MM,
Miragememories said:
The data was neither the NIST's or Chandler's. It was always there for anyone who had a decent copy of the WTC 7 collapse video.
Agreed.
Do you agree that this applies to any & all video & photo evidence taken by anybody on 9/11 (other than copyrights)? That the government has neither the opportunity nor the technology to reach out to all those private & news service videos & photographs & alter them somehow?
Miragememories said:
Chandler forced the NIST to admit something they clearly did not wish to admit.
Let's first agree on the sequence of events: NIST did not describe the 3 stages of fall, including stage 2 ("near free fall") in their draft, and did provide that detail in their final report.
Furthermore, I'll agree that they did so as a result of Chandler's comments & its high profile as a result of truthers' vocality.
I will admit that, while I strongly disagree, this is one
possible interpretation of the sequence of events.
My interpretation is that they may, or may not, have known about those details. Someone clearly examined the video in detail, & extracted the timing of several events, including the east penthouse fall, the swaying of the building, the start of the north wall collapse & the time that the wall disappeared from sight.
[BTW, you need to fix one of your assertions. The 40% greater time does NOT reach back to the collapse of the East Penthouse. It only includes the Stage 1, 2 & 3 fall, all of which represent north wall collapse time to disappearance from view, and took 5.4 seconds. Free fall would be 3.9 seconds, so 5.4 / 3.9 seconds = 1.38 ≈ 40% longer than free fall.
The EP fall began 6.9 seconds before the start of the fall of the north wall. If NIST had stretched the clock back that far, then they would have claimed that it took (6.9+5.4) / 3.9 = 3.16 ≈ 320% longer than free fall. Clearly they did not do this. [See Table 12-2 in NCSTAR1-9, vol 2.]
Perhaps someone plotted out the height versus time for the fall. Perhaps not. It is distinctly possible that someone simply provided the start & stop times for those events.
My point is that it is very likely (IMO certain) that, if they did see that curve, structural engineers would not find the near free fall to be surprising in the slightest. Especially in view of the slow (1.75 second Stage 1) onset, which serves to clearly distinguish this collapse from a CD. (A CD would go into near free fall immediately, not after a 1.75 second delay.
And since they would not find this timing to be significant, they would very likely leave it out of the report. Just like they've left out many thousands of details that they've judged to be not significant. (Signal to noise ratio, don't ya know.)
I would like you to concede this point, that they may have left it out because they did not judge it to be significant, as I have conceded the point above. As a POSSIBILITY, even if you don't believe it to be true.
Miragememories said:
Of course the NIST knew that a period of free fall occurred and of course they knew such an occurrence was an extraordinary event.
I gotta tell ya that I do not think that it's "an extraordinary event" in the slightest.
I find it highly probable that the NIST engineers didn't find it extraordinary before the final draft came out, or after.
Do you have any evidence to suggest that NIST engineers considered it to be "extraordinary"? Or is this just your belief because you think that it is extraordinary?
Miragememories said:
By not breaking the collapse sequence down, they could use the whole period from the start of the east penthouse collapse and ignore the 8 storeys of free fall.
They didn't do this, as explained above. They used only the collapse time of the north wall from when it started descending until it disappeared from sight.
Miragememories said:
After Chandler's video went viral and embarrassed them, the NIST came up with a "detailed analysis" which they only referred to in their summary.
Yup.
Miragememories said:
Unlike the many pages they wrote about the global collapse as described by their computer model, the NIST did not go into any additional detail explaining the 8-storey free fall mechanism.
First, they did go into extra detail. Not a huge amount.
Perhaps, as I stated above (& I believe that I could make a compelling case to another engineer, anyway) that they simply didn't think that it was important.
But I'd ask you to concede that, IF NIST simply didn't think this was all that significant, then all the events that you've found "extraordinary" become perfectly ordinary.
___
Supporting the idea that NIST may have thought that it was not hugely significant, it strikes me, for several reasons, that they may have put a junior engineer on this task.
Now, I might be wrong about all of this. Perhaps one of the senior guys produced this analysis & these figures. But I don't think so.
Miragememories said:
Given the NIST's penchant for details, that omission is also quite extraordinary.
No, it fits quite comfortably into the concept that they just didn't think that this was all that significant.
Their job was primarily two-fold. Find out why it collapsed and how to change the building codes to decrease the probability that progressive collapses happen in the future.
Neither one of these goals would have been furthered in the slightest by more manpower applied to the question of "what did the 2.25 seconds of near free fall signify?"
Especially since they all already know exactly what it signifies: nothing unexpected.
tom
