Controlled Demolition at the World Trade Center on 9/11: Dealing with Debunkers

Introduction

The debate about what happened at the World Trade Center in New York on September 11, 2001, is marred and mired by ever-increasing attempts to debunk the work of scientists and others who are investigating the evidence for controlled explosive demolition. This debunking is characterized by the publication of countless trivial details which appear contradictory or are as yet unexplained. Any attempt to counter this debunking line by line would be a gargantuan task, and would accomplish nothing, as a new crop of trivial objections would soon be generated and old ones would be polished a little and repeated.

Logically, if there is solid proof that explosives were used in controlled demolition the discussion should terminate, as it is already proved that the official account is false. There should be no need to speculate on how various puzzling details might be explained. This letter will attempt to set out just the clearest evidence that explosives were used in all three towers. It will be little more than a list, with appropriate references. There will be no attempt to provide an exhaustive coverage. Others have already performed a valuable service in examining and presenting the evidence in detail. An excellent example is the work of David Ray Griffin, with his Debunking of 9/11 Debunking: An Answer to Popular Mechanics and Other Defenders of the Official Conspiracy Theory, and numerous other books. His recent book The Mysterious Collapse of World Trade Center 7: Why the Final Official Report about 9/11 is Unscientific and False is a very thorough and useful reference.

It is noteworthy however that Griffin makes an assertion in his Debunking book that there is a strong case that no Boeing 757 hit the Pentagon. There is in fact no convincing evidence that it did not, and much argument has taken place over this question. It is a classic example of an issue which is unclear and ambiguous, divisive and time-wasting.

Far better than arguing about this question is digging deeper to ask how it came about that the plane was not intercepted, and Norman Mineta gives us a clue to this. Far better also to ask why the authorities have hidden evidence which would prove what happened at the Pentagon. Could it be because they want good people in the 9/11 Truth movement to argue against one another? The purpose of this letter is to make the case that the evidence for controlled demolition is compelling and has long been more than sufficient to demand a new, real investigation.

This letter will focus on only two types of evidence. The choice of these two is based on the fact that the evidence in question is in public hands and can not now be destroyed, hidden, taken away or denied, as happened with so much other evidence. The first is the videos of the collapses and the second is the dust the collapses produced. The videos show the buildings all came down too fast and the dust contains residues of explosives.

Topics will be discussed in the following order:

1. WTC 7 Freefall: Video Evidence
2. NIST’s Thermal Expansion Theory: Deceptions and Contradictions
3. WTC1 and WTC2 Videos: Collapses Consistent with Explosives
4. WTC Dust: Thermitic Material Discovered
5. WTC 7 Freefall: Video Evidence

In the case of Building 7 (WTC 7), which was not hit by a plane, the north-west corner of the roof descended at a rate “indistinguishable from free fall” for 2.5 seconds, as shown by David Chandler.

This is a drop of over 100 feet, about 8 floors.

The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), in their final report on WTC 7, now acknowledges that free fall occurred, though only for 2.25 seconds. Perhaps they measured a different point. Before their admission of free fall, we heard the immortal words of Dr Shyam Sunder, NIST team leader, stating that the collapse was slower than free fall because “… structural resistance was provided … a series of structural failures had to take place. Everything was not instantaneous.”

It is clear that what Sunder was talking about was not the collapse of WTC 7 itself but their simulation of it. One of their images of that simulation is below.

Here is another, showing the simulated collapse from three directions.

This simulation is obviously presenting a collapse in which “a series of structural failures” was taking place. As millions of dollars were spent on this presentation it must be assumed it was the best they could do, yet it looks nothing like what the videos show. We have several videos of this collapse, taken from different angles, and all show that the building fell virtually intact. There was no evidence of structural resistance for 2.5 seconds and very little distortion of the walls.

Another of Sunder’s remarks is relevant as it appears to provide a description of what we see in the real WTC 7 collapse: “A free fall time would be an object that has no structural components below it.”

Now that NIST has admitted free fall, they have a problem. Sunder’s explanation of the implication of free fall was scientifically correct: free fall implies no support exists whatsoever. Only explosives can eliminate support from all columns simultaneously and instantaneously. Free fall and progressive collapse are obviously incompatible, yet NIST has not altered its conclusion and still adheres to its new complex explanation for the collapse, which we now examine.

NIST’s Thermal Expansion Theory: Deceptions and Contradictions

NIST has abandoned its original explanation that WTC 7 was brought down by intense fire. We have photos which show that there was very little fire on the north side therefore the intense fire would have to be on the south side. Obviously if a steel structure is heated on one side until the steel fails, while the other side is not, the structure must lean toward the heated side. As the building came straight down, this explanation was clearly absurd.

After 8 years NIST managed to think up an alternative. In their final report they claim the building collapsed due to “thermal expansion”. In this explanation a section of floor expanded due to heat and initiated the collapse by pushing a supporting girder off its bracket on a major internal column.

Their explanation starts with a deceptive illustration of a section of floor in the north-east corner of the building. The first deception is found in the row of 5 exterior columns along the east wall. These columns are shown as equal in strength to the very strong interior column at the extreme right, number 79, thus giving a false impression of the rigidity of the eastern wall.

NIST’s thermal expansion theory asserts that this floor, number 13, was heated and expanded, but only expanded toward the west, presumably because the eastern columns were assumed to be rigid. Note the yellow arrow, which points only to the west and thus suggests we should ignore the obvious fact that fires were burning on the floors above and below, so all floors would have expanded and their combined force would have pushed the unbraced eastern wall outward.

The joint which was supposed to have failed is marked in this photo.

The expansion of the floor section was said to cause the girder running north from column 79 to be pushed off its bracket. Was the girder pushed off brackets at both ends simultaneously? NIST appears to assume this, though they don’t mention the other end falling. The probability of both ends falling at the same time, requiring exact symmetry in the fire, is vanishingly small. Realistically one end would have dropped first. NIST then assumes that the impact of the falling floor would be sufficient to dislodge the floor below, but how can this be, given that the floor would have resisted the twisting that would occur when the first end fell? Despite this, NIST has no hesitation in asserting that the impact was sufficient to start a domino effect in which 9 floors fell, leaving column 79 without horizontal support for a length sufficient to permit it to buckle.

Note that column 79 is braced in four directions including substantial beams running to the west and south. How then could the column become unsupported horizontally when only the beams to the north and east had fallen? This is clearly a flagrant deception.

Given the impossibility of a buckling collapse of column 79, the initiation cannot occur and the whole explanation must be false, nevertheless we will pursue the NIST theory a little further. NIST asserts that, after column 79 buckles, a progressive collapse occurs in which adjacent columns buckle and more floor sections collapse, eventually removing lateral support from columns to the west. Once again we note the impossibility of additional columns collapsing given that, even if floors fall on the near side, there is nothing to make them fall on the far side, thus lateral support cannot be lost.

In NIST’s imaginings the entire internal structure of the building collapses, piece by piece, but nothing happens to the outer columns, thus these are left standing, leaving a perfectly intact hollow outer shell. How can this be, given that their theory requires the interior columns to invariably buckle when the floors fall? Why didn’t some external columns also buckle during this process? Why didn’t some of the falling floors pull the walls inward?

That is, after all, what their simulation indicates! It appears magic is involved to provide lateral support to the perimeter columns when the floors fall to prevent them from buckling, though NIST apparently forgot to mention it.

The NIST thermal expansion theory is clearly just as absurd as their previous hot fire theory. Sunder’s remarks, before he was forced to admit free fall occurred, are true. Free vertical fall is proof of simultaneous severance of all supporting columns. Only explosives can achieve this.

At this point it might be wise to obtain a little light relief. I recommend David Ray Griffin’s Left-Leaning Despisers of the 9/11 Truth Movement: Do You Really Believe in Miracles?

For a total demolition of the NIST final report on WTC 7 see the work of Kevin Ryan.

WTC1 and WTC2 Videos: Collapses Consistent with Explosives

In the case of the Twin Towers the collapse rate was slower, about 2/3rds the acceleration due to gravity. This complicates the argument as free fall does not occur, so it cannot be simply claimed that no support exists in the lower portion of the towers. NIST does not attempt to simulate the collapse of the towers: their simulation ceases at the moment when the towers were “poised for collapse”. Instead NIST relies on the prior work of Bazant who stated that the top of each tower was severed by plane impact and fire damage, and fell on the lower undamaged portion, the impact destroying it floor by floor.

Again the videos show the falsity of this claim. We see that the top section does not fall as a block but disintegrates before the lower section starts to give way. Only explosives can account for this disintegration. A substantial rebuttal of the NIST report has been provided by Jim Hoffman. Several other websites set out refutations of the official story, for example The Science of 9/11, and Architects and Engineers for 9/11 Truth.

Numerous papers have been written showing the falsity of various aspects of the NIST report: temperatures were too low to initiate collapse; the appearance of the towers while collapsing, and the projection of debris, indicate the use of explosives; fire damage should have produced a slow, sagging, unsymmetrical collapse, not the vertical, constant acceleration collapse observed. If the top section fell as a block, delivering destructive energy on impact, its velocity must reduce, but no such reduction was seen. A philosophical study of the nature of scientific inquiry, and its application to the events of 9/11, has been provided.

Recently David Chandler published a particularly clear explanation of the way in which the fall rate of the towers, even though slower than free fall, provides proof of controlled demolition, by application of Newton’s Third Law. This can be found in a video and a paper. He also provides interesting observations of pieces of debris changing direction in flight, indicating rocket-like behaviour, which apparently would require some pyrotechnic material to be present, attached to the debris. This leads us directly into the next type of
evidence: the study of the dust.

WTC Dust: Thermitic Material Discovered When the twin towers fell, huge clouds of dense dust rolled out and settled across Manhattan. Photos of the area where the towers fell show little concrete, though there was an area of about 100 acres of concrete, four inches thick, in each tower. The dust therefore is composed not only of the ordinary materials expected, but also most of the concrete. The pulverization of the concrete is evidence by itself of the use of explosives. The dust has been examined and found to contain two materials that each provide further evidence of explosives, and hence of controlled demolition. These materials can be extracted from the dust using a magnet. First examined was a collection of small spheres. Analysis showed that the spheres were mainly iron but also contained aluminium, silicon and oxygen. This was reported in a paper titled Extremely High Temperatures during the World Trade Center Destruction, published in the Journal of 9/11 Studies. These spheres were indistinguishable from spheres produced when thermite is ignited. The fact that the fragments were spherical was proof that the material had once been molten. The fact that they were small showed that something violent had happened to scatter them. They would have cooled and solidified as they fell through the air, thus preserving their shape. Similar spheres were reported by the USGS and by the R J Lee Company. The latter group had been engaged to determine whether the Deutsche Bank building across the road had been contaminated with WTC dust. The company reported that these spheres were unique and provided evidence that the dust had indeed come from the WTC towers collapse.

There is no reasonable justification for this material to be in the dust. It is evidence that some form of thermite had been involved in the collapse of the buildings. The other magnetic particles found in the dust were small chips, red on one side and grey on the other. Analysis showed the composition of the red side to be similar to that of the small spheres, except that they contained more aluminium and much carbon. They were also more uniform, which suggests a manufactured product. A series of experiments and analyses showed that the red side of the chips corresponded with nanothermite, as described in the literature.

When tested in a Differential Scanning Calorimeter the chips started to react when the temperature reached 370 to 400 C, quickly raising the temperature, producing spherical globules of iron. Iron melts at about 1530 C, but the reaction was completed while the calorimeter was not above 470 C. It was never heated above 700 C.

Clearly the red material has reacted vigorously, generating a great deal of heat, and has therefore behaved like nanothermite. The red chips are evidently fragments of unreacted nanothermite. Reaction of this material would produce the small spheres described above. During reaction the carbon-containing material is apparently consumed. Aluminium oxide is known to drift away in a white cloud from conventional thermite reactions, which would account for the variable reduction in aluminium content. A report on this very significant work titled Active Thermitic Material Discovered in Dust from the 9/11 World Trade Center Catastrophe, was published in the Bentham Open Chemical Physics Journal. No paper has been published disputing its findings. There is no plausible explanation for the presence of this high-tech material other than for demolition. It does not appear to be commercially available, which suggests that the source would have been some government-backed research laboratory.

Conclusion
It is clear from the videos that all three buildings fell too fast, too symmetrically and too completely for the collapse to be due to anything other than controlled demolition using explosives. It is also clear that at least part of the material used to demolish the buildings was nanothermite. As this evidence is compelling there is no point in wasting time debating debunkers on distracting issues, such as the difficulty in laying the explosives without detection. Clearly explosives were laid, hence that difficulty, and all other such difficulties, must have been overcome.