Debunking NIST’s Conclusions About WTC 7: Shooting Fish in a Barrel

By
George Washington
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4051

Symmetrical Collapse

NIST lamely tried to explain the symmetrically (sic) collapse as follows:

WTC 7’s collapse, viewed from the exterior (most videos were taken from the north), did appear to fall almost uniformly as a single unit. This occurred because the interior failures that took place did not cause the exterior framing to fail until the final stages of the building collapse. The interior floor framing and columns collapsed downward and pulled away from the exterior frame. There were clues that internal damage was taking place, prior to the downward movement of the exterior frame, such as when the east penthouse fell downward into the building and windows broke out on the north face at the ends of the building core. The symmetric appearance of the downward fall of the WTC 7 was primarily due to the greater stiffness and strength of its exterior frame relative to the interior framing.

NIST can’t have it both ways. If the exterior frame was so stiff and strong, then it should have stopped the collapse, or – at the very least – we would have seen a bowing effect where tremendous opposing forces were battling each other for dominance in determining the direction of the fall. See also this .

In real life, the thick structural beams and “stiff [and strong]” exterior frame used in the building should have quickly stopped any partial collapse, unless the support columns were all blown. At the very worst, we should see a 1 or 2 floor partial collapse.

Freefall Speed

NIST said that WTC 7 fell at 40% slower than freefall speed. But it collapsed alot faster than it would have if the structural supports were not all blown away at the same instant. 40% slower isn’t very impressive — that’s like arguing that a rock falling through concrete 40% slower than a rock falling through the air is perfectly normal.

Again, why did the building collapse at all, given that the thick structural beams should have quickly stopped any partial collapse?

Fires Knocked Down Steel-Frame Buildings

NIST said fires alone brought down Building 7, but other office fires have burned longer and hotter without causing collapse.

No Explosive Sounds

NIST also said:

“No blast sounds were heard on the audio tracks of video recordings during the collapse of WTC 7 or reported by witnesses.”

Oh, really?

What about this , this , this , this , this and this ?

Moreover, as discussed below, high-tech explosives don’t necessarily make the same loud “booms” that dynamite make.

High-Tech Explosive Residues

And why were there residues for high-tech explosives at ground zero (and see this )?

Molten and Partially Evaporated Steel

And what about the pools of molten metal at ground zero for months ? And why was the at and under the ground at the site of WTC 7 as hot as the ground under WTC 1 and 2?

And the New York Times wrote that partly EVAPORATED steel beams were found at WTC 7. But normal office and diesel fires are not NEARLY hot enough to evaporate steel. Hydrocarbon fires fueled by diesel (which was apparently stored at WTC 7) and normal office materials cannot evaporate steel. Steel does not evaporate unless it is heated to at least 5,000 degrees Fahrenheit . Everyone agrees that fires from conventional building fires are thousands of degrees cooler than that.

Pre-Knowledge

And why didn’t NIST address the obvious pre-knowledge (and see this ) by everyone around and well in advance that 7 was going to come down?

Experts

And why didn’t NIST address what these experts say?:

  • Kamal S. Obeid, structural engineer, with a masters degree in Engineering from UC Berkeley, of Fremont, California, says :

“Photos of the steel, evidence about how the buildings collapsed, the unexplainable collapse of WTC 7, evidence of thermite in the debris as well as several other red flags, are quite troubling indications of well planned and controlled demolition”

  • Ronald H. Brookman, structural engineer, with a masters degree in Engineering from UC Davis, of Novato California, writes :

“Why would all 47 stories of WTC 7 fall straight down to the ground in about seven seconds… ? It was not struck by any aircraft or engulfed in any fire. An independent investigation is justified for all three collapses including the surviving steel samples and the composition of the dust.”

  • Graham John Inman, structural engineer, of London, England, points out :

“WTC 7 Building could not have collapsed as a result of internal fire and external debris. NO plane hit this building. This is the only case of a steel frame building collapsing through fire in the world. The fire on this building was small & localized therefore what is the cause?”

Source URL: http://georgewashington2.blogspot.com/2008/08/debunking-nists-conclusions-about-wtc-7.html

Editor’s Note: One week ago the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) held a press conference to announce that the “reason for the collapse of World Trade Center 7 is no longer a mystery…” They issued long-awaited results of their findings as to the cause of collapse of World Trade Center 7, the third building destroyed on 9/11. Nearly seven full years (and untold millions of dollars) later, the federal governmental agency responsible for safety of Americans in our buildings (and other structures) came to the groundbreaking conclusion that, in an “unprecedented event,” fires and inoperative sprinklers caused a 47-story steel and concrete building to collapse neatly into a pile in a matter of 9 seconds. In addition to a press conference and release of the printed report, NIST has kindly created a video to help us understand the unfathomable NEW mystery they created … that office fires are capable (though as they note, never before and never since 9/11/01 has this happened to this type of structure) of causing this kind of complete destruction. The more significant mystery NIST has now created is how in this world this agency–with this kind of money and resources, and this kind of time–could possibly have managed to ignore so much information, so much evidence, and so many whistleblowers and witnesses in order to come up with this kind of report. Astounding.In the last week, a number of individuals have posted responses to the NIST report. As a convenience to our readers, 911truth.org has compiled four of those here. In addition, we posted information about and links to the Architects and Engineers for 9/11 Truth press conference (audio here) immediately following the NIST conference, an interview of NIST’s Dr. Sunder by NoLiesRadio.org, and the technical briefingA hosted by NIST earlier this week.

We refer readers also to Kevin Ryan’s excellent and unsettling article of July 2, 2008, “The Top Ten Connections Between NIST and Nano-Thermites” and physicist Dr. Steven Jones’ well-known paper, Why Indeed Did the WTC Buildings Completely Collapse?“

Questions Asked at NIST’s WTC7 Briefing

by Professor Steven Jones 8/26/2008

NIST’S WTC 7 technical briefing took place this morning (Ed: NIST briefing was 8/21/2008). A number of good questions were asked, it seemed they came mostly from the 9/11-truth-seeking community. I asked (and these got through but were somewhat re-worded by the fellow “reading” the questions):

1. Did NIST have available to it samples of dust from the WTC catastrophe, and if so, did NIST examine the dust for red/gray chips as described by Dr. Steven Jones (physicist)? Note that over a dozen WTC-dust samples were examined by the US Geological Survey, and these were presumably available to NIST.

2. NIST discusses the fall time for WTC 7 on page 40 of their summary, where we find the significant assumption: “Assuming that the descent speed was approximately constant…” However, observations by Dr. Frank Legge and others of the descent speed shows that it is accelerating, not constant at all. Why did NIST assume “that the descent speed was approximately constant” when observation shows otherwise?

On 1, Shyam Sundar did not answer my questions at all — he simply replied that they found some hypotheses “not credible,” without doing the relevant experiments. Not a very scientific answer, IMO. PS — they didn’t look…

The NIST report disappointingly ignores our papers published in established, peer-reviewed journals:

Environmentalist: http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10669-008-9182-4

The Open Civil Engineering Journal: http://www.bentham-open.org/pages/content.php?TOCIEJ/2008/00000002/00000…

But by so doing, NIST loses credibility, in not dealing with the issues raised and published in peer-reviewed venues.

I have heard from a number of scientists and engineers who are swayed by our arguments…

On question 2, Sundar and John Gross hemmed and hawed a bit, admitted that acceleration was probable and finally said the report probably needed to be corrected. If they make the needed correction, it should of course change their calculated fall time which was evidently based on the assumption that the descent SPEED was approximately constant… We will be watching.

My third question, about the high-temperature corrosion and sulfidation of a WTC 7 steel member– reported in Appendix C of the FEMA report — was not read… AFAIK — I say this because, after my second question was read and answered, the feed of the Briefing to my computer failed, and I could not get re-connected… Sundar spoke about this beam briefly in remarks, but I found he represented Barnett’s explanation that gypsum COULD possibly have caused sulifdation as a given, rather than an untested hypothesis.

In other words, THAT hypothesis was taken as completely credible without experimental tests, no problem… What has happened to science and critical thinking?

Note that my paper with colleagues on the red-gray chips found in the WTC dust has been submitted to an established journal (a couple of weeks ago) and is going through the peer-review process prior to possible publication.

Source: Professor Jones’ Blog at 911blogger.com

NIST Concludes “Fire” Caused WTC 7 “Collapse” when FEMA Report Concluded Fuel Tank Explosion had “low probability” of Knocking Down Tower

NIST claims “fire” had better chance of knocking down tower than planted explosives in bizarre response to interview question

By Arabesque

NIST has finally released their final report into the collapse of Building 7 , which collapsed inexplicably on 9/11 . The New York Times quoted Sunder who said, “[The] reason for the collapse of World Trade Center 7 is no longer a mystery … It did not collapse from explosives or fuel oil fires.” Earlier, Sunder was scratching his head, saying, “We’ve had trouble getting a handle on Building No. 7 .” Similarly, the collapse baffled FEMA who lamely concluded, “The specifics of the fires in WTC 7 and how they caused the building to collapse remain unknown at this time. Although the total diesel fuel on the premises contained massive potential energy, the best hypothesis has only a low probability of occurrence .” In other words, despite the fact that FEMA claimed a diesel fuel explosion would have been improbable , NIST is now asserting that mere “fires” knocked down WTC 7? As NIST admits, this would be the ” first known instance of fire causing the total collapse of a tall building .” A 9/11 blogger named Buru Dragon comments on NIST’s press conference saying:

[A] reporter appeared to temporarily stump Sunder with a very basic but perfect question. Throughout the presentation Sunder spoke about building seven as if it were particularly susceptible to collapse by even moderate fires because of the design. However Sunder would later go on to explain that it would require a very large amount of explosives to bring it down by demolition… ” if the buildings were so vulnerable to collapse due to regular fires alone, wouldn’t they also be equally vulnerable to failure with just a small number of explosives? ” Sunder… proceeded to stumble through some convoluted explanation for why only fire could be responsible… [seeming] caught off guard and uncomfortable.

If this wasn’t bizarre enough, NIST took 7 years to reach this conclusion. Jim Hoffman commented in response to FEMA’s original report:

People who have seen buildings implode in controlled demolitions are unlikely to be as challenged as FEMA’s team in understanding the cause of Building 7’s collapse. They will notice, upon watching the videos , that Building 7’s collapse showed all of the essential features of a controlled demolition .

Because of this, many are openly disputing NIST’s explanation. Raw Story explains that ” As federal agency declares ‘new phenomenon’ downed WTC 7, activists cry foul “:

Richard Gage, founder of Architects & Engineers for 9/11 Truth and a member of the American Institute of Architects, doesn’t believe a word of the theory. His group, which has swelled to over 400 architectural and engineering professionals, immediately responded to the Institute’s claim in a press conference…. ” Tons of [molten metal] was found 21 days after the attack ,” said Gage in an interview with a Vancouver, Canada television station. “Steel doesn’t begin to melt until 2,700 degrees, which is much hotter than what these fires could have caused.” “There are holes in this story that you can drive a truck through,” Gage added during the press conference. His group asserts that thermite, a steel cutting agent, was used to bring the building down.

The press conference by Architects and Engineers for 9/11 Truth is available on their website . In an article entitled, Conspiracy theorists ‘not swayed’ by WTC7 explanation , Raw Story also quotes Richard Gage who explains that molten metal was ignored by the NIST report:

FEMA found [molten metal] … Dr. Steven Jones found it, in the dust that landed in the entire area of lower Manhattan. And he finds it in the chunks of previously molten metal [from the towers].

Jim Hoffman’s website 9/11 research addresses this phenomenon of molten steel mentioned in the FEMA report (but completely ignored and omittedin the new NIST report), writing:

The results of the examination are striking. They reveal a phenomenon never before observed in building fires: eutectic reactions, which caused ‘ intergranular melting capable of turning a solid steel girder into Swiss cheese .’ The New York Times described this as ‘perhaps the deepest mystery uncovered in the investigation .’

In response to NIST’s report on Building 7, 9/11 blogger George Washington pokes fun at their explanation saying :

NIST has solved the mystery of WTC 7, explaining that a brand “new phenomenon” was discovered, namely, that ” thermal expansion “… NIST also discovered another new phenomenon it calls ” fire “. (NIST explained that fire is hot)… which led to the “thermal expansion”.

How impressive could this “thermal expansion” be to explain the collapse of WTC 7? We can only turn to NIST who explain helpfully, ” At any given location the combustibles needed about 20 minutes to be consumed .” To put this in perspective, WTC 7 collapsed at 5:20 p.m., many hours after the fires were started . The collapse was not entirely a surprise apparently, as some news organizations were reporting it collapsing before it collapsed .

Quoting expert opinions and contradictions in NIST’s explanation, George Washington also writes:

NIST said fires alone brought down Building 7, but other office fires have burned longer and hotter without causing collapse… NIST [said]: ‘No blast sounds were heard on the audio tracks of video recordings during the collapse of WTC 7 or reported by witnesses.’… What about this , this , this , this , this and this ?… why were there residues for high-tech explosives at ground zero (and see this )?… what about the pools of molten metal at ground zero for months ? And why was the at and under the ground at the site of WTC 7 as hot as the ground under WTC 1 and 2? why didn’t NIST address the obvious pre-knowledge (and see this ) by everyone around and well in advance that 7 was going to come down?

John Doraemi describes the NIST report as being written in “bad faith” :

With the release of the NIST final report on Building 7 we can safely say that the government remains committed to the ongoing cover-up, and that crucial evidence was simply ignored… Most relevant to the WTC7 building investigation is that all of the steel [which they now attempt to use computers to simulate…] was disappeared from history, and melted down in Asia — ILLEGALLY — and without any justification whatsoever. Bad Faith is that NIST deliberately misled the public by claiming that “140 decibel” explosives would have been required to take out support columns, knowing full well that evidence of incendiary material (thermate) was found, which produces no such noise .

How indeed could a building be more likely to collapse from small offices fires than from pre-planted explosives? Further to this observation, the New York Times, quoting WTC 7 building owner Larry Silverstein explained that like most modern structures, WTC 7 was reinforced to survive structural damage: “We built in enough redundancy to allow entire portions of floors to be removed without affecting the building’s structural integrity .”

Barry Jennings, who was in WTC 7 on 9/11, claimed that he was stuck inside of the building after a massive explosion and that firefighters tried to get him out of the building before either of the twin towers collapsed .

Responses from other 9/11 researchers should be expected in the coming days.

Source URL: http://arabesque911.blogspot.com/2008/08/wtc-7-report-response-round-up.html

Bad Faith: WTC 7 and the Official Lies

by John Doraemi August 22, 2008 Crimes of the State

With the release of the NIST final report on Building 7 we can safely say that the government remains committed to the ongoing cover-up, and that crucial evidence was simply ignored, fairy tales were manufactured, and that’s good enough for a lot of media. Perhaps a super-majority of media.

As media, “the press,” will not perform its function as society’s government watchdog, and will not pursue the gaping holes in this wizard’s curtain, it’s basically left to us — you and me — to clear up this matter for our fellow citizens. We are at a serious disadvantage, and yet the task is not so daunting as rabid “debunkers” would have you believe.

Let’s defer to one of their own, the former head of NIST’s Fire Science Division (the federal government organization which produced the sham report linked above).

Dr. James Quintere Ph.D. certainly meets the criteria of “expert” as well as “specialist” and “insider.” Here’s what he had to say about NIST’s 7 year farce investigating the 9/11 building “collapses.”

Quintere:

“I have over 35 years of fire research in my experience. I worked in the fire program at NIST for 19 years, leaving as a division chief. I have been at the University of Maryland since. I am a founding member and past-Chair of the International Association for Fire Safety Science–the principal world forum for fire research.”

“In my opinion, the WTC investigation by NIST falls short of expectations by not definitively finding cause, by not sufficiently linking recommendations of specificity to cause, by not fully invoking all of their authority to seek facts in the investigation, and by the guidance of government lawyers to deter rather than develop fact finding .”

Alan Miller reports:

“Dr. Quintiere made his plea during his presentation, ‘Questions on the WTC Investigations’ at the 2007 World Fire Safety Conference. ‘I wish that there would be a peer review of this,’ he said, referring to the NIST investigation. ‘I think all the records that NIST has assembled should be archived. I would really like to see someone else take a look at what they’ve done; both structurally and from a fire point of view .’”

“’ I think the official conclusion that NIST arrived at is questionable ,’ explained Dr. Quintiere. ‘ Let’s look at real alternatives that might have been the cause of the collapse of the World Trade Towers and how that relates to the official cause and what’s the significance of one cause versus another.’”

” ‘I hope to convince you to perhaps become ‘Conspiracy Theorists’, but in a proper way,’ he said.”

— Former Chief of NIST’s Fire Science Division Calls for Independent Review of World Trade Center Investigation, By Alan Miller, August 21, 2007, Oped News

This degree of honesty and risk to one’s reputation and career is seldom seen from high-level government officials. We must take these warnings and revelations seriously. Much more seriously than NIST has done, considering their best guess is that a “new phenomenon” brought Building 7 down, even though much hotter and longer-lasting fires have never had a similar effect on other high rise buildings in all of history. “Global collapse” just does not happen to steel framed skyscrapers due to fire. It has not happened anywhere in the world before or since that one September day.

I called this article “Bad Faith,” and here is why. As Dr. Qunitere has indicated, the investigation was hindered by “government lawyers,” and thus is clearly tainted. Its conclusions are suspect, and a true independent investigation and “truth and reconciliation” must occur if this matter is to be truly solved: if we are to ever have justice for the crimes of September 11th 2001.

Bad Faith was the White House stalling for 444 days before acquiescing to calls for a 9/11 investigation at all. Witholding millions of documents and access to key witnesses was also indication of cover-up and of acting in “bad faith” rather than as a “good faith” source of information.

Bad Faith is ignoring the many whistleblowers, like Sibel Edmonds, Indira Singh, Colleen Rowley, Harry Samit, Robert Wright and even the sitting Senator Bob Graham who told PBS about the “foreign governments” who were part of the 9/11 plot. But Graham was unable to disclose these “governments” for fear of imprisonment!

Most relevant to the WTC7 building investigation is that all of the steel [which they now attempt to use computers to simulate, as if that was an acceptable forensic substitute] was disappeared from history, and melted down in Asia — ILLEGALLY — and without any justification whatsoever.

Bad Faith is that NIST deliberately misled the public by claiming that “140 decibel” explosives would have been required to take out support columns, knowing full well that evidence of incendiary material (thermate) was found, which produces no such noise. Further, on-scene witnesses heard many, many explosions and reported those, but this is not allowed to factor in to the NIST cover-up.

Bad Faith is also trying to dismiss “conspiracy” at every opportunity, by attempting to argue that because of a particular claim regarding this particular building, no “conspiracy” could have occurred on 9/11 at all. This is ludicrous reasoning on its face.

Even the government’s official story is a conspiracy theory. We are duty bound to investigate the extent and reach of this conspiracy — as in what really happened that day, what preceded the day which allowed it to occur, and what was blatantly covered-up after the fact.

People who don’t trust the Bush regime to tell them the truth about anything else you could possibly name suddenly lose all capacity for critical thought once the “sacred” topic of 9/11 is touched. If these people could just acknowledge that a cover-up exists, that would be the first step to demanding the actual truth.

Perhaps there’s a 12 step process involved in escaping Plato’s cave. One must accept the possiblity of a cover-up, given the blatant and overwhelming evidence of its existence. To deny this is infantile and a clear example of cognitive dissonance.

Why would you accept Bad Faith excuses from a lying, despotic, war criminal regime?

Why?

It truly boggles the mind.

J.D.

Further debunking of the new NIST WTC7 report:

Debunking NIST’s Conclusions about WTC 7: Easy as Shooting Fish in a Barrel , George Washington’s Blog

Links included:

Crimes of the State Blog http://crimesofthestate.blogspot.com/

NIST WTC 7 Investigation Finds Building Fires Caused Collapse Report and Recommendations for Improving Building Safety Released for Comment http://www.nist.gov/public_affairs/releases/wtc082108.html#docs

Former Chief of NIST’s Fire Science Division Calls for Independent Review of World Trade Center Investigation http://www.opednews.com/maxwrite/print_friendly.php?p=genera_alan_mil_070820_former_chief_of_nist.htm

PBS News Hour, IMPROVING INTELLIGENCE, December 11, 2002 http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/congress/july-dec02/intelligence_12-11.html

Debunking NIST’s Conclusions about WTC 7: Easy as Shooting Fish in a Barrel http://georgewashington2.blogspot.com/2008/08/debunking-nists-conclusions-about-wtc-7.html

Source URL: http://crimesofthestate.blogspot.com/2008/08/bad-faith-wtc-7-and-official-lies.html

SOURCEOriginally published by George Washington at Washingtons Blog on 8/21/2008
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George Washington
http://www.washingtonsblog.com/
Washington’s Blog strives to provide real-time, well-researched and actionable information. We at Washington’s Blog have an insatiable curiosity for new discoveries, new information and new insights. Despite our passion for what’s new, there are themes that we keep reporting on year after year, as they reflect a bigger picture which remains fairly constant, or the root causes of our problems which have still not been addressed, or potentially powerful solutions which have still never been tried.