Stupid Question: The Crystal Palace and WTC

[Ersby]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Crystal_Palace

This iron framed building burnt down in 1931. According to the newsreel of the time

http://newsfilm.bufvc.ac.uk/catsearch/index.php?find_mode=date&dc=3

... it collapsed after one hour. All I know about the structure is that the aforementioned iron and glass, and that it had wooden floors. I don't know what was inside it when it burnt down apart from some early television equipment in the south wing.

Does anyone happen to know more about this? Can any useful parallels be drawn between this and WTC1 and 2?

[Gravy]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Crystal_Palace

This iron framed building burnt down in 1931. According to the newsreel of the time

http://newsfilm.bufvc.ac.uk/catsearch/index.php?find_mode=date&dc=3

... it collapsed after one hour. All I know about the structure is that the aforementioned iron and glass, and that it had wooden floors. I don't know what was inside it when it burnt down apart from some early television equipment in the south wing.

Does anyone happen to know more about this? Can any useful parallels be drawn between this and WTC1 and 2?
New York had a copy of London's Crystal Palace on the site of the current Bryant Park. It burned down in the 1850's, likewise collapsing quickly. Cast iron was thought to be a wonderful new material for constructing "fireproof" buildings, but in reality it fractured fairly easily in structure fires. A steel-framed structure like these crystal palaces probably wouldn't have lasted much longer.

The McCormick Place exihibition hall fire is a good analogy to the Crystal Palace fires. It's unprotected heavy steel truss roof failed quickly: http://www.chipublib.org/004chicago/disasters/mccormick_fire.html

There's more on the behavior of steel in fires on pages 72-77 of my new paper: http://www.911myths.com/WTC7_Lies.doc Or http://www.911myths.com/WTC7_Lies.pdf

[Silentknight]

I have a similar question, but I dug up this thread because I didn't want to start a new one if it wasn't necessary. I had already read about the Crystal Palace and McCormick Place when I first became interested in debunking the 9/11 CT, and was going to mention them until I saw someone already did here. I also remember reading about how the upper floors of the Windsor Tower in Madrid collapsed during the fire because they were steel only, whereas the concrete supported floors did not.

Anyway, in addition to the aforementioned buildings, are there any other noteworthy examples of steel buildings that have collapsed due to fire damage? I've heard that there have been millions of buildings that have collapsed because of fire, and obviously fire codes and fireproofing exist to prevent such disasters, but I haven't had much luck finding specific cases. Is there anyone who can help me with this? I think it would be useful to have such a list compiled in order to refute truthers when they claim that, "No steel building in history has ever collapsed due to fire."

[Gravy]

Yes, SK, particularly the Kader toy factory buildings, which also collapsed quickly. See my page Fire Safety Engineering and the Performance of Structural Steel in Fires (http://wtc7lies.googlepages.com/firesafetyengineering%26theperformanceofst)

[Reality Believer]

I have a similar question, but I dug up this thread because I didn't want to start a new one if it wasn't necessary. I had already read about the Crystal Palace and McCormick Place when I first became interested in debunking the 9/11 CT, and was going to mention them until I saw someone already did here. I also remember reading about how the upper floors of the Windsor Tower in Madrid collapsed during the fire because they were steel only, whereas the concrete supported floors did not.

Anyway, in addition to the aforementioned buildings, are there any other noteworthy examples of steel buildings that have collapsed due to fire damage? I've heard that there have been millions of buildings that have collapsed because of fire, and obviously fire codes and fireproofing exist to prevent such disasters, but I haven't had much luck finding specific cases. Is there anyone who can help me with this? I think it would be useful to have such a list compiled in order to refute truthers when they claim that, "No steel building in history has ever collapsed due to fire."
Be careful not to fall into that "no building in history..." logic trap in the first place. There are no 1:1 historical precedents. No building has ever been hit with a 757 / 767, sustained the damage they did, and burned unchecked for an hour.

Get the CT to ask the correct question and then agree that it has never happened before.

[Elizabeth I]

[slight derail]There is a building in Dallas that looks almost exactly like the Crystal Palace (the Dallas Palace?) It seems to me that it is some sort of exhibit hall as well. Does anybody know what it is? Wonder why it hasn't burned down yet, since all such similar buildings seem to be under some sort of burning-down curse. :D [/slight derail]

[A W Smith]

everything in history happened for the "first time in history" at some point in time.

[Reality Believer]

[slight derail]There is a building in Dallas that looks almost exactly like the Crystal Palace (the Dallas Palace?) It seems to me that it is some sort of exhibit hall as well. Does anybody know what it is? Wonder why it hasn't burned down yet, since all such similar buildings seem to be under some sort of burning-down curse. :D [/slight derail]
It is the very elegantly named "Infomart".

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Infomart

I'm not familiar with it, just good with Google :D

[Silentknight]

Yes, SK, particularly the Kader toy factory buildings, which also collapsed quickly. See my page Fire Safety Engineering and the Performance of Structural Steel in Fires (http://wtc7lies.googlepages.com/firesafetyengineering%26theperformanceofst)
Thanks. Bookmarked.
Be careful not to fall into that "no building in history..." logic trap in the first place. There are no 1:1 historical precedents. No building has ever been hit with a 757 / 767, sustained the damage they did, and burned unchecked for an hour.

Get the CT to ask the correct question and then agree that it has never happened before.
I know, I know. But they always try to weasel out of it with, "Hurrr, the twin towers were designed to withstand plane crashes." Then I'm stuck explaining the difference between a plane lost in the fog en route to JFK airport after dumping fuel and a fully fueled 757 going at 500 mph; or pointing out how most structural engineers were impressed by how long the towers actually stood after the impact, which allowed a lot of people to escape. I was looking more for a way to kick the strawman argument out from under them in the first place.

I wanted to mention that an engineer once explained to me the difference between a wood structure and a steel structure. The steel structure would tend to fail first, because all it has to do is weaken and buckle. The wood however would keep its shape until a certain percentage of the beam has been burnt through, at which point it would break. Does anyone know anything more about this?

[Norseman]

I wanted to mention that an engineer once explained to me the difference between a wood structure and a steel structure. The steel structure would tend to fail first, because all it has to do is weaken and buckle. The wood however would keep its shape until a certain percentage of the beam has been burnt through, at which point it would break. Does anyone know anything more about this?

That is right:
http://www.fire.nist.gov/bfrlpubs/fire80/art009.html
http://www.fire.nist.gov/bfrlpubs/fire82/art020.html

In the 1980 test unprotected steel frame floor assemblies used in residential buildings lasted 4 minutes before collapse, while unprotected wood frame floor assemblies lasted about 10 minutes. Protecting the floor assemblies with gypsum board increased the endurance time by 12 minutes for steel and 23 minutes for wood. (Page 23)

There are off course other reasons why steel is used in high rise buildings and not wood.

[Alferd_Packer]

A key point is the history of how they fireproofed buildings. Anyone who has ever done any Anyone who has ever done construction work inside a early 20th century skyscraper knows that the steel columns and beams were often encased in concrete. Later, in the mid century, the use of a clay tiles or a white firebrick material known as “Pyrobar” was the most common fireproofing method. In both of these methods the fireproofing material was massive, bulky and robust. Being robust was good, being massive and bulky was not. After WWII, in the mid 1950’s the use of sprayed on fireproofing became popular. It was light weight, and applied directly to the beam, thus allowing smaller column enclosures and larger rentable areas per floor. Unfortunately it was also made with asbestos and could be best described as “friable.” That is you could crumble and break it off with hand pressure alone. (Asbestos abatement workers rarely have to use power tools to strip this stuff off the steel, usually, getting it wet and running a hand scraper along the bottom of the beam causes huge chunks to fall off).

[Hamradioguy]

everything in history happened for the "first time in history" at some point in time.

Sorta like that old Vermont saying, "The wind blows really hard up on Cabot Plains. Last winter it blew down two trees that had never blown down before."

If anyone wants to know about steel framed building behavior in a fire just ask a firefighter. Even a probie knows that steel can soften (not melt) in a fire and cause building failure.

And if you don't want to ask any of the men and women who have hands on experience with fires in steel framed buildings just obtain a copy of Francis L. Brannigan's, "Building Construction For The Fire Service".