However, let’s all be aware that from a broader engineering perspective, there is always something valuable to be learned from a failure....even horrific ones such as the collapse of the Towers where it already is clearly understood by any reasonable person as to why they fell. It should be mandatory that every engineer entering the workforce read ‘To Engineer is Human: The Role of Failure in Successful Design’ by Henry Petroski. It is not until there is a precise understanding of the exact nature of the 'why' that steps can be taken in the future to make something better. I have no insight into what has all gone on with the post-9/11 studies in this case but I will bet that much failure analysis has already happened with the Trade Towers. What will it yield? Perhaps a requirement for more steel columns? Perhaps an upgraded standard for steel beams that retain higher yield strengths at higher temperatures? A change in the standards and materials used for column insulation? Recommendations for alarm systems that will inform occupants to get away from a side of the building and toward exists on the other side if a plane gets within say a few minutes of potential impact? Recommendations for different methods for extinguishing flames? All are possibilities plus many more.... not just for the objective of having a building withstand a crash but for it to remain standing longer. Think about it..... if the Twin Towers had of been able to stand for double the length of time they did, how many additional lives would have been saved?
There is much to be learned. However, none of it will come from the agenda of nuts like Richard Gage.
I post this at least once every September, when the "where were you on 9/11" threads appeear...
"I was home, recovering from a work injury. I had got in the habit of doing internet while watching Fox and Friends, though I hadn’t found FR yet.
"I was watching when E.D. Hill said that there was news of a small plane hitting the WTC, and the reportage of this “accident” continued until the second plane went in. I knew, then, and I think so did everyone else. I called my mother, who lives elsewhere in the state, after the second plane to get her to turn on the TV, and we called back and forth a couple of times during the morning.
"My sister, who lived in Finland at the time, was visiting our mother; they had just been to visit me, and my sister had brought one of her Finnish friends to try to match up with me (it didn’t take, and she and I are happily wed to others today), and they were back at Mom’s, getting ready to fly back to Finland on the 12th (which obviously didn’t happen...they got out 3 or 4 days later).
"This friend was a structural engineer by trade. During either the first or second call, before it happened, she said “those buildings will fall; they cannot stand.” We asked “how will they fall?” Fearing for those caught under them falling like trees. “Probably straight down,” she said. So when it happened we were not terribly surprised, and I was immunized against all of the “deliberate demolition” conspiracy theories before they appeared."