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Something Conspiracy Theorists Don't Get...

JAStewart

Graduate Poster
JAStewart
Joined
Nov 5, 2006
Messages
1,521
I've pretty much given up having an opinion on 9/11 now, but something always struck me as interesting, and, a question I was never able to get an answer from a conspiracy theorist:

"Who would build a huge building so that it fell sideways, and NOT into its own footprint? The architects would have considered that one day it may have fallen, and they would have built it to minimize damage"
 
I once saw a program about how some building in NYC was in danger of falling due to high winds. It didn't have the right kind of trussing or something. Anyway, they were afraid that should it fall, it was topple other buildings like dominoes, all the way to Central Park.
 
JAStewart said:
I've pretty much given up having an opinion on 9/11 now, but something always struck me as interesting, and, a question I was never able to get an answer from a conspiracy theorist:

"Who would build a huge building so that it fell sideways, and NOT into its own footprint? The architects would have considered that one day it may have fallen, and they would have built it to minimize damage"
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I don't think that the possibility that the building will fall over some day is often considered by architects. They (and the structural engineers) are more concerned with making sure the building stays standing. Buildings may tend to collapse mostly symetrically because they are built symetrically, but of course that also depends on the nature of the damage that causes the collapse. Earthquakes (probably the most common cause of large building collapses) have caused buildings to topple over rather than collapse from the bottom.
 
Lisa Simpson said:
I once saw a program about how some building in NYC was in danger of falling due to high winds. It didn't have the right kind of trussing or something. Anyway, they were afraid that should it fall, it was topple other buildings like dominoes, all the way to Central Park.
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That would be the Citicorp building at 53rs and Lex. Problem since fixed, but the builder would be in jail, if there was a law against stupidity.
 
60hzxtl said:
That would be the Citicorp building at 53rs and Lex. Problem since fixed, but the builder would be in jail, if there was a law against stupidity.
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I remember the tourguide on the Cirle Line ferry telling the roof had suncollectors on it, but the slope was pointing the wrong way?
 
JAStewart said:
I've pretty much given up having an opinion on 9/11 now, but something always struck me as interesting, and, a question I was never able to get an answer from a conspiracy theorist:

"Who would build a huge building so that it fell sideways, and NOT into its own footprint? The architects would have considered that one day it may have fallen, and they would have built it to minimize damage"
Click to expand...

More significantly, due to the sheer, unprecedented size of the WTC towers, it would have been nearly impossible to get them to fall sideways even if one wanted them to.

Angular momentum is also conserved. The amount of energy to get those things moving sideways is vast, really vast. The only practical way would be to overbuild one side of the structure so dramatically that upon collapse initiation, the whole thing canted over like the world's biggest Slinky.

Obviously no one would do that. What would be the point?
 
Something Conspiracy Theorists Don't Get...


I believe that would be........a life.
 
Muckar-duva said:
And who designed the Citicorp? Leslie Robertson.
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Polaris said:
Says Hugh Stubbins, Jr. for Citibank.
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Stubbins was the architect. The structural engineer was [SIZE=-1]William LeMessurier. Robertson was called in to help fix the problems, which were caused by the four main support columns not being put at the corners of the building.[/SIZE]
 
JAStewart said:
"Who would build a huge building so that it fell sideways, and NOT into its own footprint? The architects would have considered that one day it may have fallen, and they would have built it to minimize damage"
Click to expand...

Jones claims it's really easy to get buildings to fall over sideways, so that's why people need to hire experts to figure out how to make them fall straight down. I understand that he doesn't know anything about structural engineering, but you would think common sense would steer him away from making assumptions like that.

The reason people hire experts is because every building is different, and you can't make blanket statements about it being either easy or hard to make them fall over sideways. (If it was as easy as Jones thinks it is, you could probably look it up on a Web page.) If you just take out some columns on one side, that doesn't necessarily mean it will fall over sideways. A few condition need to be met: 1) If the structure above is not very rigid, the part above the destroyed columns might just come straight down anyway, shearing away from the other side. 2) If the columns remaining aren't strong enough to hold the building up when the extra load gets dumped on them (because of the rigidity), they might collapse before the building tilts very much. 3) The tilting building will exert a lateral force on the standing columns in the opposite direction of the tilt (because it's trying to rotate around its center of mass), so if the columns can't withstand that lateral force, they will get pushed out of the way before the building tilts very much. Number 3 appears to be what happened with WTC 2 when the top of tower started tilting: the base of the collapsing block broke loose and came back inside the building before the top could develop much angular momentum, and after that it fell pretty much straight down (while continuing to rotate).
 
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