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A DISSERVICE TO THE PUBLIC & ENGINEERING PROFESSION
It is widely accepted that the collapses were caused by the failure of the buildings' steel structure as it was weakened by the heat of the fires. But Jim Quintiere of the University of Maryland, College Park, thinks the thickness of the surviving fire insulation, rather than the destruction of insulation during the impacts, explains why the towers collapsed when they did.
Quintiere, whose previous work includes investigating the 1993 fire at the Branch Davidian compound in Waco, Texas, was struck by a statement in last year's preliminary report of the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA). It noted that there was a discrepancy in the thickness of the fireproofing in the towers. On the floors of the south tower where the plane hit it was just 19 millimetres thick, half that on the floors struck in the north tower.
The diagonal rods in the trusses supporting the floors were particularly vulnerable, he says, since they were the thinnest structures and would heat up fastest. "The implications of these insulation differences are astounding," Quintiere says.
Together with Marino di Marzo, also at College Park, and Rachel Becker at the Technion, the Israel Institute of Technology in Haifa, Quintiere calculated how long it would take for the trusses to fail at the temperatures they were subjected to in the fires.
.....
Frank Lombardi, the Port Authority's chief engineer, insists that the thickness of the insulation is irrelevant. He says the impacts dislodged much of the fireproofing on the trusses. Without this protection, he says, it was inevitable that the heat would make them buckle.
This view is supported by Gene Corley, who led the FEMA's investigation last year. "I do not believe the insulation was substandard," he says. However, he concedes that if extra insulation had been applied and had remained in place after the planes hit, the buildings would have remained standing longer.
.....
Six months before the attacks, the Port Authority received a copy of a report it commissioned from British consulting engineers Buro Happold to see if there was a more cost-effective alternative to applying thicker insulation. The authority declined to provide New Scientist with a copy of this report. But on being told of the report's existence, Alexander said he would be seeking a copy as part of legal proceedings.
Quintiere has also received the support of some of the families of those killed when the towers fell. Sally Regenhard, the founder of the Skyscraper Safety Campaign and the mother of one of the firefighters lost on 11 September, has said she would fund his research if NIST did not address the issue. "Right now we do not have the truth. We have people who have a vested interest in not knowing the truth," she says.
NEW YORKâWorld Trade Center insurer Swiss Reinsurance Co. and WTC leaseholder Silverstein Properties Inc. continued their public sparring with the release of competing engineering reports that differ on whether the destruction of one of the twin towers would have rendered the other unusable. Following a federal judge's order, Swiss Re released a report by Menlo Park, Calif.-based Exponent Failure Analysis Associates that concludes that the destruction of one tower would have caused such extensive damage that it would have "compromised the future viability of the entire complex," according to Swiss Re.
Among other things, the report notes that the towers shared heating, cooling, electrical and plumbing systems that would have been severely damaged by one tower's collapse, and that the second tower would have suffered extensive structural and fire damage.
The report counters engineering studies prepared for Silverstein that conclude that the collapse of one tower would not have caused structural damage to the other and that the surviving tower would have remained a "viable" building.
AND .....
Engineers Set the Record Straight on Trade Center Study Results (11/04/2002) By Nadine M. Post
http://enr.construction.com/news/buildings/archives/021104a.asp Engineers have bombarded several media outlets with letters recently in an effort to correct errors in coverage of the aftermath of the World Trade Center collapse. The issue is exceptionally sensitive, they say, because of pending lawsuits against the developer-owner, the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey.
Engineers from the Structural Engineers Association of New York say that errors, innuendo and quotes out of context in the media do a disservice to the public and the engineering profession. They are concerned about the possible impact on a lawsuit filed against the port authority that alleges that design flaws in the trade center led to the deaths of the trapped occupants and firefighters.
Control of the News Media and legal eagles allowed the perpetrators to drown the facts and confuse technical issues - when will those with knowledge stand up and be counted among the few?
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