatives surveyed by Bazant can be presented: controlled demolition, fracture waves, and (his own) progressive collapse. As a side consequence, this would allow us to completely remove the "conspiracy theory" section. It should be noted that both controlled demolition and fracture waves have been officially presented to NIST as hypotheses in the form of "public comments". Finally, in an unrelated matter, the open questions section should also include Lane and Torero's ideas about the possibility that fire alone could have initiated the collapses.--Thomas Basboll 20:59, 18 February 2007 (UTC)

I oppose this, as it would seem to legitimize the conspiracy theories about the collapse. This article is about physical reality. 9/11 conspiracy theories and its sub-articles are about a sociological phenomenon. No expanded presentation of conspiracy theories into this article, whether called 'controlled demolition' or anything else, is appropriate. Tom Harrison Talk 14:21, 19 February 2007 (UTC)
It only legitimates questions about the progressive collapse mechanism, and only grants them as much legitimacy (very little) that Bazant and Verdure apparently also think they deserve. Like BYU's administrators, we have to distinguish scientific doubts about structural mechanics from accusatory speculations about global politics. It looks like doubts about progressive collapse of the WTC buildings are perfectly legitimate. To dismiss them by association with conspiracy theories is a kind of ad hominem.--Thomas Basboll 14:51, 19 February 2007 (UTC)
The so-called 'controlled demolition hypothesis' is a conspiracy theory, and is described as one by the reliable sources. Tom Harrison Talk 14:55, 19 February 2007 (UTC)
Yes, and one of those sources is a mainstream engineering journal (Bazant & Verdure). The critique of progressive collapse that the CDH proceeds from is not, in any case, just a conspiracy theory: people like Cherepanov use it as part of proposal for another natural process. I'll write up a draft and post it here, that should make the discussion a bit more concrete.--Thomas Basboll 15:11, 19 February 2007 (UTC)

The issue that should be addressed is the demo of WTC 7, and yes it is all confirmed(watch the interview, silverstein says clear as day: "the fire department made the decision to go ahead and pull it.") Pull means controlled demolition. The WTC tower 7 was a 49 story office building, one of the largest in the area. That building was "pulled" only 6 hours after the demolition of the North and South tower. No demolitions expert in the world could design the demoliton of a nearly 50 story steel structure in that amount of time. These demolitions are in the planning stages for months. Computer models are created which predict how the building will collapse and then must be modified until the desired implosion is modeled.

Open questions (draft of new section)

[I propose we put this in right after the NIST report in the history section. Its sources are Bazant and Verdure, Cherepanov and Lane and Torero.]

The NIST report shifted the consensus in the engineering community from the pancake collapse theory to the column failure theory. But NIST carried out neither simulations nor calculations of the progressive collapse after the point of initiation, depending instead on the early work of Bazant and Zhou to explain why the lower structure provided almost no resistance to the falling mass of the upper stories. This has left the question of the precise mechanism of the structural failure open, and research is currently underway to understand precisely why the buildings fell at essentially free fall speeds.

There are at present three hypotheses that attempt to account for the rapid and total collapse of the underlying structure: controlled demolition, fracture waves, and progressive collapse.[1] The first of these has been dismissed by the engineering community as a "conspiracy theory", while the second has been presented in recognized engineering journals. Both hypotheses proceed from an apparent incongruity between the calculated collapse times and the observed collapse times, when the assumptions of the third hypothesis are applied. In order for the collapses to have occured as they did, it is argued, something must have completely destroyed the structural support of the building just before the collapse initiated.

The progressive collapse hypothesis requires that relatively short sections of the underlying structure buckled under the strain of the impacting block of upper stories, allowing the block to fall onto another undamaged section below it, which then buckled, and so on. This process, argue proponents of the two alternative hypotheses, would require much more time than the 12 to 16 seconds that it took for the towers to collapse. Indeed, their calculations purport to show that none of the energy of the falling mass could have been applied to destroying the structures of the towers. This would have slowed their collapse appreciably, and as NIST and defenders of the progressive collapse hypothesis grant, there was no significant slowing of the upper stories as they fell.

Unrelated to the puzzle about the lower structure, some fire engineers have suggested that they would have collapsed even if no fire-proofing had been knocked off by the impacts and, indeed, even if the structure had been completely undamaged. That is, they believe that very large fires alone could have destroyed the towers.

The alternative hypotheses were presented to NIST, along with criticism of its own hypothesis, after the release of a draft report for public comments and before the publication of the final report. These questions notwithstanding, it is safe to say that the NIST report currently constitutes the accepted consensus on how and why the World Trade Center collapsed.

--Thomas Basboll 20:58, 19 February 2007 (UTC)

Comments on this draft

I should've put something in about further research; both Bazant and Cherepanov emphasize the need for more detailed modelling of the collapses to prove their ideas. As do controlled demolitionists, of course (but this research programme cannot be reliably sourced).--Thomas Basboll 21:04, 19 February 2007 (UTC)

Shouldn't this proposition be finally put into the article?
When it comes to sourcing controlled demolitionists about them urging for more modeling and investigation: here is the article by a structural engineer I've tried to source recently. This letter by David L. Griscom Ph.D is very reasonable, too. SalvNaut 20:06, 2 March 2007 (UTC)
Question about the letter referred above: Shouldn't an opinion from D.Griscom, PhD with over 200 peer reviewed, highly respected publications (Hirsch index = 39) be considered as very reliable one? It is a relevant opinion from a man of science. SalvNaut 20:12, 2 March 2007 (UTC)
To source the existence of a research programme, you need articles like Bazant's and Cherepanov's, which have been published in major journals. I don't think there is any point in implementing this draft. The result will be predictable right now. I'm certainly not going to get involved in that fight.--Thomas Basboll 20:18, 2 March 2007 (UTC)
Yes, I've got those articles. No point you say? I'll think about it during the weekend. Of course, it's not on Wikipedia where one should fight most battles. SalvNaut 20:24, 2 March 2007 (UTC)
I meant that the fact that Griscom is a reputable engineer does not mean that he is, in this case, doing certifiable "research". (I may have been mistaken, but I thought you were taking issue with my "this research programme cannot be reliably sourced"). That is, CD has not been presented as an area of inquiry to the engineering commmunity like fracture waves and progressive collapse. It is a hypothesis that is not (according to any reliable source) being pursued by engineers.--Thomas Basboll 20:30, 2 March 2007 (UTC)
Ok, thanks for clarification. The paragraph would,of course, be justified with Cherepanpov's and Bazant's pursues. Side point is if it should be mentioned that proponents of CD also insist on more scientific inquiry. I suppose that wouldn't win consensus anyway. SalvNaut 20:51, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

MIT Quote

I have reverted the descriptor for the MIT quote regarding the week-after-event prediction of the collapse mechanism to "accurately speculated" from previously "correctly identified." It is my feeling that the word correct makes the quote seem as if their opinion should be taken as the utmost truth of the procedings of the collapse. Perhaps speculate does not give the postulation the credit it deserves (the source says nothing of how the conclusion was reached). DerwinUMD 04:00, 20 February 2007 (UTC)

Hypothesis versus Conspiracy Theory

Cmon people, is it really worth fighting a revert war over? A Conspiracy Theory is a type of Hypothesis, narrowed down by the viewpoint of the hypothesis that a hidden plan was enacted. Leave the title as Conspiracy Theory, move the single engineer view below the established views of FEMA and NIST (which carry more weight than a single engineer, sorry), and cite the text that was added so that others can confirm what was added. This is not a democracy, we will not vote on what is added, but it is not a dictatorship either. Get together on the talk pages, and stop reverting until a final decision has been made. CodeCarpenter 16:48, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

Very reasonable. I've chosen to add this engineer's view (he is not single among engineers, but this article is the best as a source, I think) to conspiracy theory section because it was obvious to me that it was to be reverted, if added to a different section. Unfortunately, usual "guards" of this article decided to revert anyway. The title change is not the case here. I agree that I shouldn't have changed it without consensus.
I've lost faith in discussion, or it's rather that I do not have much time to force my pov here. Not an excuse probably. I've tried to give some reason in the comments, but what can you say to a comments like: "who cares about one engineer"? If you don't care about one, why do you care about two, or 10 or whole community at all?
Anyway, there are other very good propositions waiting to be implemented, like the one about (lack of) scientific consensus on the progressive collapse process. SalvNaut 19:55, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

William Rice commentary

The Vermont Guardian article referenced in the proposed edit is not a technical assessment of the collapses. It simply repeats the well-known qualitative and intuitive arguments. If this (individual) engineer performs a quantitative analysis and sujects it to peer review, that would be something entirely different. Peter Grey 16:49, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

Proposed addition to WTC 7 section

Richard Porter, the head of news at BBC World, has put together a useful summary of the coverage of WTC 7, prompted by the recent internet storm over their pre-reporting of the collapse. I think he can be taken as a reliable source for the following addition to the first paragraph.

Unlike the Twin Towers, the collapse of WTC 7 had been anticipated for at least an hour before it happened.[12]

I'm not making changes to articles these days. But if there is consensus for this, then just put it in.--Thomas Basboll 19:21, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

"Yep" from me. This sentence contradicts some official statements, if I recall correctly. Then, none of them is in the article, so I guess there is nothing to discuss. SalvNaut 19:59, 2 March 2007 (UTC)
I think it would go better on one of the conspiracy theory pages, since it is primarily about aspects of the conspiracy theories. Tom Harrison Talk 20:11, 2 March 2007 (UTC)
Sorry, I see no logic here. How the information about WTC 7 having been expected to collapse for some reason (who knows? maybe it showed sings of destruction? or maybe someone wanted it to collapse?) is about aspects of conspiracy theories? It's mainly about events that preceded the collapse, nothing else. Many firemen and policemen knew some time before that WTC7 is going to collapse. SalvNaut 20:18, 2 March 2007 (UTC)
What is the title of the web page presented just above as the reference? Tom Harrison Talk 20:28, 2 March 2007 (UTC)
I think Porter has in this case been prompted to make a much more general contribution to our understanding of the collapses: he has settled the question of whether the building collapsed suddenly and without warning or whether people were actively worried about it. We may not like the people we have to thank for bringing this to light; but it happens all the time in this kind of activism. Also, Porter could even be a source for a piece of "trivia" (a mainstay of WP articles), namely, that the BBC (and less confidently CNN) reported that WTC 7 had collapsed about half an hour before it did (even, funny twist, standing in front of the building while making the report).--Thomas Basboll 20:39, 2 March 2007 (UTC)
Sure, in one of the pages about the conspiracy theories. But I oppose expanding the presentation of conspiracy theories in this article. Tom Harrison Talk 20:43, 2 March 2007 (UTC)
But this is a fact about the collapse of WTC 7. Why should only people who are interested in CTs know that the collapse of WTC 7 was anticipated about an hour in advance?--Thomas Basboll 20:47, 2 March 2007 (UTC)
E X A C T L Y. SalvNaut 20:55, 2 March 2007 (UTC)
It looks like it is more about the conspiracy theories, and the media coverage of them. People have been trying to insinuate this latest BBC thing into several pages. Further, this will have the result of elaborating on the conspiracy theories. I oppose that for a number of reasons, which I think are all listed above or in the archives. Tom Harrison Talk 20:52, 2 March 2007 (UTC)
The source itself might be more about conspiracy. But the information that we want to put is not. SalvNaut 20:55, 2 March 2007 (UTC)
Tom, do you recognize that, in this case at least, protecting the article from (mentions of) conspiracy theories (in the sources used) comes at the cost of leaving out a verifiable fact about the collapse of WTC 7?--Thomas Basboll 20:58, 2 March 2007 (UTC)
No. Selectively presenting factoids that exaggerate the importance of fringe theories does not add value to the article. Tom Harrison Talk 21:39, 2 March 2007 (UTC)
The proposed statement is weak - it should be possible to provide much more precise statements regarding the evacuation orders for 1 WTC and 7 WTC (which are, of course, important elements of the story). The reference given is useless - it is hardly a "summary of the coverage of WTC 7", and it simply isn't possible to make a very strong statement corroborating or refuting has either collapsed or is collapsing. That can apply equally well to a collapsed or a standing building. The tie to conspiracy theories doesn't make any sense - conspiracy theorists typically do not emphasize the fact that professional firefighters on the scene believed 7 WTC was ready to come down without any further intervention. Peter Grey 21:01, 2 March 2007 (UTC)
But Peter, the words "has either collapsed or is collapsing" are not in the proposed statement. But I agree with you that (and disagree with Tom) that this has nothing to do with conspiracy theories.--Thomas Basboll 21:06, 2 March 2007 (UTC)
It's what the link is about, and that why it's irrelevant. Peter Grey 21:17, 2 March 2007 (UTC)
Are you suggesting we reject a fact solely because of who it's target audience was when ordinally presented? This discussion would be moot if he had better source. Now, we are in a position to cite both CNN and BBC directly on the day of the event, but the conclusion that the collapses were "anticipated" is actually more Porter's professional judgement based on his review of the archives.--Thomas Basboll 21:31, 2 March 2007 (UTC)
No. The reference is unsuitable because it is unrelated. Peter Grey 21:42, 2 March 2007 (UTC)
Excellent. Then let's put it in with your source.--Thomas Basboll 21:48, 2 March 2007 (UTC)
Better, let's put it in the article to which it is relevent. Tom Harrison Talk 21:56, 2 March 2007 (UTC)
You can of course try to work it into another article as well, if you like. But I think people who are just here to read about the details of the collapse of WTC 7 will want to know stuff like "could anybody tell before it collapsed that it was going to?" etc. It seems the answer is a clear yes.--Thomas Basboll 21:59, 2 March 2007 (UTC)
It was common knowledge that the building was likely to collapse. That is one of the reasons firefighters made only a minor effort to deal with the building. Let's not twist it around into something it isn't.--MONGO 09:45, 5 March 2007 (UTC)
I would consider myself more knowledgable than most about most details of 9-11, and the fact that WTC7 was suspected to collapse for an hour is news to me - I have yet to see a reliable source that says such a thing. And please, if Tom is the only major objection, I think some information regarding the time line of the knowledge of wtc7's iminent (spelling?) collapse ought to be put into this article. DerwinUMD 05:04, 11 April 2007 (UTC)
It is documented fact that 7 WTC was considered at risk by the professionals at the scene. Peter Grey 15:32, 13 April 2007 (UTC)

New draft

Unlike the Twin Towers, the collapse of WTC 7 had been anticipated for several hours. It had been evacuated and there were no casualties. (Hayden, Peter. "WTC: This Is Their Story". Firehouse Magazine, April 2002. [13])

Or, if Peter has a better source, we could use that. I did go back to the FEMA report but I could only find scattered reports of the damage, not direct predictions that it would collapse.--Thomas Basboll 23:03, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

The issue that should be addressed is the demo of WTC 7, and yes it is all confirmed(watch the interview, silverstein says clear as day: "the fire department made the decision to go ahead and pull it.") Pull means controlled demolition. The WTC tower 7 was a 49 story office building, one of the largest in the area. That building was "pulled" only 6 hours after the demolition of the North and South tower. No demolitions expert in the world could design the demoliton of a nearly 50 story steel structure in that amount of time. These demolitions are in the planning stages for months. Computer models are created which predict how the building will collapse and then must be modified until the desired implosion is modeled.

The expectation that WTC 7 would collapse is (or ought to be) non-controversial. A transit(or theodolite) was used to detect a deformation or bulge in the building that validated the expectation that the building would collapse because of the asymmetry of damage to it. So it would not be a surprise for a reporter to hear "expected", and in the chaos, see and hear buildings collapse and then incorrectly announce that WTC 7 "had" collapsed. patsw 00:19, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

Do you have the link to the reference to the use of the transit? I looked at that reference before and found it to be unsubstantiated, i.e., they attempted to use it but it gave bad results, but now can no longer find the link. 70.137.172.194 21:28, 8 March 2007 (UTC)

Secret Service officer Craig Miller

The mention of Secret Service officer Craig Miller in this section in unnecessary and misleading and should be removed. Officer Miller was evacuated from WTC 7 and the entered either WTC 1 or WTC 2 to assist the NYPD and FDNY in the ongoing evacuation of people from those building and he tragically died as many others did in the collapse of those buildings. patsw 00:19, 4 March 2007(UTC)

It would be good to have an actual reference to this statement -- could you please provide it so this issue doesn't come up over and over? Thanks. 70.137.172.194 21:37, 8 March 2007 (UTC)

According to this from the Congressional Record [14], Officer Miller was either in the "Towers" (i.e. World Trade Center 1 or World Trade Center 2) and therefore died at 10:29 a.m. or 9:59 a.m. respectively, or in the Marriott World Trade Center (where equipment belonging to him was found) and died at 9:59 a.m. in its collapse.

There is no source from what I have read that he abandoned the rescue effort in the buildings which were still being evacuated to enter World Trade Center 7 and, after its complete evacuation, remained in that building for 7 more hours to die in collapse of that building at 5:25 p.m. patsw 02:30, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

Template:911ct confused listing

Shows one theory under "Theories" and lists supporters and proponents of any theory or hypothesis counter to the official story. Much needed improvements in points organized above. As for supporters and proponents, not all challenges to official story imply or infer controlled demo hypothesis. Blaswell 03:45, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

Bin Laden but not Bush

MONGO deleted my REFERENCED Bush quote about the collapse of the towers. http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Collapse_of_the_World_Trade_Center&oldid=112762636#Remarks_by_President_Bush

Why this policing effort? Is the president's word not pertinent? Was it too bizarre? Was it more bizarre than the collapse of the towers? Was it illogical? (Bush talked about planting explosives HIGH enough to trap MORE people, which is absurd) 124.197.1.128 09:26, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

MONGO, wikipedia should be a source for pure facts. You are undermining that. You are using an open source reference area to discredit and delete FACTS. If you want to be some uneducated fool with his head in the ground then be my guest but do it elsewhere. My suggestion would be to post on the FOX news forums or just keep trying to push that tree over...good luck.

—The preceding unsigned comment was added by 72.188.158.166 (talk) 15:57, 14 April 2007 (UTC).

Your misuse odf the quote is the reason I reverted you. Bush may have used explosives as a word, but he was referring to the words provided by the person they had interrogated about the plans for destroying the WTC.--MONGO 09:48, 5 March 2007 (UTC)
OK, fair enough. I try to include the Bush quote again in a more appropriate form. Bush reports KSM as talking about explosives is still the first know official peep that mentions explosives. IMO that is pertinent. 124.197.1.128 21:09, 5 March 2007 (UTC)
If you wanna find someone else who quotes KSM, go ahead, but the quote is pertinant. You guys seem to be on too much of an "anti-conspiracy" rage here, you are almost as bad as the conspiracy theorists themselves. This page should not only display what you want it to, it just doesn't work that way. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by DerwinUMD (talk • contribs) 23:21, 5 March 2007 (UTC).
Put that nonsense in the Controlled demolition hypothesis for the collapse of the World Trade Center...let's not add idiotic misinformation to this article.--MONGO 12:53, 6 March 2007 (UTC)
There's nothing in the quote to say that Khalid Sheikh Mohammed or George Bush were referring to the World Trade Center. Peter Grey 00:25, 6 March 2007 (UTC)
George Bush involved in conspiracy theory? How do you know that? Why can't you let the reader decide? George Bush said it, and although it MAY BE unclear who he meant exactly, he is certainly talking about BUILDINGS in the context of 9/11 and terrorism .. which can hardly be unimportant. Wikipedia has an obligation to bring together historical information and how ever much you want it to be unconnected, he said it, and the reader must decide. To blank this statement out is - IMHO - an ommission —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 124.197.1.128 (talk) 04:37, 6 March 2007 (UTC).
he is certainly talking about BUILDINGS This does not connect the quote to this article in any way. There are many, many buildings on the planet. Peter Grey 04:59, 6 March 2007 (UTC)
Oh, I see! Peter Grey knows that George Bush did not mean the "high enough" buidlings! Put the bush quote back in ... or I report you to the Bush people for censoring them!! —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 124.197.1.128 (talk) 05:07, 6 March 2007 (UTC).
  • Bush talked about planting explosives HIGH enough to trap MORE people, which is absurd Incorrect: up to a point, a fire in a building puts people at greater risk the higher up it is, because the fire is more difficult to fight effectively. However, there is no indication that this was a factor in the World Trade Center attacks. Peter Grey 05:26, 6 March 2007 (UTC)
Amazing mental contortions you have to do in order to defend the official version. Sane assumptions, like "the central columns would be left standing cannot be used, whereas insane speculation of exploding fuel-fumes in massive elevator shafts had miraculous effects on the structure are taken for real. It is a scandal that you conspue a possible position without regard for its present propriety. My solace is that MONGO, Peter Grey et al will one day have to come here and explain at length their motives in stopping the truth from emerging. I find it outrageous that you are allowed to erase any legitimate hint of demolition with the kill-all argument conspiracy theory. Future generations will be abhorred at your orthodoxy. 124.197.1.128 20:25, 6 March 2007 (UTC)
Well, my appologies, after having researched the quote, it is easy to tell that Bush was speaking in regard to the benefit of torture etc. in future counter terrorism operations, however, it is in a speach commemorating the 5th annerversiary of 9/11 and it is talking about KSM, the supposed mastermind of 9/11 talking about blowing up a building. I don't have any trouble seeing the connection, however, Bush previously claims that this information was used to thwart "future attacks" not in any regards to 9/11. I have two things to say however. One, the quote really does not belong in this article. And two, it was removed for a horribly wrong reason, and the removal of such information is what 124.197.1.128 said - dead wrong. You cannot pick and chose your facts just as CTists cannot pick and chose their facts. However, it seems that any unexplained phenomena which should be listed here under a section of "As yet unexplained phenemena" has been heaped in with the "government is trying to take over the world, and blew up the WTC" article. You have to get over this fear you have that anything here without an answer will lead to the massive spread of the beleif that the government destroyed the WTC - you seem like the Roman Catholic Church printing the Bible only in latin for fear the masses may decide they were wrong if they had all the facts. And like 124... said, it has to stop. If you wish to remove something from this article, CONSPIRACY THEORY is not a valid justification. If you wish to reword something to ensure it represents the source of the information, go ahead, but do not remove something with out having researched it yourself to determine truely whether or not it belongs. This is not as passionate as 124's post, but please, if nothing else, attempt to justify why you remove things beyond the fact that they incite conspiracy theories. DerwinUMD 04:55, 8 March 2007 (UTC)
Hi....no thanks...if there is no evidence to support the claims, then we justifiably remove such things and label them for what they are, namely conspiracy theories.--MONGO 06:11, 8 March 2007 (UTC)
124.... I believe the problem with your bush quote is that bush is not refering to 9/11, he actually says that KSM's info helped prevent future attacks. For instance he says

"Khalid Sheikh Mohammed has provided valuable information and has helped disrupt terrorist plots, including strikes within the United States. For example, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed described the design of planned attacks of buildings inside the U.S. and how operatives were directed to carry them out... He told us the operatives had been instructed to ensure that the explosives went off at a high -- a point that was high enough to prevent people trapped above from escaping."

This seems to indicate that he is not talking directly about 9/11, but the benefits of his proposed Militarcy Commisions Act of 2006. The explosives planted was just part of Bush's scare 'em routine to try and influence opinion regarding something he wishes to be done. Were this really about 9/11, and bush was behind it, and they were trying to cover up the fact that explosives were planted in the building, do you think he would so easly let this slip in a pre-written speach? Mongo is correct in this instance, in that this quote does not have relavency in this article, however, he did not research it enough to tell you why. DerwinUMD 18:54, 10 March 2007 (UTC)
Mongo, please read this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WP:RPA, especially the section on "When not to refactor." I believe this incident constitutes such a situation. DerwinUMD 18:47, 10 March 2007 (UTC)
DerwinUMD, this talk page is for discussing how to make the article better, not for engaging in ongoing efforts to "out" other ediotrs. Continued efforts to do so and or support such actions have led to blocks in the past.--MONGO 19:22, 10 March 2007 (UTC)

Uncited quote

I am not sure, but to me the quote "The fires were hot enough to significantly weaken the columns and cause the floor trusses to sag. This might have caused the buildings to collapse, although not as quickly," does not seem as if it is referenced. This quote either needs cited or removed. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by DerwinUMD (talk • contribs) 20:46, 9 March 2007 (UTC).