Richard Gage, AIA meets Dean of USC School of Engineering
bbruhwiler8 Mon, 09/01/2008 - 2:28am
Richard Gage, AIA presents evidence of the use of controlled demolitions on 9-11 to Yannis C. Yortsos, Dean USC Viterbi School of Engineering for peer review.
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I like that Gage is talking to
the higher up's, one or more of them will have a backbone.
Peer-review is good!
Maybe a competent engineer will convince Mr. Gage that high-speed (> 7.2m/s^2 drop velocity) collisions of a 33,000 ton block of building, will create more stress than the design live-load strain limit of any floor below it. Perhaps then, Mr. Gage will focus on the real mystery of the WTC collapses: That, of course, is the fact that they should never have BEGUN to collapse in the first place.
There did not need to be "tons of explosives" in the WTC to create a controlled demolition.
Indeed it is. I think your
Indeed it is.
I think your statement is worth expert attention. Please consider submitting it for comment, to www.AE911truth.org and the Letters section of www.journalof911studies.com
I think Gordon Ross would be particularly interested. In the scenario of one floor falling onto the floor below it, he considers the strength and failure modes of all the steel elements below that level. He also cites the steel structure in the falling chunk as relevant.
RE: Ross.
His assertions would be valid, but he double-dips his energy; he assumes that the concrete comminution energy is separate from that which is consumed from the crush-down. The energy exerted upon the connections, includes all the falling-body energy and is used in inelastic collisions forces, including crushing/comminuting. The buildings were 95% air, so that much downward energy, would expand the crushed partitions and wall-board into powder and the concrete into gravel, fairly easily.
Momentary failure would apply the forces (F) to the strain modulus of the steel with assumed connection strength. But what a lot of "arrest" arguments assume the connections were stronger than the column yield limit. Clearly, however, from the debris pile, the vast majority of broken columns were failed at the joints and were NOT buckled. So, lacking a buckling mode, but a multi-story hinge at the welds (each perimeter member was 3 floors in size) seems more likely. Assuming "thermite" or some other heat-weakening device was used, and with clear "failure lines" in the North Tower, prior to "collapse" (See this thread: http://the911forum.freeforums.org/wtc-1-n-and-w-perimeter-failure-lines-...), we have a falling body of 33,000 tons acting directly upon and missing some columns below.
Honestly, do you think that a 33,000 ton object, allowed to travel at approx. 7.2m/s^2 acceleration, be stopped by a building with only 300% redundancy, if this block were allowed to travel 2 or more floors. The thread I linked to above, shows the clear "black lines" at the EXACT spots where the building fails... nice, perfect lines. If something cut the building around this area---plus heat-weakening the core---there would be nothing to stop the downward plunge of this massive thing and with perhaps only minor weakening below, you'd have a total demolition. Remember, demolitions use a MODICUM of explosives and lets gravity do most of the work.
May I say again: please
May I say again: please consider submitting your argument for peer review.
I do not possess the engineering knowledge necessary for a capable and fair response to your input. I therefore neither dismiss nor accept its conclusions, but I do believe it is valuable.
One point which is clear to me, is that the destruction at the World Trade Center has not been fully and honestly analyzed in scientific detail. This is where dialog amongst peers can help.
Where is Mr. Gage's peer-reviewed paper?
I don't believe he's released any original work on a structural analysis. This is the point. There are numerous papers, already published, that demonstrate the stress/strain relationship of the WTC buildings quite accurately.
These analyzes however, assume NIST is correct about heat-failure. They obviously were not, since such sudden failure has been shown in peer-reviewed papers to be near impossible w/o some energy source to cut the columns.
My point is that there is ADEQUATE data out there to show Mr. Gage that arguing collapse arrest is a waste of time. He should be demonstrating the errors of NIST and focusing on the impossibility of collapse initiation from office fires. He does, but he also tries to imply that the ONLY way the collapse could have progressed to the ground is via explosives, laced throughout the building. He's yet to provide a quantifiable analysis showing how the building COULD survive such a violent collision with the upper 30/12 stories.
I don't believe it is me who needs to submit their work for peer-review.
Gage is wearing his "hat" well !!! Very well!!!
Gage has organized and expanded a united group of "Architects & Engineers For 9/11 Truth" all within about 15 months to a membership of over 449 !! What a tremendous feat!! He has spoken at over 50 engagements around the country during that time!! What a great benefit for the entire 9/11Truth Movement!!
That is Gage's "hat", to manage and expand this wonderful organization. He wears his "hat" well...extremely well. No one else took up the hat and "wore it". He often works 18 hour days. He has sacrificed his own finances and personal life in order to help save this planet. Starting and expanding AE911Truth.org is an incredible commitment and responsibility. (It is not like he can say: "I quit...too many headaches and the pay sucks.")
It is our duty to support these efforts in any way possible, not add burdens or extra work-loads. I have a personal philosophy: "If a person doesn't like how something is done, ....well then go do it yourself better."
It is up to each of us to personally take initiatives and responsibility. As a citizen, I want to support this heroic man in every way I can. Hell yea...I will email for AE911Truth.org. I want to see this organization grow, not leave the burden on the back of just a few dedicated individuals.
I agree to some extent
The initiation had to have been assisted and it is the key but so are the first couple of floors of collapse, during which energy calculations show that if one floor collapsed there is an extremely high chance for arrest. This is probably why we see several floors of the north tower disintegrate at initiation. It is harder to see in the south tower with the larger tilt.
Bazant has a grievous error in his calculation of the spring constant for the lower stories, as he is off by a factor of ten, and this causes his dynamic load to be three times higher than it would have been in reality. This has been verified by a number of us out here.
Based on more accurate peer reviewed but not yet published calculations I have been involved in, I would tend to say that if the upper block was assisted to fall through three or more floors then the momentum would probably be unstoppable and would explain the columns being broken at their welds without buckling.
One additional thing that must be considered is that we know the focused ejections we see in different places on the building, well below the collapse front and freefalling material, are most probably squibs which weren't hidden by the debris cloud. The speculation on this is that there probably were some charges used after initiation to ensure reliability and no topple. However, the number of charges would be kept to a minimum if the plotters were as smart as they seemed to be. Most of the work would be performed by gravity as it is in every controlled demolition once the potential energy is assisted in being freed up.
Richard Gage is learning the details of what happened just like the rest of us. Investigations are evolutionary in general and this one is no exception. The overall judgement we can make at this point is that these collapses were artificially induced and some form of controlled demolition was used. On that general count Richard Gage is right on.
Exactly, Tony.
I think the notion that "tons of explosives" were needed needs to be taken out of the argument, more than anything. There are some might dynamic results from large chunks of building striking other, similar bits of building, colliding with the ground and being struck over and over. I think the safest bet is Mr. Gage having honest dialogue with these engineers and for both sides to look at the currently understood ideas.
Bazant's paper is far from perfect. He even admits it's just a theory, because of the lack of visual data to support the mechanism. He asserts "accretion" of the upper block, but does not explain how each perimeter piece yields so easily and falls apart as we see in the first couple seconds of the NT collapse and the same period in the ST collapse... where you might expect the tipping top to fall through the cloud, instead we get an exploded mess. You are also probably right on with his assumption of a latent "spring" reaction, as opposed to one that I personally believe happened: That is, the spring worked, but the welds and seams failed. Perhaps these ejected perimeter column pieces will clue us in on the exact mode of failure we are talking about. If a seam failure caused by elastic loading the increased the potential energy of the piece, once it fails it might fly off... but 600 feet?
I think the problem Richard Gage is presenting is a valid one, however.
There has to be a dynamic load to cause collapse
I am involved with Graeme MacQueen and a retired structural engineering professor in writing a paper about the seeming lack of deceleration of the upper block in the north tower during its initial fall through several stories.
There has to be a dynamic load to naturally cause a collapse of a structure which has less than 30% of its load capacity being used gravitationally. To get the dynamic load you need a high deceleration impulse and we don't see it on the north tower with somewhat high resolution measurement techniques. It just keeps accelerating at approximately 23 feet/second/second or 7.2 meters/second/second for the 114 feet and over 3 seconds we are able to measure before smoke obscures the view.
The difference between the upper block deceleration and the aircraft hits is that due to energy requirements we can determine what the approximate velocity of the upper block would be after impact and with it being a gravitational fall know how long it would take to come back to the pre-impact velocity. It turns out to be more than one second and we are measuring every 165 milliseconds, so it would certainly be visible if it occurred.
It appears that there was no Wham, as Graeme puts it, so the initiation had to be assisted and it appears to have been done for at least several floors to get things going. After it got going I would think explosives would have been used for reliability but more sparingly. Those we see are the ones they probably didn't time right to be covered by the debris cloud. It wasn't a perfect job.
Most of the pulverization seen is gypsum as a study of the dust shows that about 15% of the concrete was pulverized vs. most of the gypsum.
The few columns being thrown outward up to 600 feet may have been due to spring action as I think it could provide enough of a horizontal component and starting from 1000 feet up it could be possible. The conjecture that explosives could explain this phenomena makes me wonder why would they have used that much explosive, especially on the exterior columns, when it wouldn't be needed and would risk exposure.
Pulverization of concrete
"Most of the pulverization seen is gypsum as a study of the dust shows that about 15% of the concrete was pulverized vs. most of the gypsum."
If only 15 percent of the concrete was pulverized, where was the 85 percent after the destruction?
I have seen only very small pieces of concrete debris in photos.
I am speaking of 15% into a fine powder dust
Most of the concrete was broken up into small pieces but only 15% was pulverized to a powder which was airborne in the flow which went all over lower Manhattan. The rest of it went into the basement/bathtub. The floor concrete was 4.35 inches thick and over 110 floors that would be 478.5 inches or about 40 feet of concrete. Taking 15% from that leaves 34 feet. The basements were 72 feet deep and were significantly wider than just the above ground plan of the buildings.
The break up of most of the concrete into small pieces could occur without explosives doing that work. It does not make sense that explosives/incendiaries would have been used for anything other than columns.
Since I think Bazant may be an "insider"...
...it would then be obvious they use these pre-fabricated theories to design the "collapses".
This is the only reason I even cite Bazant, because his paper reflects the "dynamics" of the collapse. That does not, however, prove the dynamics required no help.
Something to the effect of cutting the majority of the core columns down low (for which there is a rich history of eye/ear witnesses that support that idea) and forcing the load to be close to 100% yield at the perimeter. This could be calculated ahead of time. Once your force yield on the perimeter, it is a matter of initiation and removing all ability to arrest the upper part. The upper part also much have been weakened too, since it "accretes" into a rubble pile, by the time the 90th floor begins exploding apart.
The fact that yield was clearly reached in the column connections, shows that the "spring reaction" of some columns, causing them to eject would be a reasonable and testable idea. If the perimeter columns were stressed to the point of failure and in additional force were applied in a compressive, downward vector, certain conditions could cause that assembly to fly outward. Six-hundred feet is half the size of the building and he is referring to a section from 3/4 of the way up. It's possible, but needs a good analysis.
Far too much credence has been given to office fires, in terms of how it weakens a structure and the connection of "exotic nano-energetic materials" with NIST scientists, brings into question the DEGREE of fires that were really going on inside the building. Only that tiny glimpse in the corner of the ST gave us an example. Could the airplanes have delivered some of the charges? Maybe "UA175"'s hit was off-kilter and we weren't supposed to see the "steel cutters".... who knows.
The molten metal
in the rubble shows something strange was happening.
I think the basements were probably taken out and the upper block was cut loose by cutting columns on several floors starting just above the aircraft hits. After that gravity is doing much of the work and one would only need explosives at key spots in the core and on the corners of the perimeter.
95% air
"The buildings were 95% air, so that much downward energy, would expand the crushed partitions and wall-board into powder and the concrete into gravel, fairly easily."
That applies equally well to the allegedly all-crushing top sections of the buildings. They, too, were mostly just air.
Obviously,. the top was also mostly air.
The dynamics we are talking about, applies the top to be ALLOWED to plunge downward, disregarding the air resistance. Even with that ratio of air, the resistance applied to a 33,000 ton structure would be insignificant. I'm talking about the capability of the air to mix the crushed, pulverized, comminuted material into the distinctive clouds. But as Tony stated, the wall board/drywall/sheetrock portions of the building comprised the majority of the "dust", while the concrete was mostly sand and gravel. The sand, was ejected violently into the whirlwind of "pyroclastic energy" that hit Manhattan, along with the dust that hung much longer.
The crushing forces---to the degree that no such degree of energy has ever been witnessed in the destruction of any building(s) in history---need to be further studied, even though they are energetic forces that would HAVE to be available by the upper part, in conjunction with that which is used up compressing and failing the columns. Bazant has allegedly shown those forces to exist within the combination of upper mass, velocity of initiation (which I question the most in terms of causation) and he assumes column to column impacts, which he assumes is the "best case scenario for survival". Some believe that is not true, where out-of-plane tilt may cause frictional considerations where an arrest curve, goes up with the degree of tilt and, of course, if the 80% of columns still in service acted normally and in a typical ductile fashion, the upper part would slowly deform, friction would then stop collapse from propagating.
Something had to remove nearly all resistance from those remaining 80% still in-service, in order to have a non-arresting result. Once that block begins moving, once it breaks up the mass of the first impacted story, it builds. Perhaps minor weakening would be necessary "just in case". I just see no need to install "tons of explosives", when they would be louder than the collapse itself.
Were the videos tampered with?
Did the soundtracks get edited?
The demolition probably could be done with 4,000 lbs.
I have looked at how much explosive was really needed and it really isn't all that much, when considering the size of the buildings. My calculations show that 4,000 lbs. of explosive could take down the towers if placed in the right spots.
Steven Jones estimated a similar amount by just scaling up from smaller building demolitions.
Of course, there was probably much less explosive than that as incendiaries were used for much of the work.
The incendiaries could have been painted on the columns to cause thermal weakening in the areas of the fires. Don't forget fire is not hot enough to ignite the incendiaries and they aren't shock sensitive. The fuses would have had to be protected somehow. I can think of a ways to protect the fuse with the incendiary material itself.
ANYONE can sign the petition. --Spread the word to all !!!
ANYONE can sign the petition at www.AE911Truth.org . (You do not need to be an Engineer or Architect to sign the petition.) Spread the word to all that they need to sign the petition!! Post on blogs and websites that everyone should sign the petition. EVERY 9/11 TRUTHER should sign the petiton.
"Architects and Engineers For 9/11 Truth" now has 445 Professional Members. You can help by emailing, calling, or contacting architects and engineers to take a look at www.AE911Truth.org --Here is a quickie "hat" of what to do to help http://www.911blogger.com/node/17341#comment-195698
Take Richard Gage's lead of his superb segue & approach shown in the Dean video in order to get other professionals involved. Don't let Gage carry this job alone -- we owe our support.
Totally Amazing
It is totally Amazing that the Dean COMPLETELY FAILS TO GRASP THE CRITICAL NATURE OF WHAT RICHARD GAGE IS PRESENTING TO HIM.
The Dean is on his way somewhere -- and is polite - but seems annoyed to be detained. He seems to be living in a bubble - TOTALLY UNCONSCIOUS OF THE ROLE HE IS BEING ASKED TO PLAY IN THE HISTORY OF THE HUMAN RACE.
AMAZING !!!!
GREAT WORK RICHARD --- THE MORE YOU DO THIS -- THE BETTER YOU ARE GETTING AT IT! The precise question you asked the Dean to examine was EXCELLENT.
THANK YOU. I know you do not have to be thanked, as you really have no choice but to do what you are doing --- as you are driven by your CONSCIOUSNESS of what actually happened to those buildings.
It seems the Dean was receptive until...
He heard the word explosives. I don't think he is oblivious, he is probably well aware of the implications, and well aware that he is not going to jepoardize alumni donations or student recruitment by taking on the government.
After hearing the word explosives, his whole demeanor changed, he started looking away, shifting his feet, and interrupting to cut Gage off. Trying to get out of there and aware that a camera was running.
Just another spineless supportor of the controlled demolition of the republic.
I don't think he is oblivious
He is not oblivious to the short term implications for his school. But he is TOTALLY OBLIVIOUS TO THE LONG TERM IMPLICATIONS FOR THE HUMAN RACE.
HE IS TOTALLY OBLIVIOUS TO THE DEAD, THE WOUNDED THE DISPLACED (in MANY countries around the world) - in numbers too great to actually grasp.
HE IS TOTALLY OBLIVIOUS - to the fact that he is personally in a position to change the tide of world history - by simply - honestly - doing his job as the Dean of a respected school of architecture.
HE IS A POSTER CHILD FOR UNCONSCIOUSNESS --
BUT ----- MAYBE HE WILL AWAKEN. MAYBE HE WILL REALLY LOOK AND REALLY SEE.
THEN HE WILL BE REVERED BY MILLIONS FOREVER.
I'm not kidding.
WELL SAID zmzmzm
North Texans for 911 Truth (new site)
http://tellstruth.webs.com/index.htm
North Texans for 911 Truth Meetup Site
http://9-11.meetup.com/249/
Brilliant Strategy
to go after the dean.
For much too long, American universities have been compromised by their reliance on federal funds and contracts. That's why the dean started to panic when he heard 'explosives'.
Gage is doing the right thing by going after them, pointing out physical inconsistencies that their students and faculty should study.
Richard also says he will be doing this in Europe. Academics there should be far more receptive.
Thank you, Richard!
Support ae911truth!
Kevin O (former US academic)
Richard Gage on ABC Radio - Christine Craft
Friday March 14, 2008
Richard Gage, AIA broke into mainstream radio last Friday morning March 7th at midnight in a one-hour interview on the Christine Craft show on KGO-810(San Francisco ABC)
http://www.radiodujour.com/people/gage_richard/
(I added the video)
Sorry Richard
..valiant effort. One would think a Dean would look forward to a challenge. I am sure the dean is no fool.
You can see the horror on his face when confronted with this taboo topic.
It is obvious.
Capturing the look of horror . . .
priceless!
VERY IMPORTANT QUESTION FOR RICHARD GAGE !!!
Richard:
How many liscensed and degreed architects have resigned from AE911Truth or otherwise expressed to you that they are satisfied with NIST's latest explanation of thermal expansion from office fires causing the collapse of WTC7?
(My guess is none --- but I am open minded)
Thank you.
Yeah...
...I'll bet spray-on nano-thermite would cause some serious "thermal expansion".