Gage: Hell No I Ain't Reading Mackey's White Paper

[ElMondoHummus]

I dont really know what you guys are discussing in this thread, but keep in mind these buildings in Brazil are not steel frame structures like the skyscrapers in the US. They are all reinforced concrete.

Yes, I noticed that myself when looking at the Brazil buildings on the NIST list, and a couple of others I tripped over along the way.

Truthers compare structures without regard to construction materials or building design. For most of them steel = concrete and traditional steel grid frames = monolithic reinforced concrete. They just don't care because either a) They are just plain ignorant or b) They hope that other people won't notice the difference (ie: they hope that other people are just plain ignorant).

Yes, most definitely. But it goes farther than that: Design also has a lot to do with things, from what I understand. Astaneh-Asl has hinted at this, saying that a "more traditional design" (whatever he means by that) probably would've survived. Although that was an early statement of his; I wonder if he's modified it since studying the event more... anyway, yes, there's a danger in gross comparisons to that degree. I don't mind doing so for fire sizes, like I did above, because it's a decent general measure, but at the same time I'm the first to admit that there are other factors in play besides area when you start to consider how a fire affects a building. Intensity has to be one of them; the sufficiency of the fireproofing must be another. The devil is in the details, and there's a huge difference between noting relative fire sizes but nothing more (like I did), and just comparing a number of buildings in order to make the claim "they didn't collapse, so why did this one?" when there are multitudes of factors in play besides fire size to consider.

 

[ElMondoHummus]

There was a whackjob in the 50s or 60s who campaigned to have cows wearing underwear because those great huge udders were actually breasts and they were an obscenity. I can't find anything about him in Google, but I'm notoriously weak in Google-Fu.

And so what'd you do with the concept? Expand it to full-on lingere? I sorta thought you'd be the type who'd get bored with mere cow tipping.

As I've mentioned before, I used to have a job delivering office supplies for the local IBM branch. The offices weren't in skyscapers, but in HUGE, sprawling one-story multi-purpose buildings. Looking down the hallway, you would see a line of office doors extending seemingly into infinity. It could take ten minutes to walk from one end to the other.

Most people don't thiink much about how much office supplies are required to keep such an operation running, but since I delivered them, I found out first-hand. I would estimate that each acre of office space had several tons of copy paper stored in the vicinity at any given time (we normally delivered them in increments of 1000 pounds, the largest quantity we could conveniently carry). Then there's all the loose paper in filing cabinets. Then there's the carpet. Then there's the computers, at least one in each office.

In a typical office, there is a LOT of fuel waiting to feed a fire. At IBM, the sprawled-out design would probably protect against a serious conflagration, but I could see how a similar design, but stacked one floor on top of another, could cause a much more serious problem. In a multi-story office building, the conditions are ideal for the fire to spread quickly out of control, almost as if it were designed for that very purpose.

Yeah, that's a component of James Quintiere's critique too. He complained that NIST underestimated the fuel load.

It cracks me up when I think of truthers thinking his statements support their viewpoint. They obviously haven't read all his statements, merely the cherry-picked ones.

 

[ElMondoHummus]

EMH, I think you can take it easier! I don'*t think there is any need to go for perfection as long as the other side hasn't done a thing!

Most truthers who spread this meme of WTC fires not being so large are comparing two unknowns that they haven't even defined.

What you are doing here - suggesting one or more definitions of the quantities to be compared, and using the definitions to estimate values, is waaaay more than I have ever seen from any truther. So no matter how imperfect your results are, they beat every truther adversary that I have seen so far by default.

Also, as soon as you place this in a thread of its own and start with a well-crafted OP to define the scope, I think you will find that others will happily join in and provide criticism as well as research and material.

Finally: Your work here runs a much greater risk of being lost and wasted to obscurity than a dedicated thread would be. Much easier to find these things in well-tagged threads than hidden in threads that have a different topic.

Heh. Yeah, I guess I could do things that way too.

Anyway, at minimum, I'm really thinking about splitting my subject tangent off; I'm already asking the mods about doing this and re-editing my first post on the topic.

 

[TruthersLie]

That would cover a lot of stuff in print, DGM, so that's not in fact accurate.

My understanding of a white paper is that it's usually a policy or advisory document commissioned from experts by government or some other decision-making body. In what way does Mackey's paper qualify as such?

ah... welcome back.

So we can lump your inability to understand what a white paper is with your inabilities to understand qualifying language, prepositions, exponential, center of mass, essentially vs actually, and the list keeps on growing...

Your list of personal ignorance keeps on growing... amazing at that.

 

[ergo]

The very doc linked above came out and stated that the WTC events were "... the dominant fire and collapse events of this survey". And it put them right up there with the largest fires they could find.

http://www.haifire.com/Resources/presentations/Historical_Collapse_Survey.pdf

Um, yes, the "dominant fire and collapse events" of the survey. Have you thought about why that might be? Because no other steel-framed highrises have ever experienced complete collapse from fire.

Where does it say in this survey that the WTC fires are "right up there" (or any words of that meaning) with the largest fires they could find? They don't. It says, "The extent of the tragedy and devastation on this day were unprecedented." Tragedy and devastation, is what they said. That's obvious to anyone looking at the pictures. That's not talking about the fires. It's talking about the collapses and mass loss of life.

The survey does not include data for the size or extent of the fires, only duration, destruction, and size of building. So you're making stuff up again.

 

[NoahFence]

Because no other steel-framed highrises have ever experienced complete collapse from fire

First time for everything, dood.

 

[ergo]

First time for everything, dood.

Yes, and what a first time it was. Three separate buildings all on one day.

 

[Cl1mh4224rd]

Yes, and what a first time it was. Three separate buildings all on one day.

All related in one way or another, so not that extraordinary.

 

[Nursedan]

Yes, and what a first time it was. Three separate buildings all on one day.

There was something else that happened that day for the first time...I can't quite put my finger on it....it involved planes or something...?

 

[Cl1mh4224rd]

There was something else that happened that day for the first time...I can't quite put my finger on it....it involved planes or something...?

Nah. The thermitic demolition of three skyscrapers. I don't recall that ever having happened prior to 9/11. Three buildings! I mean... wow.

 

[NoahFence]

Yes, and what a first time it was. Three separate buildings all on one day.

Well, two really.

The first tower to fall was the precedent, then the second was confirmation that yes, 110 story buildings can fall when struck by an airplane at 500 miles per hour then sit and burn out of control for an hour or so.

WTC 7?
irrelevant. Sorry.

 

[tsig]

And so what'd you do with the concept? Expand it to full-on lingere? I sorta thought you'd be the type who'd get bored with mere cow tiupping.



Yeah, that's a component of James Quintiere's critique too. He complained that NIST underestimated the fuel load.

It cracks me up when I think of truthers thinking his statements support their viewpoint. They obviously haven't read all his statements, merely the cherry-picked ones.

ftfy

 

[tsig]

http://www.haifire.com/Resources/presentations/Historical_Collapse_Survey.pdf

Um, yes, the "dominant fire and collapse events" of the survey. Have you thought about why that might be? Because no other steel-framed highrises have ever experienced complete collapse from fire.

Where does it say in this survey that the WTC fires are "right up there" (or any words of that meaning) with the largest fires they could find? They don't. It says, "The extent of the tragedy and devastation on this day were unprecedented." Tragedy and devastation, is what they said. That's obvious to anyone looking at the pictures. That's not talking about the fires. It's talking about the collapses and mass loss of life.

The survey does not include data for the size or extent of the fires, only duration, destruction, and size of building. So you're making stuff up again.

So what?

 

[tsig]

Yes, and what a first time it was. Three separate buildings all on one day.

What does this tell you?

 

[TruthersLie]

Yes, and what a first time it was. Three separate buildings all on one day.

First time in history cannard... wowsers..

that means nuclear weapons don't exist... first time in history and all

Rockets and going to outer space don't exist... first time in history and all...

amazing.

 

[twinstead]

Well, that settles it. When someone starts spewing useless truther canards like "first time in history" it officially means he's getting desperate.

What's next, "pull it"?

Yea, the first time in history 2 of the tallest buildings on Earth were secretly brought down by CD, therefore it didn't happen, eh ergo?

 

[Grizzly Bear]

First time in history cannard... wowsers..

that means nuclear weapons don't exist... first time in history and all

Rockets and going to outer space don't exist... first time in history and all...

amazing.

humanity doesn't exist; this can be "pulled" all day. Viewing the collapse of the WTC buildings is useless from a purely statistical vantage point is useless, whether ergo like it or not.

 

[Grizzly Bear]

The devil is in the details, and there's a huge difference between noting relative fire sizes but nothing more (like I did), and just comparing a number of buildings in order to make the claim "they didn't collapse, so why did this one?" when there are multitudes of factors in play besides fire size to consider.

Yes, and the factors that you describe are the biggest reason why the "first time in history" argument is nothing more than pseudoscience to the max. In the architecture education, we've done tons of case studies to learn from previous examples of a variety of topics; from building failures, conceptual inspirations in design, construction methods, materials, and lots more. They provide the foundation of communicating research in the field. Every building is different, and has to be treated based on the conditions it meets, not arbitrarily with other buildings or through utterly blind statistics. Truthers are incapable of the former.

 

[NoahFence]

Well, that settles it. When someone starts spewing useless truther canards like "first time in history" it officially means he's getting desperate.

What's next, "pull it"?

Yea, the first time in history 2 of the tallest buildings on Earth were secretly brought down by CD, therefore it didn't happen, eh ergo?

 

[ElMondoHummus]

Yes, and the factors that you describe are the biggest reason why the "first time in history" argument is nothing more than pseudoscience to the max.

Pseudoengineering, pseudohistory, and pseudoanalysis too. It's so painfully dishonest how they isolate that aspect and ignore all the other "firsts".

• First time jetliners ever hit a pair of steel framed building at over 400 MPH. Which leads to another pair of first time details itself:
  • First time load bearing columns were severed by the jetliners right before the fires, thus causing shifts in load.
  • First time applied fireproofing was removed by said jetliner impacts.
• First time that a huge, multistorey fire was 1. Lit over such a large area at once rather than spreading from a small, localized starting point to a larger area.
• First time that a building with relatively unique design features suffered such damage period, let alone damage plus fires (Grizzly Bear: I admit, I'm a bit fuzzy on these. I only know that they're unique due to Astaneh-Asl's criticisms and the NIST listing of differences from then standard building code. Do you have a feel for the specifics of those features? I keep reading/hearing "lightweight truss system", "non-loadbearing floors", and the like, but I've learned little detail about the specifics).

If they want to bring 7 World Trade into the mix: First time a tall structure was impacted and set on fire by an even taller structure, first time the fire was not fought and left alone, and so on.

The actual relevant characteristics are being ignored by the truthers. It's not just steel framing, it's also the design. And the impact damage. And the unfortunate ineffectiveness of the fire resistence (SFRM) and containment (sprinklers) systems. They latched onto one, single characteristic as if it's the only one that needs to be considered, which demonstrates that they haven't even bothered to try to comprehend the NIST report or any of the other works on the towers, because as an accumulation of knowledge, those cover all those points.

In the architecture education, we've done tons of case studies to learn from previous examples of a variety of topics; from building failures, conceptual inspirations in design, construction methods, materials, and lots more. They provide the foundation of communicating research in the field. Every building is different, and has to be treated based on the conditions it meets, not arbitrarily with other buildings or through utterly blind statistics. Truthers are incapable of the former.

I can't help but feel that this tactic of treating buildings individually - as well as ignoring the truly relevant issues of the collapse - is deliberate. They've shown time and time again that they're willing to dive into details in order to build their arguments, plus they've been having this argument shoved at them for years now. If they're not hearing it, it's because they're choosing not to listen to it.