Enough already!

A light aircraft crashed into a building in New York today. Without waiting for actual news, CNN went into a terrorist blitz. Turned out it was some baseball player who was flying his own plane and had engine trouble. No less, here's some of what CNN were reporting:

The twin-engine plane came through a hazy, cloudy sky and hit the 20th floor of The Belaire -- a red-brick tower overlooking the East River, about five miles from the World Trade Center -- with a loud bang, touching off a raging fire that cast a pillar of black smoke over the city and sent flames shooting from four windows on two adjoining floors.

Well first of all, the whole bit about the WTC is totally unnecesary - it has nothing to do with the story other than to scare people. 5 miles? That's not even fucking close. If they were doing it as a geographic landmark, one of the bridges right next to the building would have been much better.

Onwards:
Large crowds gathered in the street in the largely wealthy New York neighborhood, with many people in tears and some trying to reach loved ones by cell phone.
Well done Bush. People just assume terrorism now. Even looking at the aircraft and seeing the accident, people get all panicky and scared.

This is the best bit:
"I was worried the building would explode, so I got out of there fast," said Lori Claymont, who fled an adjoining building in sweatpants.
Well Lori Claymont needs a lesson or two in explosives. Fire does not make buildings explode, or collapse. If she really believes a steel-frame redbrick building was somehow going to magically explode because of a fuel fire, she needs to be locked up. That only happens in movies and government conspiracies woman. Your comments are doing much to assuage the argument that Americans are stupid.

Enough already. It's not terrorism, people. It's an accident. Don't believe CNN. Don't believe Bush or his regime. All they do is tell lie after lie after lie.

Comments

Anonymous said…
Well huh, fire will make building colapse, remember the WTC... they did colapse because of the heat(fire).
Chris said…
Oh dear. Okay, I'll bite.
In May 1988 a fire at the Interstate Bank Building in Los Angeles destroyed four floors and damaged a fifth floor of the modern 62-story building. The fire burned for four hours. The building did not collapse.
In February 1991 a fire gutted eight floors of the 38-story One Meridian Plaza building in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. The fire burned for 18 hours. The building did not collapse.
In October 2004 in Caracas, Venezuela, a fire in a 56-story office tower burned for more 17 hours and spread over 26 floors. Two floors collapsed, but the underlying floors did not, and the building remained standing.
In February 2005 a fire burned for about an hour and a half in an office building in Taiwan, but the building never came close to collapsing.
The icing on the cake of this argument? It is not well-known that WTC1 itself survived a serious fire in 1975. It started on the 11th floor and spread to six other floors, burning for three hours. WTC1 did not collapse then.

Oh, and burning jet fuel doesn't burn hot enough to melt steel, or even soften it. You need an oxygen-rich blast furnace to do that.
The WTC towers did not collapse because of the fire (especially the second one where most of the fuel ignited outside the building).
Anonymous said…
Hi Chris,
Did you already read some of Noam Chomsky's books? Very interesting stuff if you can find it in the US.
desktopdave said…
Love the site - love the attitude. But I don't agree with all the conspiracy stuff. Your examples are comparing apples and oranges. I'd suspect that jet fuel wasn't the final cause of the collapse, but it sure is an awesomely effective ignition source. Styrene, nylon, polyester and paper (always abundant in an office building) provide fine fuel sources, and the unique structure of those buildings would have created the directional airflow of a ad-hoc blast furnace. In an unsupported space, those trellis supports could very easily have given way. If you've ever seen a collapsed roof after a warehouse fire, you'll understand why the towers died.

More importantly, conspiracy theories, even if true, detract from the essence of this disaster, and the need for significant changes in American foreign policy.

Finally, Bush isn't Hitler. The WTC is not the Reichstag. America was already a modestly fascist state before he came to power. Bush is much more like Nixon with half the brains and twice the paranoia.
Chris said…
desktopdave - you say "More importantly, conspiracy theories, even if true, detract from the essence of this disaster, and the need for significant changes in American foreign policy."

Far from it. We know the Bush regime was informed of the potential for this attack months before it happened. That makes them complicit, even if it was an external source. The fact that they did nothing to even investigate the possibility makes them as guilty as the people who eventually committed the crimes. From an aeronautical, mechanical and engineering perspective, the official version of events simply does not add up. Bush could hush up the conspiracy theorists if he simply released the camera footage from the three security cameras that filmed the Pentagon incident (car park, hotel and gas station). As it is, we've been given a crappy step-frame parking meter camera view. Releasing the 30fps footage from the other security cameras would prove or disprove for once and for all whether a 757 hit the pentagon. The fact that they refuse to even acknowledge the existence of these three tapes speaks more about the government's involvement than any conspiracy theorist ever could.
desktopdave said…
Your supposition that the Bush regime is complicit lacks credibility on two levels. First, incompetence seems a much more plausible explanation than conspiracy. Examples abound. There are conspiracies, to be sure, but this is not one of them. More importantly, the electorate is still too complacent to make a change.

And I must disagree about your engineering evidence. A quarter-million pounds at 250MPH equates to a tremendous momentum. Factor in the tremendous weight and sheer scale of the upper floors. It's amazing that the buildings stood for as long as they did.

An administration as paranoid as this one, fixated only upon remaining in office, will release as little information as possible. With the lack of significant credible evidence and feeble popular pressure, they'll ignore and stonewall.

For example: How long did it take the Iraqi forged intelligence conspiracy to collapse? Years. How much less effort did it take to implement than what you're describing? One forged document? How much more important were the results to the American military-industrial complex? Vital. This trillion-dollar corporate junket is virtually ignored by conspiracy buffs.

The 'WTC conspiracy' boat has sailed - let it go. Agitate for construction of a memorial and new tower instead.

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