I didn't know much about WC7 before now, this thread got me curious enough to start digging into the information available, and actually just consumed the last 4 hours of my life
The prevailing explanation of the tower collapse is that debris from WTC 1 impacted WTC 7, damaged a fuel oil system that fed generators on the 5-9th floors, feeding a fire that weakened the steel support columns on the East side of the building and eventually caused them to fail and the building to collapse.
If I understand correctly, there are 3 main questions/points:
1) Where is the damage that was in the report?
2) Were there fires that weakened the support structure (and if so how did they burn so hot)?
3) How did the building collapse in such a symmetric way?
I will be up-front and admit that I kept coming back to
www.debunking911.com. While the author of the site at times takes a dismissive tone, I found his reasoning and sources to be persuasive and within the realm of credibility that supports the prevailing explanation of collapse. I understand that per the format of this thread sources may be brought into question but I would also encourage you to look at his collection of arguments at
http://www.debunking911.com/pull.htm and
http://www.debunking911.com/WTC7.htm as another source of information to consider.
1) Where is the Damage?
Regarding the NIST picture of the Southwest corner, I would offer a 4th possibility that smoke is obscuring the corner. However, I would also say that the damage to this corner of the building was not what was being referred to, and it is unfortunate that the NIST report didn't have a better picture to show.
The "scooped out" section referenced by the report was on the *South* face of the building, *not* the Southwest corner as shown in the picture. The report also had a graphic showing the possible locations of initial failure, that showed (in a cross-hatched orange region) the damaged areas. Note that the largest damage area is supposed in the middle of the south wall, and a much smaller damage area is shown on the southwest corner:
The thinking goes that a large chunk of WTC1 impacted the building, tearing out the wall and floors between 2 outer columns. If you watch the video above, it appears that the gash goes from the top of the building down at least 20 floors, possibly more, which is corroborated by a fireman on the scene.
The smoke blowing through the building makes the damage difficult to see. This video zooms in at about the :32 mark
and this still is taken from the video:
Quote:
Firehouse Magazine Reports
WTC: This Is Their Story
From the August 2002 Firehouse Magazine]
Captain Chris Boyle: A little north of Vesey I said, we�ll go down, let�s see what�s going on. A couple of the other officers and I were going to see what was going on. We were told to go to Greenwich and Vesey and see what�s going on. So we go there and on the north and east side of 7 it didnt look like there was any damage at all, but then you looked on the south side of 7 there had to be a hole 20 stories tall in the building, with fire on several floors. Debris was falling down on the building and it didnt look good.
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http://www.firehouse.com/terrorist/9.../gz/boyle.html
1a) Why this Damage could have been significant to the collapse:
It is surmised that the fire was fed by fuel oil that failed to shut off when the supply piping was damaged, the routing systems for the piping crossed the area of damage:
As I said above, it is unfortunate that the NIST report did not have pictures showing the damage to which they are referring, but I believe that their graphic showing the possible initial failure locations, coupled with the videos and photos above, indicate that the damage was there and was as significant as was reported.
The fires and collapse mechanic still need to be addressed, but I fear that this is already eye-glazingly long. I also want to verify that I am staying within the spirit of the posting rules, and to discuss any points of debate that this post may generate