September 11th Conspiracies - Twin Towers

This is page two in the Twin Towers section of my series on the September 11th terrorist attacks. If you were linked here by mistake, please refer to page one in this section.

 Madrid Windsor Building did not Fall

Perhaps it was inevitable that another building fire would occur and could be compared to the disaster at the Twin Towers. The Madrid Windsor Building fire is sometimes cited as being evidence of something else going on in the Twin Towers than what was formally stated. Reality, however, is not very forgiving to such a hypothesis, considering several major differences.

Firstly, no plane flew into the Windsor building, and did not sustain any structural damage prior to the fire beginning. Secondly, the Windsor building was much smaller, at only 29 stories above ground and 3 below[15]. It had a concrete structure, not completely steel one like the Twin Towers, though steel columns were in use above the 17th floor, but those suffered complete collapse -- just like what happened in the Twin Towers[16]. In all, the Windsor building was completely different than the Twin Towers -- the steel parts of the Windsor building collapsed like the Twin Towers, but the concrete parts did not. I hardly see how the buildings are similar, outside weakened metal due to fire.

 Fire and Collapse

This is a complicated question that has a more complicated answer than conspiracy theorists would let on. There are several theories from engineers, architects, and others as to why this happened. Some suggest that the fire proofing was too thinly applied, saying "One WTC had 1 1/2 inch fireproofing, which fell in 104 minutes while, Two WTC had 3/4 inch fireproofing [and] crumbled in only 56 minutes [...] The insulation used [was] too little, according to our calculations."[17] Yet others suggested that even this level of fireproofing was not consistently applied[18]:

Roger Morse, an architect who investigated the WTC's fireproofing from the early 1990s to June 2001, said that the towers suffered from the same sorts of deficiencies as many other high-rise office buildings in the United States and Europe. He noted that fireproofing on long-span joists was often "extremely thin" (less than the 3/4 inch specified in the FEMA/ASCE report) and that some structural elements were never fireproofed in places because ductwork prevented ready access. Moreover, he observed that fireproofing on the columns had been coming off because it had been applied over the rust that had built up on the columns, and the rust was flaking from the steel.

There is also the position at which the towers were hit, that many assumed was another factor[19]:

Solomon questions whether the thickness of fireproofing is related to how fast the buildings collapsed. He notes that Two WTC, which fell first, was struck at a lower point than One WTC, and thus the damaged Two WTC had more weight to support. The relative times to collapse "probably had more to do with the additional weight that [Two WTC] was trying to support," he says.

NIST said several factors were involved, in "Finding 58" of the official report[20]:

Finding 58: The time it took for each WTC tower to collapse was due primarily to the differences in structural damage, the time it took the fires to travel from the impact area across the floors and core to critical locations, and the time it took to weaken the core and exterior columns. WTC 2 had asymmetric structural damage to the core including the severing of a corner core column and WTC 1 had more symmetrical damage. The fires in WTC 2 reached the east side of the building more quickly, within 10 to 20 minutes, than the 50 to 60 minutes it took the fires in WTC 1 to reach the south side.

It is clear that there is no ideal theory as to why they fell at different times, but most are pretty clear and seem fairly accurate. This conspiracy theory only exists to further other conspiracy theories, as to say "They shouldn't have fallen so far apart, which means .... "

The Towers were Designed to take Direct Aircraft Hits

This argument typically is not too clear. To clarify the building was "designed" to take a hit from a 707, not the 767 which the planes were. This all can be best explained by Leslie Robertson, lead structural engineer of the World Trade Center. According to his account the assumption was that the collision would be with a relatively slow-moving 707, lost in fog[21]:

The two towers were the first structures outside of the military and nuclear industries designed to resist the impact of a jet airliner, the Boeing 707. It was assumed that the jetliner would be lost in the fog, seeking to land at JFK or at Newark.

The full document includes a graphic indicating the 707 impact speed was indeed estimated to be approximately 180 miles per hour, which compares with the flight speeds of the 9/11 airplanes, going more than twice that fast, between 470 and 590 miles per hour on impact[22].

This account later appeared to be contradicted by NIST[23]:

The investigators also said that newly disclosed Port Authority documents suggested that the towers were designed to withstand the kind of airplane strike that they suffered on Sept. 11.

Earlier statements by Port Authority officials and outside engineers involved in designing the buildings suggested that the designers considered an accidental crash only by slower aircraft, moving at less than 200 miles per hour. The newly disclosed documents, from the 1960's, show that the Port Authority considered aircraft moving at 600 m.p.h., slightly faster and therefore more destructive than the ones that did hit the towers, Dr. Sunder said.

The level of disagreement between the Port Authority and Robertson on this point is revealed in a further article[24]:

Robertson took the time to calculate how well his towers would handle the impact from a Boeing 707, the largest jetliner in service at the time. He says that his calculations assumed a plane lost in a fog while searching for an airport at relatively low speed, like the B-25 bomber. He concluded that the towers would remain standing despite the force of the impact and the hole it would punch out. The new technologies he had installed after the motion experiments and wind-tunnel work had created a structure more than strong enough to withstand such a blow.

Exactly how Robertson performed these calculations is apparently lost -- he says he cannot find a copy of the report. Several engineers who worked with him at the time, including the director of his computer department, say they have no recollection of ever seeing the study. But the Port Authority, eager to mount a counterattack against Wien, seized on the results -- and may in fact have exaggerated them. One architect working for the Port Authority issued a statement to the press, covered in a prominent article in The Times, explaining that Robertson's study proved that the towers could withstand the impact of a jetliner moving at 600 miles an hour. That was perhaps three times the speed that Robertson had considered. If Robertson saw the article in the paper, he never spoke up about the discrepancy. No one else issued a correction, and the question was answered in many people's minds: the towers were as safe as could be expected, even in the most cataclysmic of circumstances.

There were only two problems. The first, of course, was that no study of the impact of a 600-mile-an-hour plane ever existed. ''That's got nothing to do with the reality of what we did,'' Robertson snapped when shown the Port Authority architect's statement more than three decades later. The second problem was that no one thought to take into account the fires that would inevitably break out when the jetliner's fuel exploded, exactly as the B-25's had. And if Wien was the trade center's Cassandra, fire protection would become its Achilles' heel.

According to all of this, the towers were not even specifically designed to survive the impact from a plane. Robertson, instead, carried out some calculations on the existing design to assess what the results of an impact might be. Further, whatever the truth about the speed of the plane, there is no indication that the design considered the effects of the fire. Leslie Robertson says the towers were not designed to handle it[25]:

To the best of our knowledge, little was known about the effects of a fire from such an aircraft, and no designs were prepared for that circumstance. Indeed, at that time, no fireproofing systems were available to control the effects of such fires.

And even the later documents reported by NIST apparently left the issue open to question[26]:

Potentially challenging other statements by Port Authority engineers, Dr. Sunder said it was now uncertain whether the authority fully considered the fuel and its effects when it studied the towers' safety during the design phase.

"Whether the fuel was taken into account or not is an open question," Dr. Sunder said

In all what matters is that the towers did withstand the impact: it is claimed that the combination of that damage and the resulting fire is what brought them down. What is clear from Robertson is that he believe the "robustness of the towers was exemplary", and that "the fact that the structures stood long enough for tens of thousands to escape is a tribute to the many talented men and women who spent endless hours toiling over the design and construction of the project." To clarify, he appears to be saying the performed better than expected, not worse.

So, the towers did survive the impact, but not the impact and raging fires.

The Empire State Building Survived a Crash with a B-25, why not the Twin Towers?

I think the primary cause behind this conspiracy theory is that people are confused (or are confusing others) between the B-25 which is a about the size of a small airplane versus the size of the B-52, the plane most people are familiar with, which is the size of a jet liner. The fact is, since the B-25 was so small, the damage was very minimal. Here is a graphical chart detailing the size, weight, fuel, and speed of the B-25, 707, and a 767. Click for a larger picture.

The size of a B-25 bomber is much smaller than a Boeing 767, with smaller wingspan and smaller fuel capacity. A B-25 bomber has a wingspan of 67 feet, compared with 156 feet for a Boeing 767. The fuel capacity of the B-25 bomber was 1,000 gallons, as compared with 24,000 gallons for a Boeing 767. As well, the speed at which a B-25 bomber traveled was far less than the ~500 mph than the speed that the two Boeing 767's were traveling when they hit the World Trade Center.

As I discussed earlier, the engineer of the Twin Towers stated that the buildings were only supposed to take an impact of a Boeing 707, lost in fog, and traveling at a relatively slow speed of 180 miles per hour. Some others say the buildings were not designed to take a hit at all, rather these calculations were done later, as a worst case scenario. Regardless, there was no chance of the buildings standing up to a plane nearly 11 and a half times the size of a B-25, full of jet fuel, hitting at around 500 miles per hour.

The Boeing 767 aircraft that hit the World Trade Center were significantly heavier, with fuel for transcontinental flights. American Airlines Flight 11 was traveling at 470 miles per hour when it crashed into the North Tower at 8:46 a.m. United Airlines Flight 175 was traveling at 590 miles per hour when it crashed into the South Tower[22].

The energy contained in an airplane or other moving object is proportional to the velocity.

Where m is the object's mass (in kg) and v is the object's speed (in m·s⁻¹).

Aircraft	Boeing 767 - North Tower	Boeing 767 - South Tower	Boeing 707
Calculation	(179,168 kg * 210.12)/2	(179,168 kg * 263.72)/2	(163,293 kg * 80.46722)/2
Energy	3,954,417,824	6,229,464,421	528,658,660

The engineers also did not consider how fires resulting from a crash would affect the buildings. It was a combination of the damage from the impact of the Boeing 767s, and the resulting fires that ultimately caused the steel columns to weaken to the point where they failed and the building collapsed.

Matthys Levy, an architect at Weidlinger Associates and the author of "Why Buildings Fall Down" (Norton, 1992), watched the first tower collapse while standing at Seventh Avenue and Houston Street, some 20 blocks away. "I saw the beginning of the top moving down, and the whole thing collapsed in a cloud of smoke," Mr. Levy said. "From what I saw, it seemed to come straight down." Mr. Levy said the situation was much different from the one that occurred in 1945 when a much smaller plane slammed into the Empire State Building. That plane, a bomber with a smaller impact and less fuel, ripped a 20-foot hole in the structure, but the building remained standing.[27]

But Anthony G. Cracchiolo, director of priority capital programs for the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, which owned the buildings, said little thought had been given to the possibility of a plane crash into the towers. "We never were asked to consider trying to protect the building from such a threat," said Mr. Cracchiolo, who was among those who coordinated the reconstruction after the 1993 bombing. "As structural engineers, there is nothing we could have done to protect the building from a direct impact from a plane as large as these." Melvin Schweitzer, a member of the Port Authority board of commissioners from 1993 to 1999, said, however, that the board repeatedly inquired about that possibility. "We were just told that architects had explained that the building was designed to withstand a jet," Mr. Schweitzer said. "Frankly, when we raised that question, most of us were thinking of a small plane."[27]

Giuliani knew the towers were going... before it happened

The presumption here is that no one could have possibly have suggested the towers would collapse, unless he or she had advanced knowledge of a demolition. But why not? The "collapses were unprecedented", yes, but so were the initial impacts. There is absolutely no reason someone might have no have expressed their personal view that the tower would collapse. John Peruggia of the FDNY is reported to have heard warnings about the towers prior to the first collapse:

An engineer from the Department of Buildings reported that the structural damage appeared to be immense. The stability of both buildings was compromised. In particular, the engineer was worried about how long the north tower would stand[29].

Peruggia found this an "astounding possibility", this account tells us, but could not ignore it. He sent a messenger to tell Chief of Department Peter Ganci ("and Chief Ganci only") "that the building integrity is severely compromised and they believe the building is in danger of imminent collapse".

That messenger turns out to be Richard Zarillo, who takes up the story[30]:

As I was walking towards the Fire command post, I found Steve Mosiello. I said, Steve, where's the boss? I have to give him a message. He said, well, what's the message? I said the buildings are going to collapse; we need to evac everybody out. With a very confused look he said who told you that? I said I was just with John at OEM. OEM says the buildings are going to collapse; we need to get out.

He escorted me over to Chief Ganci. He said, hey, Pete, we got a message that the buildings are going to collapse. His reply was who the fuck told you that? Then Steve brought me in and with Chief Ganci, Commissioner Feehan, Steve, I believe Chief Turi was initially there, I said, listen, I was just at OEM. The message I was given was that the buildings are going to collapse; we need to get our people out. At that moment, this thunderous, rolling roar came down and that's when the building came down, the first tower came down.

So we have at least two reports from what would have been an authoritative source on the day, of the potential for collapse, and there's no reason to believe this might not have filtered through to Giuliani. There are also reports of others who shared this opinion, including a New York Linguistics professor, who said he'd thought this after witnessing the fires[31]:

My Thayer School engineering training came back, and I realized that with that intensity of heat in a building in which the steel girders were insulated with asbestos, it had to collapse within one hour. I called the fire department, police, etc. and told them the building was guaranteed to collapse.

Assistant Chief Joseph Callan of the FDNY also reported his concerns about conditions in the North Tower before it collapsed[32]:

Approximately 40 minutes after I arrived in the lobby, I made a decision that the building was no longer safe. And that was based on the conditions in the lobby, large pieces of plaster falling, all the 20 foot high glass panels on the exterior of the lobby were breaking. There was obvious movement of the building, and that was the reason on the handy talky I gave the order for all Fire Department units to leave the north tower.

It is far from inconceivable that someone might have suggested to Giuliani that the WTC might collapse, but there is another potential explanation for this claim that could be even simpler. Let's look at other accounts from those around Giuliani at the time[33].

I received a radio transmission from FDNY Captain Joe Folino, an OEM responder, who informed me that the Mayor had requested that I join him and Police Commissioner Bernard Kerik at 75 Barclay Street, where they were establishing a temporary executive command center. I left the North Tower lobby and went to Barclay Street.

In addition to the Mayor and the Police Commissioner, several Deputy Mayors and Senior City Hall staff were at the command post. The Mayor was on the phone with the White House, and had been told the White House was being evacuated. Suddenly, the building began to shake, and someone yelled the towers were coming down. We could hear the roar of the building collapsing, and then there was silence and darkness.

FORMER COMMISSIONER OF THE NEW YORK CITY
OFFICE OF EMERGENCY MANAGEMENT
RICHARD J. SHEIRER

Here "someone yelled the towers were coming down" only just before (or even as) they collapsed. Could this be the warning Giuliani referred to? Let's try another version[34]:

From there Giuliani, needing phone lines, commandeered a Merrill Lynch back office at 75 Barclay Street. After 45 minutes someone yelled, "Get down! It's coming down!" The force of the collapse flattened the building across the street

And another[35]:

...Lhota says. "We got through to the governor's office and peppered them with questions: Is this terrorism? Are more planes on the way? Are the airports closed? Should we close the tunnels? The mayor also wanted to talk to the White House. As I handed him the phone, saying, 'Vice President Cheney is about to get on the line,' a police official ran in yelling, 'Get down! Everybody get down! It's coming down!'"

The collapses were indeed unprecedented, however it seems there were several possible warnings that Giuliani may have received, no mysterious phone calls required. This also explains a point that is often ignored, if Giuliani did receive earlier notification of the collapse from a reliable source concerned about his safety, then why was he still in the building? Why would such an evil, calculating person, risking the lives of tens of thousands of people, wait around to keep up the facade of a hero?

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