Conspiracy theorists say
Structural and Civil Engineers haven't come out to support
Jones paper because:
- They
can't believe the government would do this
- They
don't know it exists
- They
fear being killed by the government
- They
fear losing their jobs
They can't
believe the government would do this
This assumes
they think the government did this. Why would the scientists
jump to the conclusion that the government was responsible?
I know why a conspiracy theorist would but not a scientist.
There are many other possibilities a smart scientist could
think of, like Saddam working with Al Qaeda and hiring
people to install the bombs. What about another country like
North Korea? It could even be a home grown terrorist.
You know, like some psycho angry with the government over a
conspiracy to murder innocent Americans.
They don't
know it exists
This could be
true. The Scholars have been very busy
enlisting politicians and running
Zogby polls. They have little time to do things like
reach out to civil engineers. Why would they do that? The
most they would get from that is a critique of his paper
anyway. They'll learn about it as they see the "Bombs
Blew up the Twin Towers" tee shirts and bumper stickers
anyway.
They fear
being killed by the government
They fear losing their jobs
There are many ways to get a paper supporting Jones in the
public. One way is becoming a "Deep Throat". Just as
Mark Felt
exposed crimes during Watergate, so can a civil engineer.
There are many journalists who would love to win a Pulitzer
uncovering the largest mass murder in US history. But what
if you don't trust them? What about through a third party or
the internet? The point is, the people killed in the towers
could have been them or someone in their family. I have a
hard time believing they don't have a single Civil Engineer
with a spine or the brains to get a paper out anonymously.
Then again, people who fear the government wouldn't come out
actively AGAINST Jones paper. You can expect someone afraid
for their life/job to say "err... No comment" but not
actively speak out against it. That's exactly what happened.
Below are civil/structural engineers who have come out
against his paper. Some of the most damning from his own
university...
Letter to the Editor
Refuting 9/11 Conspiracy Theory
April 09, 2006
Dear Editor,
After reading in the Daily Herald the presentations made
by Professor Steven E. Jones (BYU Physics) to students at
UVSC and BYU, I feel obligated to reply to his "Conspiracy
Theory" relating to the terrorist attacks on the World Trade
Center (9/11/01).
I have studied the summary of the report by FEMA, The
American Society of Civil Engineers and several other
professional engineering organizations. These experts have
given in detail the effects on the Towers by the impact of
the commercial aircraft. I have also read Professor Jones'
(referred to) 42 page unpublished report. In my
understanding of structural design and the properties of
structural steel I find Professor Jones' thesis that
planted explosives (rather than fire from the planes) caused
the collapse of the Towers, very unreliable.
The structural design of the towers was unique in that
the supporting steel structure consisted of closely spaced
columns in the walls of all four sides. The resulting
structure was similar to a tube. When the aircraft impacted
the towers at speeds of about 500 plus mph, many steel
columns were immediately severed and others rendered weak by
the following fires. The fires critically damaged the floors
systems. Structural steel will begin to lose strength when
heated to temperatures above 1000 degrees Fahrenheit. Steel
bridge girders are bent to conform to the curved roadway by
spot heating flanges between 800 and 1000 degrees
Fahrenheit. It is easy to comprehend the loss of carrying
capacity of all the structural steel due to the raging fires
fed by the jet's fuel as well as aircraft and building
contents.
Before one (especially students) supports such a
conspiracy theory, they should investigate all details of
the theory. To me a practicing structural engineer of 57
continuous years (1941-1998), Professor Jones' presentations
are very disturbing.
D. Allan Firmage
Professor Emeritus, Civil Engineering, BYU
http://www.netxnews.net/vnews/display.v/ART/2006/04/09/443801bdadd6e
[Dr.
Firmage uses unfortunate language in his letter.
"To me a practicing structural engineer of 57 continuous
years (1941-1998), Professor Jones' presentations are
very disturbing."
I give
that quote about one month before it's taken out of
context...]
"I think without exception, the structural engineering
professors in our department are not in agreement with the
claims made by Jones in his paper, and they don't think
there is accuracy and validity to these claims" "The
university is aware that Professor Steven Jones's hypotheses
and interpretations of evidence regarding the collapse of
World Trade Center buildings are being questioned by a
number of scholars and practitioners, including many of
BYU's own faculty members. Professor Jones's department and
college administrators are not convinced that his analyses
and hypotheses have been submitted to relevant scientific
venues that would ensure rigorous technical peer review." -
A. Woodruff Miller, Department Chair, BYU department of
Civil and Environmental Engineering
http://www.et.byu.edu/ce/people/people.php?person=1&page=miller/vita.php
"The structural engineering faculty in the Fulton College of
Engineering and Technology do not support the hypotheses of
Professor Jones." - The College of Engineering and
Technology department
http://www.et.byu.edu/index.php?m1=faculty&n=2
"But jet fuel wasn't the only thing burning, notes Forman
Williams, a professor of engineering at the University of
California, San Diego, and one of seven structural engineers
and fire experts that PM consulted. He says that while the
jet fuel was the catalyst for the WTC fires, the resulting
inferno was intensified by the combustible material inside
the buildings, including rugs, curtains, furniture and
paper. NIST reports that pockets of fire hit 1832°F."
"The jet fuel was the ignition source," Williams tells PM.
"It burned for maybe 10 minutes, and [the towers] were still
standing in 10 minutes. It was the rest of the stuff burning
afterward that was responsible for the heat transfer that
eventually brought them down."
Professor Williams received his BSE from Princeton
University in 1955 and his PhD from California Institute of
Technology in 1958. He then taught at Harvard University
until 1964, at which time he joined the UCSD faculty. In
January 1981, Professor Williams accepted the Robert H.
Goddard Chair in the Department of Mechanical and Aerospace
Engineering at Princeton University, where he remained until
1988, when he returned to UCSD to assume his present
position. His field of specialization is combustion, and
he is author of Combustion Theory (Addison, Wesley, 2nd
ed., 1985) and co-author of Fundamental Aspects of
Combustion (Oxford, 1993). He is a deputy editor of
Combustion and Flame and a member of the editorial advisory
boards of Combustion Science and Technology, Progress in
Energy and Combustion Science and Archivium Combustionis.
http://www-mae.ucsd.edu/RESEARCH/WILLIAMS/williams.html
"Once each tower began to collapse, the weight of all the
floors above the collapsed zone bore down with pulverizing
force on the highest intact floor. Unable to absorb the
massive energy, that floor would fail, transmitting the
forces to the floor below, allowing the collapse to progress
downward through the building in a chain reaction. Engineers
call the process "pancaking," and it does not require an
explosion to begin"
http://www.asce.org/pressroom/news/display_press.cfm?uid=1874
"Demolition expert Romero regrets that his comments to the
Albuquerque Journal became fodder for conspiracy theorists.
"I was misquoted in saying that I thought it was explosives
that brought down the building," he tells PM. "I only said
that that's what it looked like."
Romero, who agrees with the scientific conclusion that fire
triggered the collapses, demanded a retraction from the
Journal. It was printed Sept. 22, 2001. "I felt like my
scientific reputation was on the line." But emperors-clothes.com
saw something else: "The paymaster of Romero's research
institute is the Pentagon. Directly or indirectly, pressure
was brought to bear, forcing Romero to retract his original
statement." Romero responds: "Conspiracy theorists came out
saying that the government got to me. That is the farthest
thing from the truth. This has been an albatross around my
neck for three years." - Van D. Romero, Ph.D. in
Physics
http://infohost.nmt.edu/~red/van.html
http://www.popularmechanics.com/science/defense/1227842.html?page=9&c=y
The
conspiracy sites are quick to point out these civil
engineers haven't taken their valuable time away from their
students, families and jobs to critique
Professor Jones' 42 page unpublished report
line
by line. The inference drawn from this is they are just
dismissing it out of hand without really looking at it. Or
if they are looking at it, they're stumped by the
incredibly flawless nature of this 42 page report. It's
easier to just say it's wrong than have to address this
masterpiece of forensic science. But why doesn't any civil
engineer want to win the Nobel prize, write books, get on
Oprah and become a national hero by exposing the greatest
mass murder in US history? This is a little harder to
explain.
