Furcifer
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- Joined
- Apr 30, 2007
- Messages
- 13,797
Here is a close up of the column that I posted before. Below it is a photo from NIST NCSTAR 1-3C Figure 3-24 for comparison.
[qimg]http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/imagehosting/18141478fca18017ed.jpg[/qimg]
[qimg]http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/imagehosting/18141478fca377bd53.jpg[/qimg]
The black edges is a tell tale sign that the cut was made after the column was recovered from the WTC pile. Otherwise it should have been rusted like the broken weld joints at the end and like the area around the cut that is missing paint. But there are some rust visible down in the left hand corner of the cut closest to the camera, indicating that the object that made the dent when the tower collapsed also cracked/ punctured the steel as you proposed. Whatever, the engineers surly removed a piece for metallurgical analyzes because of the dent. We would need a closer and sharper photo to say anything sure about striating. Anyhow parts of the NIST cut was pretty smooth.
Here are some photos of artistic cuts in WTC steel stored at Hangar 17 at the Kennedy International Airport: Photo number 16, including the next photos and the previous photos.. Note that the edges have rusted again in these old cuts and that they are quite smooth.
And finally a picture of recyclers cutting up WTC steel at a recycling site:
http://www.americanrecycler.com/11wtc.html
Note the blackened edges of the cut.
Initially I thought you were refering to the large dark area around the hole, not just the edge of the hole itself. If the dark around the edge of the hole isn't just a shadow I'd side with you and agree that most likely a coupon was taken. It would be an ideal spot for a sample to determine the amount of force sustained. I guess my point is no matter which way I look at it there is no possible way for an explosive charge to make that hole as it obviously sustained a great deal of force in several directions, apparent from the jagged edge. Plus the explosive force required to puncture such a small hole is staggering.