9-11 was an inside job

[alohamonkey]

BTW, speaking of WTC7, has anyone seen any other information about this official who claims to have been present when there were explosions in WTC7 before the collapse of 1 & 2?

Don't know what to think of this! I guess the idea is that the Loose Change crew will reveal all when LC Final Cut is released.

That Prison Planet article is the only thing I've seen about this.  I thought I would have heard more by now.  Either A) the information was bunk or B) it is being kept under wraps until the final release of Loose Change.  I think the Loose Change guys are holding out on info until the final cut.  

[jaqeboy]

BTW, speaking of WTC7, has anyone seen any other information about this official who claims to have been present when there were explosions in WTC7 before the collapse of 1 & 2?

Don't know what to think of this! I guess the idea is that the Loose Change crew will reveal all when LC Final Cut is released.

That Prison Planet article is the only thing I've seen about this.  I thought I would have heard more by now.  Either A) the information was bunk or B) it is being kept under wraps until the final release of Loose Change.  I think the Loose Change guys are holding out on info until the final cut. 

OK, that's all I got, too. It seems like this would be really critical to doubters about WTC 7. That kind of stuff would have to make anyone wonder, eh?

[alohamonkey]

absolutely . . . I was all fired up to learn more about it right when it came out.  but then i didn't hear anything and it sort of slipped to the back of my mind until you brought it up again.  I really hope they break it out for the final cut. 

Jaqeboy - are you familiar with the "chimney" argument from error and kb?  it's something i've never come across and didn't know if I was missing something?  as far as I know, from all the studies I've read, open-air flame refers to any fire not created in a stove or other device designed for metal-working . . . am I incorrect in this assumption?

[jaqeboy]

absolutely . . . I was all fired up to learn more about it right when it came out.  but then i didn't hear anything and it sort of slipped to the back of my mind until you brought it up again.  I really hope they break it out for the final cut. 

Jaqeboy - are you familiar with the "chimney" argument from error and kb?  it's something i've never come across and didn't know if I was missing something?  as far as I know, from all the studies I've read, open-air flame refers to any fire not created in a stove or other device designed for metal-working . . . am I incorrect in this assumption?

No, that's what I would take it to mean. That's why I asked KB to clarify where or how there was a chimney effect at work in the WTC7 fires, because photographically, it just didn't appear that way to me. I think the big difference would be that with a "chimney" effect, you would have air coming in from one area (like a fireplace) and going out an unobstructed channel (the chimney) that is in the direction of natural flow for the combustion gases from the fire (up, in other words). You'd probably get a lot better flow of oxygen to the fire that way.

With a fire inside a building, it seems to me like you have to have the air coming in the broken window to get to the combustibles, and then the combustion gases would have to exit from the same hole in the windows, so I would think that the incoming air and the outgoing combustion gases would sort of impede each other's flow and intermix somewhat, creating a natural limitation to the rate that the fire could burn at. I was thinking that KB had some new information, so was going to wait to hear what it was.

There is one phenomenon that happens, not with the fires, but with people's ability to accept a horrible truth. I'm just listening to an interview with Sofia, the 911 Mysteries filmmaker where she delves into that. She mentions a friend who just didn't want to believe the horrible truth because she "just wants to have a nice life." Sofia examines her friend and many others in the conflict between their cognitive and their emotional sides. It's a pretty good interview and she is really pleasant in her explanation of what she thinks is going on (ie, not an Alex Jones type). The interview is accessible from a link on the MerrimackValley911Truth.org site on a newly-created "Interviews" page.

So, maybe we'll get an answer on the chimney effect thing soon. It'd be good to get some new information about the mysterious cause of the WTC7 collapse.

[Insurgent]

I just came across this intriguing ten-minute synopsis of who really benefited from 9/11. Bin Laden? Al Qaeda? Saddam Hussein? Others?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=puWqNJI8Mjo&mode=related&search

[Braddogg]

There was an article in this month's Harper's Magazine about Rudy Giuliani.  It mentioned that he put an emergency control center, in the wake of the first attack on the WTC, in World Trade Center 7.  In WTC7 included a few unprotected gasoline supplies (for use in generators in case of a power outage).  The author mentioned that the burning debris from the main towers hit WTC7, eventually causing these gasoline tanks to ignite, which led to its collapse.  Have any of you run across this claim before?

[Russell Kanning]

I think they had major deisel supplies in WTC7. There were definitely fires in that building. I think you see smoke coming out of windows for a long time that day. I would guess they got started because of the other buildings. I don't know. I am just a back woods shire bumpkin.

[jaqeboy]

8 June 1999, June 8, 1999: New York Emergency Command Center Opened in WTC Building 7


Giuliani's emergency command center. [Source: CNN]

New York City Mayor Rudolph Giuliani opens a $13 million emergency Command Center on the 23rd floor of World Trade Center Building 7. [Newsday, 9/12/2001] The center is intended to coordinate responses to various emergencies, including natural disasters like hurricanes or floods, and terrorist attacks. The 50,000 square foot center has reinforced, bulletproof, and bomb-resistant walls, its own air supply and water tank, beds, showers to accommodate 30 people, and three backup generators. It also has rooms full of video monitors from where the mayor can oversee police and fire department responses. It is to be staffed around the clock and is intended as a meeting place for city leaders in the event of an act of terrorism. [CNN, 6/7/1999; London Times, 9/12/2001; Glanz and Lipton, 2004, pp. 233] The center is ridiculed as "Rudy's bunker." [Time, 12/22/2001] Most controversial is the 6,000-gallon fuel tank. In 1998 and 1999, Fire Department officials warn that the fuel tank violates city fire codes and poses a hazard. According to one Fire Department memorandum, if the tank were to catch fire it could produce "disaster." Building 7 will be destroyed late in the day on 9/11; some suspect this tank helps explains why. [New York Times, 12/20/2001]

Their building shakes when the North Tower is hit at 8:46 a.m. OEM Commissioner John Odermatt initially believes a freak accident has occurred involving a ground-to-air missile, but soon after, OEM is informed that a plane hit the WTC. Immediately, OEM staff members begin to activate their emergency Command Center, located on the 23rd floor of WTC 7 (see June 8, 1999). [Jenkins and Edwards-Winslow, 9/2003, pp. 15] They call agencies such as the New York fire and police departments, and the Department of Health, and direct them to send their designated representatives to the OEM. They also call the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) and request at least five federal Urban Search and Rescue Teams. [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 293] OEM's Command Center will be evacuated at 9:30 a.m. due to reports of further unaccounted for planes (see 9:30 a.m. September 11, 2001). By this time, none of the outside agency liaisons will have arrived. [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 305]

The headquarters of New York's Office of Emergency Management (OEM), which is on the 23rd floor of WTC Building 7, is evacuated. The headquarters was opened in 1999 and was specifically intended to coordinate the city's response to disasters such as terrorist attacks (see June 8, 1999). [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 283-284] A senior OEM official orders the evacuation after being told by a Secret Service agent that additional commercial planes are unaccounted for (see (9:30 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 305] OEM personnel do not initially respond to the evacuation order with a sense of urgency. According to a 2003 report by the Mineta Transportation Institute, "They calmly collected personal belongings and began removing OEM records, but they were urged to abandon everything and leave the building quickly." [Jenkins and Edwards-Winslow, 9/2003, pp. 16] Fire Commissioner Thomas Von Essen will arrive at WTC 7 shortly before the collapse of the South Tower, looking for Mayor Giuliani. Learning that the OEM headquarters has been evacuated, he later claims that he thinks, "How ridiculous. We've got a thirteen-million-dollar command center and we can't even use it." [Essen, 2002, pp. 26] He says in frustration, "How can we be evacuating OEM? We really need it now." He will later tell an interviewer that he'd headed for the OEM headquarters because, "I thought that was where we should all be because that's what [it] was built for." [Fink and Mathias, 2002, pp. 230] All civilians were evacuated from WTC 7 earlier on, around the time the second WTC tower was hit (see (9:03 a.m.) September 11, 2001).

[source: http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/context.jsp?item=a96oemtrains]

There was definitely diesel fuel there - 6000 gals on floor 5 and 36,000 gals at street level (from my quick review). However, all that being said, FEMA concluded in their report:

"The specifics of the fires in WTC 7 and how they caused the building to collapse  remain unknown at this time. Although the total diesel fuel on the premises contained massive potential energy, the best hypothesis has only a low probability of occurrence. Further research, investigation, and analyses are needed to resolve this issue." -FEMA: WTC Study, Chp 5 (05/02)

NIST report (slides) here reports the fire locations

This site shows pictures of the fires and a reviews of media reports.

Most of this stuff is not in controversy. Your recounting of the Harper's story just seems to be a summary of the basic line, but the "which led to its collapse" line is the part in controversy, even apparently at FEMA. There are only 3 main official reports on 9/11, the Keane-Hamilton Commision report (known as the 9/11 Commission report), the FEMA report and the NIST report (see Michael Berger, Improbable Collapse video for summary of their findings). The 9/11 Commission report doesn't cover WTC7, so that leaves the official reporting of FEMA and NIST on WTC7. Both reports seem inadequate, hence the call for further investigation and analysis.

[Braddogg]

Innnnnteresting.  So when someone says "WTC7 wasn't even hit!  How did it collapse?  Obviously it was bombed!", would it be appropriate to mention the diesel fuel as a possible explanation, do you think?  Of course, since the presence of the fuel violated all sorts of building codes, the reply could be that Giuliani did this on purpose to aid in the collapse of the building a few years later . . . .  But my theory is that it was just an act of extreme incompetence.

[jaqeboy]

B-dogg, it looks like it's a little more complicated than that.  According to the FEMA report, http://killtown.911review.org/wtc7/archive/fema_403.html the layout of the fuel oil distribution system is (Hm, couldn't paste the table in - see link above, table 5.2).

The report states, in the 5th paragraph below the table:

"Engineers from the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation investigated oil contamination in the debris of WTC 7. Their principal interest was directed to the various oils involved in the Con Ed equipment. However, they reported the following findings on fuel oil: "In addition to Con Ed's oil, there was a maximum loss of 12,000 gallons of diesel from two underground storage tanks registered as 7WTC." To date, the NY State Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and DEC have recovered approximately 20,000 gallons from the other two intact 11,600-gallon underground fuel oil storage tanks at WTC 7."

This means that, of the capacity of 23,200 gal in 2 particular tanks (if the tanks were completely full), only 3,200 gallons would have burned (if it did) - the likelihood of the tanks being exactly topped up on that morning is not known - It could be that the tanks were down 3,200 gallons and none of it burned. Similar conditions could apply to the other tanks (there were others - see table 5.2)

A good starting point for you, since you have this interest in the WTC7 fires, would be to read the FEMA report. I haven't read the whole thing myself.

Btw, do you know of or have any information on the chimney-effect and forced air blast that KBC has mentioned? I'm still trying to pin that one down. I suppose I'd learn all about it if I went ahead and read the whole FEMA report like he probably has.

[alohamonkey]

Innnnnteresting.  So when someone says "WTC7 wasn't even hit!  How did it collapse?  Obviously it was bombed!", would it be appropriate to mention the diesel fuel as a possible explanation, do you think? 

I sort of thought the presence of diesel fuel was common knowledge.  The fuel, if ignited, would definitely have accelerated the fire.  My biggest issue with the official story is that . . . no matter how intense the fire, I still can't comprehend how it could cause all structural supports to fail at the exact same time and cause the building to fall directly into it's footprint.  And I don't buy the "pancake collapse theory" because it assumes that the top floors would encounter resistance on the way down.  WTC 7 fell into its own footprint . . at free-fall speed.  Take a look at the fourth picture in this link . . . barely any debris fell 30 feet outside the foundation of the building! 
http://911research.wtc7.net/wtc/evidence/photos/oem1.html

This is especially concerning when you find out how well WTC 7 was constructed. 

http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=950DEFDD113BF93AA25751C0A96F948260&sec=&spon=&pagewanted=1
"In some office buildings, that alteration would be impossible, but Silverstein Properties tried to second-guess the needs of potential tenants when it designed Seven World Trade Center as a speculative project.

''We built in enough redundancy to allow entire portions of floors to be removed without affecting the building's structural integrity, on the assumption that someone might need double-height floors,'' said Larry Silverstein, president of the company. ''Sure enough, Salomon had that need.

''And there were many other ways that we designed as much adaptability as possible into the building because we knew that flexible layout is important to large space users.''

[Russell Kanning]

Innnnnteresting.  So when someone says "WTC7 wasn't even hit!  How did it collapse?  Obviously it was bombed!", would it be appropriate to mention the diesel fuel as a possible explanation, do you think? 

I sort of thought the presence of diesel fuel was common knowledge.  The fuel, if ignited, would definitely have accelerated the fire.

I thought we all knew that place had a bunch of deisel in the basement, but I guess that is what this thread is about.
I wonder what is a normal amount of fuel for a building like that.
Does anyone remember that story from a guy going up WTC7 and finding noone at the command center and them trying to get people out before they "pulled" the building?

[alohamonkey]

I thought we all knew that place had a bunch of deisel in the basement, but I guess that is what this thread is about.
I wonder what is a normal amount of fuel for a building like that.
Does anyone remember that story from a guy going up WTC7 and finding noone at the command center and them trying to get people out before they "pulled" the building?

Actually Russell . . . I read something about that last night.  Let me look for it and I'll post the article later today.  There is also video of firefighters being told to evacuate the WTC 7 area because "There is a bomb in the building and it's going to come down."  I'll look for that video too. 

[Braddogg]

I thought we all knew that place had a bunch of deisel in the basement, but I guess that is what this thread is about.

Well, it appears that I'm just a simple bumpkin' lookin' for some truth too

[Braddogg]

A good starting point for you, since you have this interest in the WTC7 fires, would be to read the FEMA report. I haven't read the whole thing myself.

One of these rainy days I may just do that; thanks

Btw, do you know of or have any information on the chimney-effect and forced air blast that KBC has mentioned? I'm still trying to pin that one down. I suppose I'd learn all about it if I went ahead and read the whole FEMA report like he probably has.

Nah, I don't know anything about that.  I just did a google search and found that first article in the newspaper.