Crungy
12th July 2007, 12:27 PM
I play in 16" softball league in Grant Park on wednesdays http://www.wadepmoore.com/softball/. I always make the trek from my office over on Lake and Michigan to fields via beautiful Michigan Avenue. Yesterday, in front of the art institute, they were there. My very first troofer sighting. About 5 or 6 white males around 20 years of age holding up black "9-11 Was an Inside Job" signs and shouting nonsense at passerbys. One guy had a drum and was providing an offbeat soundtrack.
I've been in the big city and usually ignore the various kooks, but this time I turned around and told them, "I work in the industry. I'm a mechanical engineer at a large architectural/engineering firm. We're building a 90 story building over on Wacker Dr. You know everyone in the design industry thinks that you're a complete bunch of ignorant idiots." Immediately the woo-woo was launched my way.
"Do you know about architects and engineers for truth?" I tried to remember Richard Gage's name, but couldn't so just replied "Yes, it's run by a coupla idiots."
"Do you know that in the history of skyscrapers. No steel building has ever collapsed from fire?" Ah well, no building has ever had a 767 flying at 500 mph with a near full capacity fuel load? I mentioned the steel collapse of the Madrid building and told them that the concrete stuctural portion was the only thing holding up the building. "Nope, that's not true!" came back the reply.
"How is it possible that all the concrete in the towers were pulvarized?" I barked back with, "What are you guys into Judy Wood?". "No, no, no we're against her!" they said. Ok, at least they're not the extreme fringe of troothers. I pointed to the 83 story Aon Center just blocks away http://www.emporis.com/en/wm/bu/?id=116756 and asked them to imagine all of the drywall and furnishing in there and what would happen to it if the building collapsed in a similar top down manner as the towers. I also told them of the large pile of debri(forgot exactly how many stories) left by the towers.
"Did you see the 45 degree angle cuts of the steel? ONLY THERMITE CAN DO THAT!" I told them that pictures taken from the days following the tower collapse show workers cutting some of the steel beams in a 45 angle manner. It was still a rescue operation at that point and workers were frantically working around the clock to clear debri. "Nope, there are no pictures showing that!" was their response.
"What about the WTC7 building? How did that collapse?" Ah, I think the enorumous structual damage inflicted by the collapse of the tower coupled with the diesel fuel (I explained that WTC7 held the emergency diesel gensets used to backup the WTC complex) supplied fires had something to do with WTC7 going down. "The towers never even hit WTC7!" Oh, boy. We're in serious denial here. I told them about pictures showing the damage to WTC7 and told them to look at the Aon Center building and to imagine that falling partially on a neighbooring building. Would they want to stay in the damaged building? They also asked me what would the diesel fuel do? I explained that I've designed dozens of diesel emergency gensets around Illinois. I stumbled a bit trying to come up with the exact amount of floors damaged and the total amount of diesel fuel located in WTC7.
One of the more emotional dudes told me that the only way that the towers could fall so perfectly in it's own footprint could only be from a controlled implosion. I told them that the fall wasn't perfect, as there was damage all over the WTC complex. They said "Not true!" I told them of the enormous potential energy stored in the towers above the plane impact point and that once the supports were cut, gravity would take its course and straight down was the only way the building was traveling. I asked him how would he expect it to fall. Ok, so this young kid tells me that he is going to school with a goal of getting his masters in architecture. He took out the 3 foot post holding one end of his sign, tilted it about 20 degrees from the vertical and arrogantly asked me to identify the center of gravity. I immediately did (duh!), which surprised him. He then let go of the post and gravity took her course. "So, the towers should've fallen like a tree?". "Yes!" came back the response. You can't make this stuff up. These kids were a real life Scooby Doo episode. I was waiting for the Mystery Machine to come screaming down Michigan at any moment.
The whole time one of the twoofers is filming it. Great. I'll wind up on some heavily edited Youtube clip. I really wish I had Gravy's folder and was prepared for debate. They were just shouting the same old tired slogans over and over with little knowledge of the (il)logic behind them.
On a positive note, we won in softball 16-11. I went 3 for 4. :cool:
I've been in the big city and usually ignore the various kooks, but this time I turned around and told them, "I work in the industry. I'm a mechanical engineer at a large architectural/engineering firm. We're building a 90 story building over on Wacker Dr. You know everyone in the design industry thinks that you're a complete bunch of ignorant idiots." Immediately the woo-woo was launched my way.
"Do you know about architects and engineers for truth?" I tried to remember Richard Gage's name, but couldn't so just replied "Yes, it's run by a coupla idiots."
"Do you know that in the history of skyscrapers. No steel building has ever collapsed from fire?" Ah well, no building has ever had a 767 flying at 500 mph with a near full capacity fuel load? I mentioned the steel collapse of the Madrid building and told them that the concrete stuctural portion was the only thing holding up the building. "Nope, that's not true!" came back the reply.
"How is it possible that all the concrete in the towers were pulvarized?" I barked back with, "What are you guys into Judy Wood?". "No, no, no we're against her!" they said. Ok, at least they're not the extreme fringe of troothers. I pointed to the 83 story Aon Center just blocks away http://www.emporis.com/en/wm/bu/?id=116756 and asked them to imagine all of the drywall and furnishing in there and what would happen to it if the building collapsed in a similar top down manner as the towers. I also told them of the large pile of debri(forgot exactly how many stories) left by the towers.
"Did you see the 45 degree angle cuts of the steel? ONLY THERMITE CAN DO THAT!" I told them that pictures taken from the days following the tower collapse show workers cutting some of the steel beams in a 45 angle manner. It was still a rescue operation at that point and workers were frantically working around the clock to clear debri. "Nope, there are no pictures showing that!" was their response.
"What about the WTC7 building? How did that collapse?" Ah, I think the enorumous structual damage inflicted by the collapse of the tower coupled with the diesel fuel (I explained that WTC7 held the emergency diesel gensets used to backup the WTC complex) supplied fires had something to do with WTC7 going down. "The towers never even hit WTC7!" Oh, boy. We're in serious denial here. I told them about pictures showing the damage to WTC7 and told them to look at the Aon Center building and to imagine that falling partially on a neighbooring building. Would they want to stay in the damaged building? They also asked me what would the diesel fuel do? I explained that I've designed dozens of diesel emergency gensets around Illinois. I stumbled a bit trying to come up with the exact amount of floors damaged and the total amount of diesel fuel located in WTC7.
One of the more emotional dudes told me that the only way that the towers could fall so perfectly in it's own footprint could only be from a controlled implosion. I told them that the fall wasn't perfect, as there was damage all over the WTC complex. They said "Not true!" I told them of the enormous potential energy stored in the towers above the plane impact point and that once the supports were cut, gravity would take its course and straight down was the only way the building was traveling. I asked him how would he expect it to fall. Ok, so this young kid tells me that he is going to school with a goal of getting his masters in architecture. He took out the 3 foot post holding one end of his sign, tilted it about 20 degrees from the vertical and arrogantly asked me to identify the center of gravity. I immediately did (duh!), which surprised him. He then let go of the post and gravity took her course. "So, the towers should've fallen like a tree?". "Yes!" came back the response. You can't make this stuff up. These kids were a real life Scooby Doo episode. I was waiting for the Mystery Machine to come screaming down Michigan at any moment.
The whole time one of the twoofers is filming it. Great. I'll wind up on some heavily edited Youtube clip. I really wish I had Gravy's folder and was prepared for debate. They were just shouting the same old tired slogans over and over with little knowledge of the (il)logic behind them.
On a positive note, we won in softball 16-11. I went 3 for 4. :cool: