Debunked: Claim that Bobby McIlvaine's injuries ("lacerations") are best explained as result of glass shards and debris from bombs

[Oystein]

Bobby McIlvaine ("Bobby") was a 26 year old employee of Merrill-Lynch who died at the WTC on 9/11/2001. His father, Bob McIlvaine sr. ("Bob sr."), believes that Bobby died from glass and debris shot at his body by bombs going off in the lobby as he was walking into the WTC North Tower at or around the time the first plane, AA11, hit that tower, at 8:46 a.m. Bob sr. apparently formed this belief in about 2006, when he first got hold of the autopsy report and the medical examiner, who had originally written that report, explained it to him.

A 2016 blog post by Craig McKee, who had interviewed Bob McIlvaine Sr. for that article (published with minor differences at AE911Truth), tells Bob sr.'s story thus (text coloring mine):

In a recent interview, McIlvaine said his son’s body was one of the first to be recovered and taken to the New York City morgue on that day. He explained that he has been able to reach more definitive conclusions about the details of his son’s death only since conferring with the doctor who had examined his body at the morgue.

The meeting, which McIlvaine recalls happening in 2006 or 2007, provided evidence that a huge explosion — and not the North Tower’s eventual demise — was responsible for killing his son. According to McIlvaine, the wounds described by the doctor indicated that his son had been hit by flying glass from some kind of massive blast. Bobby’s face was damaged beyond recognition, he had lacerations all over his chest from flying glass, and he had post-mortem burns. In fact, the blast was strong enough to literally blow Bobby out of his laced shoes (they were not on the body when it was brought to the morgue).

“My final summation is that he was walking into the building, and before he got into the building there was a huge explosion, and of course the force of it just threw him back into the open area,” McIlvaine says. [...]

It is the nature of Bobby’s injuries that convinces the elder McIlvaine that the explosion had nothing to do with the airplane hitting the tower.

(Source: https://truthandshadows.com/2016/09/10/mcilvaine-controlled-demolition/ )

The key word I will focus on is "lacerations". It is a peculiar word to describe "open wounds" that Bob sr. seems to use consistently. For example in this 2011 talk between 3:04 and 3:21 minutes:

His wounds, or his death, I think it was immediately, spontaneous, I don't think he ever knew what hit him, because all his injuries were in the chest, lacerations the chest, his whole face was blown apart.

It is apparent, that he got the term from the autopsy report. Here are relevant excerpts from the new article by Jennifer Senior for the September 2021 issue of the The Atlantic:

Bobby’s was one of fewer than 100 civilian corpses recovered from the wreckage. But it haunted Bob Sr. that he never saw the body. At the morgue on September 13, the pathologist strongly advised him against viewing it. Only years later—four? five? he can no longer remember—did he finally screw up the courage to go to the medical examiner’s office in New York City and get the official report.

That’s when everything changed. “My whole thesis—everything I jump into now—is based upon his injuries,” he tells me. “Looking at the body, I came to the conclusion that he was walking in and bombs went off.”

[...]

...only a lobby embroidered with explosives could explain the injuries to Bobby’s body. He has the full medical examiner’s report.

It is very upsetting to read. Most of Bobby’s head—that beautiful face—was missing, as was most of his right arm. The details are rendered in generic diagrams and the dispassionate language of pathology (“Absent: R upper extremity, most of head”), as well as a chilling pair of responses on a standard checklist.

Hair color: None.

Eye color: None.

But a subtle thing made Bob Sr. think something was amiss. The report describes many lacerations and fractures, but they appear almost entirely on the front of Bobby’s body. The back of his corpse is basically described as pristine, besides multiple fractures to what remained of his head.

It is apparent that Mrs. Senior had the medical examiner's report before her to read ("It is very upsetting to read" - and she quotes a bit from it). The word "lacerations" comes from there.

So: What does the word "lacerations" mean?

In a medical examination, the word is descriptive of a kind of wound, to distinguish it from other types of wounds, to allow for hypotheses about the cause of it.
Starting point: Wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wound#Open

Open[edit]​

Open wounds can be classified according to the object that caused the wound:

• Incisions or incised wounds – caused by a clean, sharp-edged object such as a knife, razor, or glass splinter.
• Lacerations – irregular tear-like wounds caused by some blunt trauma. Lacerations and incisions may appear linear (regular) or stellate (irregular). The term laceration is commonly misused in reference to incisions.[1]
• Abrasions (grazes) – superficial wounds in which the topmost layer of the skin (the epidermis) is scraped off. Abrasions are often caused by a sliding fall onto a rough surface such as asphalt, tree bark or concrete.
• Avulsions – injuries in which a body structure is forcibly detached from its normal point of insertion. A type of amputation where the extremity is pulled off rather than cut off. When used in reference to skin avulsions, the term 'degloving' is also sometimes used as a synonym.
• Puncture wounds – caused by an object puncturing the skin, such as a splinter, nail or needle.
• Penetration wounds – caused by an object such as a knife entering and coming out from the skin.
• Gunshot wounds – caused by a bullet or similar projectile driving into or through the body. There may be two wounds, one at the site of entry and one at the site of exit, generally referred to as a "through-and-through."
• Critical wounds- Including large burns that have been split. These wounds can cause serious hydroelectrolytic and metabolic alterations including fluid loss, electrolyte imbalances, and increased catabolism[2][3][4]

So we already see there is a differentiation between "lacerations" and, e.g., "incisions", "punctures" or "penetration wounds": Lacerations form from blunt trauma.

Here is a page that is specifically concerned with the pathology of blunt forces: https://www.pathologyoutlines.com/topic/forensicsbluntforce.html
It describes the "hallmark" of lacerations:

Lacerations

• Laceration occurs when a blunt force causes skin compression, crushing and splitting; lacerations frequently occur on the skin overlying bony prominences but can also affect the internal organs, leaving the skin intact
• Hallmark: presence of tissue bridges in the depth of the wound is the pathognomonic feature for lacerations; also helps to distinguish them from an incised wound (sharp force injury)

I think this will do at this time: "Lacerations" are wounds from blunt traumata that generally do not penetrate deeply into the tissue but rather cause the skin to tear.

Shrapnel from bombs, particularly sharp and hard shrapnel like glass shards, would cut, puncture, penetrate the skin and underlying tissue, and cause various kinds of wounds in addition to lacerations, as this paper on a surgeon's perspective on urban bomb trauma explains:
https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf/10.1177/145749690509400407

Secondary blast injury is due to penetration of bomb fragments and other projectiles (28). To increase the likelihood of such injuries, metal or plastic particles (such as steel pellets, nails, screws and nuts) have been added to the explosive charge carried by the suicide bomber. Depending on their velocity and shape, these low velocity projectiles penetrate the body and cause a spectrum of injuries from trivial lacerations to deep, life-threatening wounds of the heart, liver or brain.

So it is not so much the presence of lacerations, but the apparent absence of any mention of penetrating wounds that differentiates Bobby's injuries from bomb trauma: Surely a bomb powerful (or close) enough to rip off a limb and much of the head would pepper the torso not merely with blunt, non-penetrating shrapnel.

In addition, the non-mention of primary blast trauma - particularly blast lung - speaks against the belief that explosive demolition devices (which have to be high explosives, to create shockwaves in steel) are to blame. From the CDC:

Explosions and Blast Injuries

A Primer for Clinicians

Key Concepts
• Bombs and explosions can cause unique patterns of injury seldom seen outside combat.
• The predominant post explosion injuries among survivors involve standard penetrating and blunt trauma. Blast lung is the most common fatal injury among initial survivors.
...
Classification of Explosives

Explosives are categorized as high-order explosives (HE) or low-order explosives (LE). HE produce a defining supersonic over-pressurization shock wave. Examples of HE
include TNT, C-4, Semtex, nitroglycerin, dynamite, and ammonium nitrate fuel oil (ANFO). LE create a subsonic explosion and lack HE’s over-pressurization wave.
Examples of LE include pipe bombs, gunpowder, and most pure petroleum-based bombs such as Molotov cocktails or aircraft improvised as guided missiles. HE and LE cause
different injury patterns.

In summary: The injuries of Bobby McIlvaine, as we know them from second hand versions of his autopsy report, are dominated by two types of injuries:
a) The loss of an arm and much of the head
b) Lacerations (open, shallow blunt-trauma skin wounds)
in conjuntion with the apparent absence of other injuries diagnostic of explosive devices such as
c) no barotrauma to the lung described
d) no wounds of penetration, puncture, incision described
are commensurate with the "blunt trauma only" scenario of him getting hit with heavy and light debris having the kinetic energy of a 1,000 ft fall, but not with explosive devices: The mere mass of, e.g., a falling wall panel can explain the loss of whole body parts; the impact of smaller rubble explains lacerations.

 

[Jeffrey Orling]

Sr's assertion of bombs in the lobby make no sense... these would have to have been extremely massive bombs... strong enough to compromise steel columns with 5 and 6" thick plates... leading to a bottom initiated collapse. The collapse in both towers was driven by structural "events" in the upper blocks at the level of the plane strikes.
Before the tower1 fell there was credible reports of explosions in the sub basement and perhaps the lobby. Elevator cabs likely came crashing down.. electrical gear might have exploded from shorts caused by the plane strike.
SR should be going after the Saudi's whose finger prints are all over 9/11.

 

[Mendel]

But a subtle thing made Bob Sr. think something was amiss. The report describes many lacerations and fractures, but they appear almost entirely on the front of Bobby’s body. The back of his corpse is basically described as pristine, besides multiple fractures to what remained of his head.

It makes me think that the poor man fell over backwards, breaking his head. He then lay with his back on the ground, protected, while debris fell on his front. Mercifully, the blow to the head probably knocked him right out, so he would not have suffered much.

His shoes could have gotten lost as searchers pulled his body from the wreckage.

Maybe they should've had a medical examiner explain the report to them.

he had post-mortem burns.

If these had been caused by a bomb blast, they wouldn't have been post-mortem. They would have occured before his death, and not afterwards (post-mortem means "after death"). In reality, they likely resulted from something burning or very hot (like molten metal) falling or dropping on his dead body at any point between the time he died and when his body was recovered from the rubble.

The misconception of these parents comes about because they learned of all of these injuries at once, and then felt they must have been inflicted all once; and then there was a conspiracy theory ready to validate that for them, when going to a medical expert (maybe even their family doctor) could have provided them with a proper understanding.

 

[Oystein]

...
Maybe they should've had a medical examiner explain the report to them.
...

According Mrs. Senior's article in The Atlantic, Bob Sr. "years later—four? five? he can no longer remember—did ... finally screw up the courage to go to the medical examiner’s office in New York City and get the official report."

According to Mr. McKees blog post from 2016, McIlvaine had been "conferring with the doctor who had examined his body at the morgue", a "meeting, which McIlvaine recalls happening in 2006 or 2007".

So if that 2016 recollection is to be trusted, Bob Sr. did have "a medical examiner explain the report to" him, about 5 years after the fact.

 

[Mendel]

@Oystein "The meeting ... provided evidence that a huge explosion — and not the North Tower’s eventual demise — was responsible for killing his son" sounds like they hadn't actually discussed this theory with the doctor -- or that the doctor didn't agree with them.

 

[Jeffrey Orling]

Truthers bend "evidence" to fit their own narrative.

 

[Oystein]

@Oystein "The meeting ... provided evidence that a huge explosion — and not the North Tower’s eventual demise — was responsible for killing his son" sounds like they hadn't actually discussed this theory with the doctor -- or that the doctor didn't agree with them.

Correct, and I don't think anyone claims or implies that the examiner discussed those theories. I merely wanted to point out that McIlvaine, apparently, had the medical examiner's report explained to him by a, or even the, medical examiner. That report surely would not include any speculation as to the cause of the physical event that ended up killing Bobby.

I think it's clear that McIlvaines theories emerged over time, after the meeting with the examiner.

 

[Jeffrey Orling]

Did Gage reach out to Sr or did senior reach out to Gage?

 

[deirdre]

Article:

It may be hard to imagine why anyone would want to spend so much time immersed in the story, sensations, and forensics of his son’s death. But for Bob Sr., that’s precisely the point: to keep the grief close. “I don’t want to get away from it,” he tells me. He wants to stay at the top of the mountain. This is how he spends time in Bobby’s company

Source: https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2021/09/twenty-years-gone-911-bobby-mcilvaine/619490/

Truthers bend "evidence" to fit their own narrative.

Let's try to show a little empathy.

 

[Fromage]

Bobby McIlvaine ("Bobby") was a 26 year old employee of Merrill-Lynch who died at the WTC on 9/11/2001. His father, Bob McIlvaine sr. ("Bob sr."), believes that Bobby died from glass and debris shot at his body by bombs going off in the lobby as he was walking into the WTC North Tower at or around the time the first plane, AA11, hit that tower, at 8:46 a.m. Bob sr. apparently formed this belief in about 2006, when he first got hold of the autopsy report and the medical examiner, who had originally written that report, explained it to him.

A 2016 blog post by Craig McKee, who had interviewed Bob McIlvaine Sr. for that article (published with minor differences at AE911Truth), tells Bob sr.'s story thus (text coloring mine):

(Source: https://truthandshadows.com/2016/09/10/mcilvaine-controlled-demolition/ )

The key word I will focus on is "lacerations". It is a peculiar word to describe "open wounds" that Bob sr. seems to use consistently. For example in this 2011 talk between 3:04 and 3:21 minutes:


It is apparent, that he got the term from the autopsy report. Here are relevant excerpts from the new article by Jennifer Senior for the September 2021 issue of the The Atlantic:

It is apparent that Mrs. Senior had the medical examiner's report before her to read ("It is very upsetting to read" - and she quotes a bit from it). The word "lacerations" comes from there.

So: What does the word "lacerations" mean?

In a medical examination, the word is descriptive of a kind of wound, to distinguish it from other types of wounds, to allow for hypotheses about the cause of it.
Starting point: Wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wound#Open

So we already see there is a differentiation between "lacerations" and, e.g., "incisions", "punctures" or "penetration wounds": Lacerations form from blunt trauma.

Here is a page that is specifically concerned with the pathology of blunt forces: https://www.pathologyoutlines.com/topic/forensicsbluntforce.html
It describes the "hallmark" of lacerations:


I think this will do at this time: "Lacerations" are wounds from blunt traumata that generally do not penetrate deeply into the tissue but rather cause the skin to tear.

Shrapnel from bombs, particularly sharp and hard shrapnel like glass shards, would cut, puncture, penetrate the skin and underlying tissue, and cause various kinds of wounds in addition to lacerations, as this paper on a surgeon's perspective on urban bomb trauma explains:
https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf/10.1177/145749690509400407

So it is not so much the presence of lacerations, but the apparent absence of any mention of penetrating wounds that differentiates Bobby's injuries from bomb trauma: Surely a bomb powerful (or close) enough to rip off a limb and much of the head would pepper the torso not merely with blunt, non-penetrating shrapnel.

In addition, the non-mention of primary blast trauma - particularly blast lung - speaks against the belief that explosive demolition devices (which have to be high explosives, to create shockwaves in steel) are to blame. From the CDC:


In summary: The injuries of Bobby McIlvaine, as we know them from second hand versions of his autopsy report, are dominated by two types of injuries:et
a) The loss of an arm and much of the head
b) Lacerations (open, shallow blunt-trauma skin wounds)
in conjuntion with the apparent absence of other injuries diagnostic of explosive devices such as
c) no barotrauma to the lung described
d) no wounds of penetration, puncture, incision described
are commensurate with the "blunt trauma only" scenario of him getting hit with heavy and light debris having the kinetic energy of a 1,000 ft fall, but not with explosive devices: The mere mass of, e.g., a falling wall panel can explain the loss of whole body parts; the impact of smaller rubble explains lacerations.

As I recall, there was a pretty reputable report of a fairly powerful "blast" in one of the WTC lobbies that was attributed to at least one elevator or mass of flaming debris that fell down an elevator shaft and "erupted" through the doors while people were *still* in the lobby - nobody spoke of casualties, but they may not have seen. Not at all indicative of a bomb, just the kinetic energy of something falling that far. It itcased damage to much of the lobby walls and floor (breaking up/flinging tile) and broke decorative glass. This man may have been hit fatally, but his body not recovered until after the tower fell.

These injuries may well have been post-mortem as well.

 

[deirdre]

He then lay with his back on the ground, protected, while debris fell on his front.

he must have been on his side, (if we're believing this man's memories)
(his wallet, likely in his suit jacket pocket, some charring looks like.)

in 2004 he said

Article:

...
What they were told was this: Bobby suffered massive trauma, had post-mortem burns over 90 per cent of his body and was missing his right arm.

Source: https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/september-11-2001-the-day-my-son-didn-t-come-home-545794.html

 

[Oystein]

As I recall, there was a pretty reputable report of a fairly powerful "blast" in one of the WTC lobbies that was attributed to at least one elevator or mass of flaming debris that fell down an elevator shaft and "erupted" through the doors while people were *still* in the lobby - nobody spoke of casualties, but they may not have seen. Not at all indicative of a bomb, just the kinetic energy of something falling that far. It itcased damage to much of the lobby walls and floor (breaking up/flinging tile) and broke decorative glass. This man may have been hit fatally, but his body not recovered until after the tower fell.

These injuries may well have been post-mortem as well.

Here is an article written (in September 2002? Or January?) by FDNY chief Joseph Pfeifer, who was the first company leader to arrive at the WTC, and who set up a command post in the North Tower lobby, after that "blast", whatever it was, had done its damage:
https://www.fireengineering.com/firefighting/first-chief-on-the-scene/#gref

On arrival, looking up its west side, I saw light smoke coming from the building and no fire. All the lobby windows were blown out. There were people injured in the lobby, severely burned. Later, I discovered that a freight elevator had fallen from high up in the crash and, when it landed, a fireball blew out into the lobby over these people. They were treated and transported by FDNY EMS personnel.

I assumed command and established the command post in the lobby. [...]

He talks of injured - not dead - people, and that they were "severely burned" - not trauma by blunt, sharp or high velocity impactors.
These casualties were "treated and transported".

This report alone - the fact that the "blast" damage was not so bad the lobby couldn't function as a command post; that no deaths are reported, that fire is the main reason of injuries, that casualties were treated and transported - makes it improbable that Bobby was fatally injured by gross trauma. It would be consistent with Bob Sr.'s belief that the body was transported to the morgue that day, before collapse - but the evidence says that Bobby wasn't found until 2 days later.
Had he not been transported from the lobby or the entrance, where Bob Sr. believes Bobby was killed, before the tower came down, he would have been crushed to pieces and buried yards deep in building debris. He must have been found closer to the perimeter of the WTC complex - and indeed there seems to be direct evidence for this.
But all that - timing, location and circumstances of the body's retrieval, will be the subject of a separate thread I intend to write later this week.

 

[Oystein]

he must have been on his side, (if we're believing this man's memories)
(his wallet, likely in his suit jacket pocket, some charring looks like.)

in 2004 he said

Article:

...
What they were told was this: Bobby suffered massive trauma, had post-mortem burns over 90 per cent of his body and was missing his right arm.

Source: https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/september-11-2001-the-day-my-son-didn-t-come-home-545794.html

Thanks for that link. I had come across it before, Googling, but then decided not to register with The Independent to be able to read it. Now I did (it's free, you just give up your email, name and birth year).

The article itself is dated "Monday 10 October 2011 01:54", but must originally have been from September 2004 ("Today marks the third anniversary of the day [...]"). This would place it before the time ("in 2006 or 2007" according to Craig McKee, "years later—four? five?" according to Jennifer Senior) he got hold of the medical examiner's report and met the medical examiner. But already in September 2004, three years later, the "post-mortem burns" to much of the skin and the loss of the right arm are mentioned - and that they were told this before the funeral.
In September 2004, Bob Sr. speculates about what may have caused these injuries, but despite him already distrusting the government story, there is not yet talk of "bombs in the lobby"; a further indication he got the report after that time.

So at this point, we can clarify Bon Sr.'s personal epistemological journey in this detail:
When he obtained the medical examiner's report, some time between 2005 and 2007, and was explained it, the new information he got was that the smaller wounds - the lacerations - were to the front (namely the chest).

 

[deirdre]

there is not yet talk of "bombs in the lobby"; a further indication he got the report after that time.

i don't think that indicates he hadn't gotten the report. i looked into him as i was interested in his reaction as a parent of a very public tragedy victim, and how it relates to other parents of tragedies and their reactions. Basically he got madder and madder at the government for not stopping it, and receiving no repercussions. his theory evolved in a typical way.

your OP quote from Jennifer says "he can no longer remember". Which i have to say is absolutely believable.

Jennifer Sept 24, 2001 also lets us know where Mr. Mcllvaine got the notion Bobby was even anywhere near the lobby.

Article:

From the nature of Bob’s injuries, he probably made it all the way down from the 106th floor – at least, that’s what the people at the morgue speculated – which would likely mean he died while running, his veins flooded with adrenaline. “And if he was down at the bottom,” says his father, Bob Sr., “I’m willing to bet he was trying to help other people escape.” Me too.

Source: https://nymag.com/nymetro/news/sept11/features/5180/

(another link -same article-if that one is firewalled to you https://nymag.com/news/articles/wtc/senior.htm )

 

[deirdre]

2006. no mention of body injuries yet.

Article:

Five years after his son's death, the Oreland father remains deeply suspicious about the 9/11 Commission's findings about the attacks.

He was optimistic when the commission was created, but became disillusioned after sitting through many of the hearings in 2003 and 2004.

"It was ridiculous," he said.

In particular, McIlvaine was irked by then National Security Advisor Condolezza Rice, now Secretary of State, who refused to answer commissioner Richard Ben-Veniste's pointed questions about the Aug. 6 Presidential Daily Brief entitled "Bin Laden Determined to Strike in U.S." that mentions the possibility of terrorists using hijacked airplanes.

"She was sitting up there filibustering," he said. "She would just not answer questions directly."

...
McIlvaine had hoped government officials would be compelled to take responsibility for the lapses that enabled the tragedy.

"The only way we're going to survive as a country is to hold these people accountable," he said. "My son was murdered."

....
McIlvaine said the government's past covert activities raise many troubling questions about the U.S. intelligence community's role in the attacks.

"To me there's enough circumstantial evidence that the U.S. was involved," he said.

...
"I think it was an inside job," McIlvaine said, referring to the Sept. 11 attacks

Source: http://911blogger.com/news/2006-09-13/father-recalls-losing-his-son-wtc-attacks

 

[Marc Powell]

McIlvaine had hoped government officials would be compelled to take responsibility for the lapses that enabled the tragedy.

"The only way we're going to survive as a country is to hold these people accountable," he said. "My son was murdered."

....
McIlvaine said the government's past covert activities raise many troubling questions about the U.S. intelligence community's role in the attacks.

"To me there's enough circumstantial evidence that the U.S. was involved," he said.

...
"I think it was an inside job," McIlvaine said, referring to the Sept. 11 attacks

That sounds to me like McIlvaine Senior is a let-it-happen-on-purpose truther. Does he actually support Richard Gage's controlled demolition theory or is he just affiliating himself with AE911Truth because he thinks he smells something fishy and they are the only ones trying to hold the Government accountable?

 

[deirdre]

That sounds to me like McIlvaine Senior is a let-it-happen-on-purpos

was listening to a 2008 podcast and a brief bit of him in a movie 2008 (from 43 mins to 52 mins...*Warning very graphic images), he thinks our government murdered his son. it seems to me he thinks the hijackers are innocent, which i must be misunderstanding because planes still hit the towers.

he does briefly mention "building 7" in the podcast (only 1 line in passing), doesn't mention explosions or injuries to his son.

this might confirm the hijackers being innocent too, but i'm not sure what i'm reading.

Does he actually support Richard Gage's controlled demolition theory or is he just affiliating himself with AE911Truth because he thinks he smells something fishy and they are the only ones trying to hold the Government accountable?

hhmm... that's a good question. He got on Geraldo with Tony Szamboti in 2010. He was pushing the 12000 architects and engineers as a claim to authority and the free fall claim. (even Geraldo though said the footage of Building 7 looks like CD.. even though it doesnt at all..so it's possible this man thinks the cd/freefall stuff is true).

 

[Marc Powell]

was listening to a 2008 podcast and a brief bit of him in a movie 2008 (from 43 mins to 52 mins...*Warning very graphic images), he thinks our government murdered his son. it seems to me he thinks the hijackers are innocent, which i must be misunderstanding because planes still hit the towers.

he does briefly mention "building 7" in the podcast (only 1 line in passing), doesn't mention explosions or injuries to his son.

this might confirm the hijackers being innocent too, but i'm not sure what i'm reading.



hhmm... that's a good question. He got on Geraldo with Tony Szamboti in 2010. He was pushing the 12000 architects and engineers as a claim to authority and the free fall claim. (even Geraldo though said the footage of Building 7 looks like CD.. even though it doesnt at all..so it's possible this man thinks the cd/freefall stuff is true).

I don't want to seem insensitive, but Robert McIlvaine Senior seems confused. On the one hand, he thinks 9/11 happened because the US Government was either lax or complicit, while on the other hand, he thinks the US Government actually planted bombs and did the deed. In the later case, he would have to believe the Government was able to recruit 19 "innocent" Arabs who were willing to give their lives so that the US Government would have a pretext to invade and plunder their homelands. I wonder what he would believe if he was made aware of all the funny business Richard Gage and company use to push their false agenda.

 

[deirdre]

I don't want to seem insensitive, but Robert McIlvaine Senior seems confused. On the one hand,

people's beliefs change with time.

 

[captancourgette]

In the later case, he would have to believe the Government was able to recruit 19 "innocent" Arabs who were willing to give their lives so that the US Government would have a pretext to invade and plunder their homelands.

Thats OK cause most of the 'innocent' Arabs were from Saudi Arabia.
Though that brings up an point, why did the US government use mainly Saudi Arabians (no Iraq's at all) on the planes as a pretex to invade Iraq to 'get revenge','get the oil' or whatever. Did no one in the US government say 'Hmmm to make this look more believable, maybe we should use hijackers from Iraq'
/s

 

[Fromage]

Here is an article written (in September 2002? Or January?) by FDNY chief Joseph Pfeifer, who was the first company leader to arrive at the WTC, and who set up a command post in the North Tower lobby, after that "blast", whatever it was, had done its damage:
https://www.fireengineering.com/firefighting/first-chief-on-the-scene/#gref

He talks of injured - not dead - people, and that they were "severely burned" - not trauma by blunt, sharp or high velocity impactors.
These casualties were "treated and transported".

This report alone - the fact that the "blast" damage was not so bad the lobby couldn't function as a command post; that no deaths are reported, that fire is the main reason of injuries, that casualties were treated and transported - makes it improbable that Bobby was fatally injured by gross trauma. It would be consistent with Bob Sr.'s belief that the body was transported to the morgue that day, before collapse - but the evidence says that Bobby wasn't found until 2 days later.
Had he not been transported from the lobby or the entrance, where Bob Sr. believes Bobby was killed, before the tower came down, he would have been crushed to pieces and buried yards deep in building debris. He must have been found closer to the perimeter of the WTC complex - and indeed there seems to be direct evidence for this.
But all that - timing, location and circumstances of the body's retrieval, will be the subject of a separate thread I intend to write later this week.

Here is an article written (in September 2002? Or January?) by FDNY chief Joseph Pfeifer, who was the first company leader to arrive at the WTC, and who set up a command post in the North Tower lobby, after that "blast", whatever it was, had done its damage:
https://www.fireengineering.com/firefighting/first-chief-on-the-scene/#gref

He talks of injured - not dead - people, and that they were "severely burned" - not trauma by blunt, sharp or high velocity impactors.
These casualties were "treated and transported".

This report alone - the fact that the "blast" damage was not so bad the lobby couldn't function as a command post; that no deaths are reported, that fire is the main reason of injuries, that casualties were treated and transported - makes it improbable that Bobby was fatally injured by gross trauma. It would be consistent with Bob Sr.'s belief that the body was transported to the morgue that day, before collapse - but the evidence says that Bobby wasn't found until 2 days later.
Had he not been transported from the lobby or the entrance, where Bob Sr. believes Bobby was killed, before the tower came down, he would have been crushed to pieces and buried yards deep in building debris. He must have been found closer to the perimeter of the WTC complex - and indeed there seems to be direct evidence for this.
But all that - timing, location and circumstances of the body's retrieval, will be the subject of a separate thread I intend to write later this week.

Here is an article written (in September 2002? Or January?) by FDNY chief Joseph Pfeifer, who was the first company leader to arrive at the WTC, and who set up a command post in the North Tower lobby, after that "blast", whatever it was, had done its damage:
https://www.fireengineering.com/firefighting/first-chief-on-the-scene/#gref

He talks of injured - not dead - people, and that they were "severely burned" - not trauma by blunt, sharp or high velocity impactors.
These casualties were "treated and transported".

This report alone - the fact that the "blast" damage was not so bad the lobby couldn't function as a command post; that no deaths are reported, that fire is the main reason of injuries, that casualties were treated and transported - makes it improbable that Bobby was fatally injured by gross trauma. It would be consistent with Bob Sr.'s belief that the body was transported to the morgue that day, before collapse - but the evidence says that Bobby wasn't found until 2 days later.
Had he not been transported from the lobby or the entrance, where Bob Sr. believes Bobby was killed, before the tower came down, he would have been crushed to pieces and buried yards deep in building debris. He must have been found closer to the perimeter of the WTC complex - and indeed there seems to be direct evidence for this.
But all that - timing, location and circumstances of the body's retrieval, will be the subject of a separate thread I intend to write later this week

Here is an article written (in September 2002? Or January?) by FDNY chief Joseph Pfeifer, who was the first company leader to arrive at the WTC, and who set up a command post in the North Tower lobby, after that "blast", whatever it was, had done its damage:
https://www.fireengineering.com/firefighting/first-chief-on-the-scene/#gref

He talks of injured - not dead - people, and that they were "severely burned" - not trauma by blunt, sharp or high velocity impactors.
These casualties were "treated and transported".

This report alone - the fact that the "blast" damage was not so bad the lobby couldn't function as a command post; that no deaths are reported, that fire is the main reason of injuries, that casualties were treated and transported - makes it improbable that Bobby was fatally injured by gross trauma. It would be consistent with Bob Sr.'s belief that the body was transported to the morgue that day, before collapse - but the evidence says that Bobby wasn't found until 2 days later.
Had he not been transported from the lobby or the entrance, where Bob Sr. believes Bobby was killed, before the tower came down, he would have been crushed to pieces and buried yards deep in building debris. He must have been found closer to the perimeter of the WTC complex - and indeed there seems to be direct evidence for this.
But all that - timing, location and circumstances of the body's retrieval, will be the subject of a separate thread I intend to write later this week.

Yeah, that's the report, and I've since seen the Naudet footage *inside* the tower that actually shows Pfieffer and some of the damage. I don't see that the fact that the lobby wasn't damaged enough to prevent use for a command post means much of anything. What I would add is that Pfeiffer wouldn't necessarily know the fate of all the injured in the lobby after they were removed the lobby. The footage makes it abundantly that no person could know precisely what happened to everyone in or near that area at the time, and it's unsurprising that records would be highly confusing about the exact travels of those DOA and contain gaps.

 

[Niz Loc]

I dont know the whole story behind this story.

But if Im understanding this correctly, it said the deceased was one of only 100 pulled from the rubble.

Is this post collapse?

Second, assuming that is the case, there is no way to say what happened to the deceased, or any other body, found in the aftermath. Being that it had already been tampered with (by the collapse), theres no way of knowing if the trauma seen was either at time of death, or after.

If there is a car crash victim in an ambulance, and the ambulance crashes and rolls on the way to the hospital.... etc etc

Also, I wouldnt expect an actual autopsey to have been performed...... instead, this is likely simply a death certificate. Issued in order to have a funeral.

Autopsies are given when cause of death is suspicious. This body came in with major drama.... after thousands witnessed a building collapse....Theres no reason to cut the skull and chest cavity open and weigh out organs, or look for blood clots.

This is all moot if the deceased was found pre collapse and taken to the hospital..... but again, youd have several more victims from a bomb in the lobby.

That being said, if the deceased was killed by a bomb in the lobby, and the body was found pre collapse, it in itself debunks CD. CD doesnt drop buildings an hour later.

 

[Oystein]

I dont know the whole story behind this story.

But if Im understanding this correctly, it said the deceased was one of only 100 pulled from the rubble.

It was one of the first 100 bodies recovered.
Which doesn't say a whole lot: Not many more bodies likely were recovered at all, the vast majority of victims was reduced to small pieces, so no "body" to be recovered.

Is this post collapse?

This is part of the dispute: Years after the events, Bobby McIlvaine's father is convinced it was pre-collapse - but i am not aware of what the evidence for this would be: In accounts of Bobby's fate written just days after it happened, and it's consistent with all the stories the father told ever since: The family got news that Bobby was "found", and was at the make-shift morgue, around noon on the 13th - 2 days later. He had been "found" in the morning. I take it that the father interprets this (today) such that he was "found" at the morgue, where he was identified on the morning of the 13th - yet he believes he was brought there before the first collapse!
To me, this makes little sense, especially seeing that, clearly, Bobby had his wallet with readable photo ID on him, so his name, address etc were known. We know from the early reports that his roommate and his family had been searching for him, and inquiring with authorities, already the day before at the latest. Certainly, if Bobby had made it to the morgue before the towers collapses, he would have been identified, and his name would have appeared in lists, by the next day at the latest, especially seeing that the number of recovered bodies was so low in the early days.

Second, assuming that is the case, there is no way to say what happened to the deceased, or any other body, found in the aftermath. Being that it had already been tampered with (by the collapse), theres no way of knowing if the trauma seen was either at time of death, or after.

If there is a car crash victim in an ambulance, and the ambulance crashes and rolls on the way to the hospital.... etc etc

Also, I wouldnt expect an actual autopsey to have been performed...... instead, this is likely simply a death certificate. Issued in order to have a funeral.

Autopsies are given when cause of death is suspicious. This body came in with major drama.... after thousands witnessed a building collapse....Theres no reason to cut the skull and chest cavity open and weigh out organs, or look for blood clots.

Well, I think the medical examination report, which exists, and a copy is in the father's possession (Mrs. Senior of The Atlantic made reference to it in a way that suggested she read it), is not in the public domain, so the only details I have from it are what McIlvaine, Senior, McKee etc said and wrote - second or even third hand. However, at least two sources (IIRC) mention "post-mortem burns", implying that the medical examination was thorough enough to try to differentiate whether at least some of the injuries occurred while he lived, or after death.
McIlvaine Sr. apparently believes the report is consistent with Bobby dying from (high-velocity) shrapnel shot at him by explosives, followed by a slower fire ball - the fire ball that many others reported as causing injuries in the WTC1 lobby - such that he was already dead when he got burned. But I am fairly sure that's not how it works: A body does not die in a fraction of second - the skin is not dead just because the heart or/and brain stopped working less than a second earlier. I mean, there is about a second between any two heart beats. I don't know by what criteria a medical examiner determines that a skin burn is "post-mortem" (after death), but surely it's something that requires the skin to have been thoroughly dead already.
No one cut the skull open mainly because much of the skull was missing! Unfortunately, we do not know if the medical examiner's report says anything about whether or not the severing of much of the head or of the right arm was perhaps post-mortem, or the probable cause of death, or undetermined. At any rate, the fact that only "burns" are mentioned as "post-mortem" is consistent with this being the only type of injury being determined as "post-mortem". I think it is more likely that he died from blunt impact to head, arm, and/or chest, and the dead body subsequently was burned by fiery debris, than the other way round - that chest lacerations and burns caused death, and subsequently the collapses also obliterated parts of his body such that he was not found in his entirety.

This is all moot if the deceased was found pre collapse and taken to the hospital..... but again, youd have several more victims from a bomb in the lobby.

That being said, if the deceased was killed by a bomb in the lobby, and the body was found pre collapse, it in itself debunks CD. CD doesnt drop buildings an hour later.

A body missing much of the skull is incompatible with life, it is a certain sign of death. In my jurisdiction, if you, as a layperson, find a dead body, you have to presume its recoverable and do all you can to reanimate, even if the body is cold, unresponsive and brutally injured - call an ambulance, attempt first aid if you know how. But that duty is moot if the body has no head, is cut in half, or if the body already exhibits livor mortis or even more advanced signs of death (being cold is not enough).
So no, this body surely was not taken to a hospital, at least not with an intention to treat it for its injuries. At most, a stop at a hospital might be a usual step in the logistics of treating a deceased person. Dead people are taken to a morgue.

 

[Henkka]

Do you think there was any kind of explosive event in the lobby? The 9/11 commission report says that the plane impact sent down a fireball powerful enough to "blow out" elevators and windows:

Source: https://i.imgur.com/aRZ0NQT.png


Source: https://i.imgur.com/9YClzmp.png


I don't know much about the Bobby McIlvaine situation, but if there's a force strong enough to knock out windows, presumably it could also kill a person if he was standing right where the force was originating from. That would be near the elevators in this case.

 

[FatPhil]

Do you think there was any kind of explosive event in the lobby? The 9/11 commission report says that the plane impact sent down a fireball powerful enough to "blow out" elevators and windows:

I can't address this specific case, but elevator shafts are the perfect conduit for shock waves, as they undergo exponential attenuation - basically a small portion of the energy is lost as you pass through the pipe. As they're rigidly sided, apart from the rigidly-mounted doors at each level, that loss should be small.

Some illustrative figures for how slow the decay in energy is compared to a blastwave in free space (following the inverse square law):
Assuming 1% loss per floor, and an explosion on the 90th floor:

? 0.99^90
0.40473
? %^-.5
1.5719

The same decrease you would experience from being 1.6x further away from the source as the top of the lift shaft is.
And at 2% per floor losses:

? 0.98^90
0.16231
? %^-.5
2.4821

The same as being 2.5x further away. With the presumption is that the explosion was close to the opening of the lift shaft at the top, 2.5 times "close" is still pretty close, not to be underestimated. (And just by eyeballing it, a 3% loss would be the same as being ~4x further away in free space. Anything much less than 1% would be equivalent to very little increase in distance at all.)

 

[John J.]

I think this will do at this time: "Lacerations" are wounds from blunt traumata that generally do not penetrate deeply into the tissue but rather cause the skin to tear.

This is far too narrow a definition of "laceration" as the term is commonly used (including by medical doctors).
The "do not penetrate deeply" bit isn't correct at all. Lacerating injuries can be sustained by any organ, and can cause death.

lac·er·a·tion
(las'ĕr-ā'shŭn), A laceration is properly a tearing or rupturing of soft tissue (e.g., skin, brain, liver) by blunt trauma. Avoid extending this term to all open wounds, including incised wounds.
1. A torn or jagged wound, or an accidental cut wound.
2. The process or act of tearing the tissues.
[L. lacero, pp. -atus, to tear to pieces]

Content from External Source

From Farlex Partner Medical Dictionary © Farlex 2012, seen here https://medical-dictionary.thefreedictionary.com/laceration

A laceration is a deep cut or tear in the skin and/or underlying tissue, commonly caused by blunt trauma (such as a fall or collision), incision by a sharp object, or mammalian bite.

Content from External Source

https://cks.nice.org.uk/topics/lacerations/ (UK) National Institute for Health and Care Excellence.

But a subtle thing made Bob Sr. think something was amiss. The report describes many lacerations and fractures, but they appear almost entirely on the front of Bobby’s body. The back of his corpse is basically described as pristine, besides multiple fractures to what remained of his head.

Content from External Source

The victim fell backwards, sharp debris fell on him. Or for whatever reason- channelled blast effects, or the direction the victim was facing as the building (or some sub-structure), under enormous pressure, collapsed and fragmented, propelling debris with lethal effect- Mr McIlvaine sustained his injuries from a specific direction. But there's no need for a bomb.

The events of that dreadful day have been comprehensively researched. The fact is, men who hated the USA flew hi-jacked planes into the World Trade Centre, resultant structural damage and fire caused the two towers to collapse.
The hi-jackers were doing the work of their terrorist group, Al Qaeda, and their attack was not anticipated by anyone else.
The physical forces unleashed by the aircraft impacts and the subsequent collapse of the towers caused injury and death on a huge scale; despite the best efforts of many diverse people after 9/11 it seems likely that the full stories of many of the deceased will never be known.

 

[Henkka]

I can't address this specific case, but elevator shafts are the perfect conduit for shock waves, as they undergo exponential attenuation - basically a small portion of the energy is lost as you pass through the pipe. As they're rigidly sided, apart from the rigidly-mounted doors at each level, that loss should be small.

I can't really comment on the math, but I can intuitively understand that an explosion could travel a long distance in any kind of tunnel, as long as the tunnel's walls don't rupture. I have a hard time relating that to an airplane crashing into an elevator shaft, though... Like presumably the elevator shaft was ruptured in the impact, and most of the explosion is going off outside the elevators. So it seems unintuitive to me that it could go down all the way to the lobby, but maybe it's possible?

Another thing that's odd about the report is them specifying the 77th floor, 22nd floor, the lobby and B4 level. Like why would the fireball explode specifically into those floors, and not others?

 

[Henkka]

Footage of the North Tower lobby before collapse. You can see the broken windows, as well as the wall being damaged at 0:40. Firefighters recount seeing people burned and killed by a "blast" caused by jet fuel going down the elevator shafts. Was Bobby McIlvaine one of them?

 

[Oystein]

Do you think there was any kind of explosive event in the lobby? The 9/11 commission report says that the plane impact sent down a fireball powerful enough to "blow out" elevators and windows:

...

I don't know much about the Bobby McIlvaine situation, but if there's a force strong enough to knock out windows, presumably it could also kill a person if he was standing right where the force was originating from. That would be near the elevators in this case.

There obviously was "some kind of" "explosive" event in the lobby - and we know it injured a number of people in the lobby, but I have not come across any report that is killed anyone in the lobby. The injuries were predominantly described as "burns". So, whatever that "explosive event" was (if we pretend we don't already know what it was), it most likely was NOT the kind of event that killed Bobby, for the injuries that other people sustained are entirely different in quality to the injuries that Bobby sustained.

So what happened there: a "fireball" - an expanding cloud of burning aerosol. This is usually and surely in this case, a sub-sonic event - notice that people did not suffer barotrauma, as you would expect from super-sonic blast shockwaves. The objects that were damaged by this "explosive" event were characterized by having large surfaces: The fireballs increased air pressure in the lobby, and that would push windows outside and can make them break.

I read a long time ago, and have no inclination to verify just now, that bombs / ordnances that have the purpose of blasting a building apart often have sub-sonic explosives - the purpose is for them to penetrare the building through a small hole, then to build up pressure "gradually" so it pushes walls outside. Shock waves would not push in a similar way. Shock waves are what you use in demolitions to rupture a structural material, but for the shock wave to get into the structural material you'd have to attach the explosive charge directly to it, touching.

Now, it could be possible that injuries LIKE Bobby's - lacerations to the chest - could be produced by broken pieces of a window hitting him that was pushed out by a fireball.
But that is not whatr Bob sr. imagines and claims, and not the story with which AE911T runs. That is the point of this thread: That Bobby's injuries are not commensurate with explosive demolition charges in the same lobby where other people suffered mostly only burns.

 

[Oystein]

This is far too narrow a definition of "laceration" as the term is commonly used (including by medical doctors).
The "do not penetrate deeply" bit isn't correct at all. Lacerating injuries can be sustained by any organ, and can cause death.

lac·er·a·tion
(las'ĕr-ā'shŭn), A laceration is properly a tearing or rupturing of soft tissue (e.g., skin, brain, liver) by blunt trauma. Avoid extending this term to all open wounds, including incised wounds.
1. A torn or jagged wound, or an accidental cut wound.
2. The process or act of tearing the tissues.
[L. lacero, pp. -atus, to tear to pieces]

Content from External Source

From Farlex Partner Medical Dictionary © Farlex 2012, seen here https://medical-dictionary.thefreedictionary.com/laceration

A laceration is a deep cut or tear in the skin and/or underlying tissue, commonly caused by blunt trauma (such as a fall or collision), incision by a sharp object, or mammalian bite.

Content from External Source

https://cks.nice.org.uk/topics/lacerations/ (UK) National Institute for Health and Care Excellence.
...

The second link (which is unavailable to me, as it is geo-restricted and I am outside of the UK) pretty much directly contradicts several of the definitions contained in the first link, which has wordings such as...
"...as distinguished from a cut or incision..."
"...Avoid extending this term to all open wounds, including incised wounds...."
"...incorrectly used when describing a cut...."
"...as distinct from a clean cut (incised wound)..."

It may be the case that the medical examiner who prepared Bobby's report incorrectly used the term "laceration" based merely on the shape of (some of) the wounds. But the term really should be used to distinguish the wound from incisions - i.e. wounds where the object causing it clean penetrated into the skin.

My words "do not penetrate deeply" were meant to refer to the object causing the wound, not the depth of the wound itself. Of course a heavy piece of concrete debris can cause damage to internal organs, includung lacerations "deep" inside the torso, without themselves penetrating the skin at all.

I am currently procrastinating on a further post within my other Bobby thread where I want to discuss when and where his body was most likely found, and what that tells us about likely times and modes of death. My current thought is that he had exited the North Tower, but not made it all the way to his workplace on the other side of the street, when he became aware oft the attacks, that he stuck around, watching, perhaps seeing if he could make himself useful in rescue or otherwise, and died when either of the towers collapsed, getting hit by debris and superficially covered. Some short snippets on why I think so:
- The presention by a colleague that he promised to help set up was to be held at 8:40 - so the setting-up would have finished before that - before 8:30 even, when the conference was schedued to begin with greetings. So there was probably time and cause for him to be out, or on his way out, when the first plane hit that same tower
- There exist stories from colleagues in the public record - no one mentions him showing up at work; also, the family inquired with Merill Lynch, and no one seems to have seen him alive that day. So that's why he think he did not enter ML company premises.
- We know that FDNY set up a command post in the lobby of the North Tower, and reported injured people - no dead ones. Had Bobby died, with the head half off, in or right next to the lobby before FDNY arrived there, certainly the body would have been recovered there and then, and some report of it would have surfaced
- But he was found only two days later - on the "periphery", which means that at no point in time had his dead body been laying out in the open - he had to be dug up or at least get recognized below a dust cover or something like that. So that speaks against him being hit by debris falling from the towers (e.g. from the second crash) before the first collapse.
- His injuries seem consistent with getting hit by copious amounts of debris - some heavy or fast enough to pepper his chest with blunt trauma wounds, some even heavier to smash head and arm into oblivion. Then, for 2 days, there was a chance that fire gnawed on the dead body to cause the post-mortem burns.
- Had he died in or next to the lobby and not been transported away before the North Tower collapsed, I am pretty sure he would have been covered by so much debris that a) he would not have been found within 2 days and b) there wouldn't have been that much of the body left.

I need to organize these arguments a bit better, and get a better grip on how debris was distributed in the area where he might conceivably have loitered as the catastrophe unfolded - more likely West and North of the North Tower than any other spots - to make my theory a bit more specific.

 

[Oystein]

I can't address this specific case, but elevator shafts are the perfect conduit for shock waves, as they undergo exponential attenuation - basically a small portion of the energy is lost as you pass through the pipe. As they're rigidly sided, apart from the rigidly-mounted doors at each level, that loss should be small.

Some illustrative figures for how slow the decay in energy is compared to a blastwave in free space (following the inverse square law):
Assuming 1% loss per floor, and an explosion on the 90th floor:

? 0.99^90
0.40473
? %^-.5
1.5719

The same decrease you would experience from being 1.6x further away from the source as the top of the lift shaft is.
And at 2% per floor losses:

? 0.98^90
0.16231
? %^-.5
2.4821

The same as being 2.5x further away. With the presumption is that the explosion was close to the opening of the lift shaft at the top, 2.5 times "close" is still pretty close, not to be underestimated. (And just by eyeballing it, a 3% loss would be the same as being ~4x further away in free space. Anything much less than 1% would be equivalent to very little increase in distance at all.)

I am not sure I follow your math - but think you went with an irrelevant set of assumptions:

The "fireball" in the lobby wasn't so much one that happened up in the tower, than had a "shock wave" travelling down to eventually cause damage there.
What more likely happened that unburned fuel was pushed into the lobby and underwent conflagration there - hence burn wounds. It was a conflagration in the lobby that caused windows to burst etc.

 

[John J.]

The second link (which is unavailable to me, as it is geo-restricted and I am outside of the UK) pretty much directly contradicts several of the definitions contained in the first link, which has wordings such as...
"...as distinguished from a cut or incision..."
"...Avoid extending this term to all open wounds, including incised wounds...."
"...incorrectly used when describing a cut...."

We're perhaps talking at cross-purposes, although your definition of "laceration"

I think this will do at this time: "Lacerations" are wounds from blunt traumata that generally do not penetrate deeply into the tissue but rather cause the skin to tear.

is too restrictive, I think (I was a registered nurse, always in acute settings including 3 years in ICU).

In the context being discussed- the attack on the World Trade Center on 9/11- I'm not sure it's helpful to describe lacerations as
"wounds from blunt traumata that generally do not penetrate deeply into the tissue".
It is surely evident that lacerations of arbitrary severity happened on a large scale.
(I continue a probably tedious ramble about definitions of "laceration" below, beneath the continuous line).

Without any reliable contrary information, there's no reason to doubt the Medical Examiner who reported on Mr McIlvaine's mortal remains that I know of. Multiple lacerations are entirely consistent with Mr McIlvaine's other reported injuries.

We don't know the reasons why Mr McIlvaine's grieving father believes what he does. He is mistaken in his beliefs.
There were no bombs or demolition charges in the WTC. The official findings best describe what happened, as far as I know.
I think Mr McIlvaine's claims have been satisfactorily debunked already.


Ante- and post-mortem burns:

A body does not die in a fraction of second - the skin is not dead just because the heart or/and brain stopped working less than a second earlier. I mean, there is about a second between any two heart beats. I don't know by what criteria a medical examiner determines that a skin burn is "post-mortem" (after death), but surely it's something that requires the skin to have been thoroughly dead already.

(My emphasis). No-
-there are a variety of clinical and histological methods to determine if burns occurred ante- or post-mortem.
One well-known indicator: If the deceased was alive in the immediate presence of fire or smoke, soot and other combustion products will be found in the airways. Similarly, there will be increased carboxyhaemoglobin in the blood.
This is not evident if the deceased died earlier.

The presence of smoke or soot particles in the air passages, evidence of thermal injury/ inhalational injury of the respiratory tract by hot fumes and gases, elevated blood carboxyhemoglobin levels due to carbon monoxide poisoning and presence of other toxic gases in the blood, cutaneous reaction have been used either alone or in conjuncture

Content from External Source

"Differentiation of antemortem & postmortem burns by histopathological examination", Chawla K., Chawla R. et al,
Journal of Forensic Medicine and Toxicology, July 2014 (link here) Note: Incudes photographs some may find distressing.

In the forensic assessment autopsy is a fundamental to determine the cause of death. When death is related to fire, particular findings during autopsy can help to suspect that the victim was alive. One of the main antemortem signs is the deposition of soot in the respiratory tract. Another important test is the toxicological analysis, which determines the level of carboxyhaemoglobin in the blood: a concentration of more than 50% indicates that the person died in the fire.

Content from External Source

"Homicides Disguised as Fire Deaths", Gabrielė Žiūkaitė, Marta Jasaitė et al, Acta medica Lituanica 30(1):10, 2023,
(link here) Note: Incudes photographs some may find distressing. Please do not view in the presence of children.


________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
Boring bit about definitions of "laceration"

My quote, and citation, was from the Farlex Partner Medical Dictionary (2012)
(https://medical-dictionary.thefreedictionary.com/laceration, Farlex Partner Medical Dictionary).

On the same page that I linked to, there is a definition from the Miller-Keane Encyclopedia and Dictionary of Medicine, Nursing, and Allied Health (2003) which I didn't quote or cite because I thought it too formally restrictive, though (Oystein) you quote it correctly of course.

a wound produced by the tearing of body tissue, as distinguished from a cut or incision.

Content from External Source

One of the reasons I don't like the Miller-Keane definition is that in describing mechanisms of injury, a reader might think those mechanisms are necessary for laceration to occur. However, perineal lacerations- very common in childbirth- are not caused by "a blow from a blunt instrument, a fall against a rough surface, or an accident with machinery", but by the stretching of tissues.

"Britannica" doesn't acknowledge internal lacerations in the absence of external laceration:

laceration, tearing of the skin that results in an irregular wound. Lacerations may be caused by injury with a sharp object or by impact injury from a blunt object or force. They may occur anywhere on the body. In most cases, tissue injury is minimal, and infections are uncommon. However, severe lacerations may extend through the full thickness of the skin and into subcutaneous tissues, including underlying muscle, internal organs, or bone. Severe lacerations often are accompanied by significant bleeding and pain.

Content from External Source

https://www.britannica.com/science/laceration

"Medline" states

A laceration is a wound that is produced by the tearing of soft body tissue. This type of wound is often irregular and jagged. A laceration wound is often contaminated with bacteria and debris from whatever object caused the cut.

Content from External Source

MedlinePlus, NIH U.S.

So we have a range of definitions. "You pays your money and you takes your choice!"

My preferred one is Farlex Partner Medical Dictionary, as it's concise yet doesn't exclude common causes of laceration.
I think it's surprising that Medline (a US National Institutes of Health site) and Britannica arguably give the shakiest definitions.
I don't think any of this has much bearing on Mr McIlvaine Senior's claims, though, other than perhaps he thinks lacerations must be bomb-related, as opposed to the result of falling (or otherwise propelled) debris.

________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

 

[Marc Powell]

There obviously was "some kind of" "explosive" event in the lobby - and we know it injured a number of people in the lobby, but I have not come across any report that is killed anyone in the lobby. The injuries were predominantly described as "burns". So, whatever that "explosive event" was (if we pretend we don't already know what it was), it most likely was NOT the kind of event that killed Bobby, for the injuries that other people sustained are entirely different in quality to the injuries that Bobby sustained.

So what happened there: a "fireball" - an expanding cloud of burning aerosol. This is usually and surely in this case, a sub-sonic event - notice that people did not suffer barotrauma, as you would expect from super-sonic blast shockwaves. The objects that were damaged by this "explosive" event were characterized by having large surfaces: The fireballs increased air pressure in the lobby, and that would push windows outside and can make them break.

I read a long time ago, and have no inclination to verify just now, that bombs / ordnances that have the purpose of blasting a building apart often have sub-sonic explosives - the purpose is for them to penetrare the building through a small hole, then to build up pressure "gradually" so it pushes walls outside. Shock waves would not push in a similar way. Shock waves are what you use in demolitions to rupture a structural material, but for the shock wave to get into the structural material you'd have to attach the explosive charge directly to it, touching.

Now, it could be possible that injuries LIKE Bobby's - lacerations to the chest - could be produced by broken pieces of a window hitting him that was pushed out by a fireball.
But that is not whatr Bob sr. imagines and claims, and not the story with which AE911T runs. That is the point of this thread: That Bobby's injuries are not commensurate with explosive demolition charges in the same lobby where other people suffered mostly only burns.

I don't usually like to speculate, but since there is much interest about what may have caused the documented damage in the North Tower lobby and basement levels and the official sources don't seem to say much about it, I will share my thoughts. All the damage was a result of the plane crash, but it came about in several different ways. First, there was the crashing of falling elevator equipment (cars, lift ropes, counterweights, etc.) accompanied by building rubble and flaming aircraft wreckage/jet fuel falling down one or more elevator shafts. The second cause of damage was elastic deformation of the building frame. Since the lobby was three stories tall and its walls lacked diagonal bracing, they would have had a tendency to slightly "parallelogram" as the building swayed and torqued in response to the airplane impact some 80 stories above. This would explain the breaking of windows on the east and west sides and the diagonal cracks in marble panels on east-facing and west-facing walls. Then again, some or all of that damage could have been caused by overpressure from the jet fuel conflagration that was documented to have erupted from one of the lobby elevator doors. One thing is certain, there is no evidence of explosions in the lobby or basement, as presumed by Robert McIlvaine Senior, and plenty of logical alternative explanations for what really caused the damage and horrific mayhem that happened there.