Well, obviously there's some room to be higher, since he hit at ground level. Personally, I would have tried to stick it in the middle of the Pentagon, instead of the outside. It seems reasonable to assume the inside might be less fortified than the outside. But that would have been a tougher thing - have to take a steeper descent angle. I think he pretty much failed - the damage at the Pentagon wasn't as severe as it might have been. barfo
It was well known when the towers opened that the buildings had been designed (not physically tested, of course) to withstand a 707 hit. This was reviewed by outside consulting firms, subcontractors, everyone involved. The owners paid for buildings they thought could withstand a 707 strike. Any subsequent owners relied upon that level of quality (and many other engineering standards in the design) in pricing out the buildings before buying. Let's say, as maxiep says, that the calculations did not include the fire that would result from the fuel inside the airplane. This means that the owners overpaid based upon false information imparted from the architects and engineers, who got the information from the ultimate source, the consultants who did the calculations for the 707 hit. I said that the tenants could sue the owners if the leasing decision depended upon promises about the collision strength. I knew the promises probably had not been made (I said maybe in a brochure, but not in the contract). But now I see a more likely avenue for a suit. It's the owners who would sue, not be sued. The owners have a basis to sue those original consultants who did the calculations (and maybe to a lesser degree, some for whom the consultants subcontracted, such as the engineers and architects, and also any subsequent chain of owners--maybe). I've read an interview of a couple of the original consultants, so they are alive and suable. This is no ordinary lease case, so the usual rules might not apply. If the consultants did not include fire damage in their collision calculations, that might be negligence or fraud, since an ordinary owner would expect fire damage to be included. The case might fail, but nothing ventured, nothing gained. So I simply ask, why hasn't such a suit been attempted, unless fire damage WAS included in the calculations, in which case we return to the original question early in the thread--it sure is weird how professional-looking those collapses were.
Okay, instead of asking why did they fall vertically (when other skyscrapers haven't, such as when utterly destroyed in Baghdad by American missiles), I'll switch it to ask, why did they pancake (when other skyscrapers haven't, such as when utterly destroyed in Baghdad by American missiles)? There were closer surveillance cameras, but the government has locked away all photographs in secret, for some mysterious reason. Any idea why? The plane was flying a mile every 10 seconds. You say it flew feet, not inches, above the ground. That's actually irrelevant. It was still an amazing piece of piloting by someone who had never flown a big or medium plane (and had very little experience in a tiny plane, or did he have any?).
This can't be serious. Moving up and down is easy when you're moving 350 mph 10 feet high? Well, moving up is. Moving down is fatal. Try driving a car at 350 mph with a concrete wall 10 feet to one side and see whether you can avoid moving 10 feet left or right. Not having to land makes it easy? He did have to land. Flying 10 feet high into a building is a lot smaller target than landing on a runway.
I doubt the engineering firm actually stated the building would withstand a 707 hit. No company big enough to work on the WTC would be so small as to not have a clue about legal liability. You would state exactly what you actually know, not generalize it. You might state "the building frame is designed to withstand a side impact of such and such type between floors 5 and 110 of force xxx; a Boeing 707 impacting the side of the building at speed zzz could be expected to have a force of yyy." You would not say "this building will withstand all airliner crashes, even for airliners not yet designed and even if the building catches fire after the impact". barfo
That was a design consideration for the WTC. That's because of when that B-2 hit the Empire State building.
Oh my god! They could have died! Uhm, no, not really. Landing involves a lot of work beyond just aiming the plane. You have to get it on the runway (and a runway is narrower than the pentagon) and have the plane at the right pitch and the right speed when you hit the runway. Ramming something where you don't really care about the exact altitude or the exact positioning or the speed or the survival of the plane is significantly easier. barfo
Right, I'm sure they did try to design it that way. I'm just arguing that they probably didn't make any legally binding broad promises, because you'd have to be fucking stupid to do so, and engineers aren't generally known to be stupid. You'd vouch for the tests and calculations that you did, all of which would be very specific, not something general like "the building will continue to stand under any circumstances involving an airliner crashing into it". barfo
Could it be that they don't want to expose construction details of the Pentagon to future attackers? Yes, he had some flight experience, unless you disbelieve everything the government says, in which case there's actually no point in discussing it, since none of us have any more believable sources. And it just isn't that amazing. If you can control the plane, which he obviously could, you can crash it, which he did. I don't see what's so amazing about it. Good piloting involves NOT crashing. barfo
The wording might be evasive (not mentioning that a plane collision was modelled), but in court, those 1970 promised specifications could be matched with experts testifying to their estimated specifications of the 2001 collision. If the actual specs were within the original design specs (even ones worded evasively), bingo, ya got a case. They could have hit the ground, like the plane in Pennsylvania did, and have failed in their mission. You think that hitting a 12 to 15,000 foot runway with multiple chances if you fail, 100 feet wide (narrower than the Pentagon? irrelevant!), at 130 mph is harder than hitting the 5-story high Pentagon at 350 mph? With telephone wires to avoid and no landing avionics helping you in? With people bamming on the door, trying to get in to kill you? You think you don't care about the altitude or the exact positioning? 5 stories is about 50 feet! The plane's tail rises as high. The Pentagon was a tiny target at that speed. An airfield is perfectly level and the land around the Pentagon has not been so scalloped. You try it and report the results back to us.
No. The cameras are on the outside of the building, which is plainly visible and appeared on worldwide television for months afterward. I've never been there but it looks like you can see it from the road. It is assumed they are hiding something unknown about the plane, it's true occupants, or how it struck the building. All that is certain is that they are hiding something.
If something the engineers said could be proven false, yes, you've got a case. I doubt we are the first people to discuss this, however, so my guess is that someone has looked into it and concluded that in fact the engineers didn't say anything that is provably false. No idea why you think that's irrelevant. Not only is a runway a narrower target than the pentagon, but you have to hit is head on. You can't hit it at an angle and succeed, whereas most any approach angle will work fine for the Pentagon. Don't know what you mean about multiple chances if you fail. If you mean going around, then in theory the hijackers could have done that too. I doubt telephone wires were a big concern. And while you can't just lock in on a landing approach, the avionics in the plane still work and could be quite useful. They flew recon flights to check out the land ahead of time. And if the Pentagon is only 50 feet tall, how tall is a runway? 0 feet, I think. barfo
Every few years, a building collapses, and later I read of the ensuing lawsuit. Were the WTC architects the only ones brilliant enough to write their specs to avoid such suits? How do any other such lawsuits occur, what with all the brilliant spec-writing that judges are just too naive to see through? Surveillance cameras are notoriously blurry. Details of the parking lot and building exterior? The Pentagon is right next to a freeway, or if you're too lazy to drive up to it, look at satellite pictures on Google and Yahoo.
What is the cause of these buildings collapsing? Airplane strikes? Or something more mundane? I assumed these were cameras pointing at the building, and thus would show details of the damage, and thus the construction. If the are pointing away from the building, then I have no idea why they'd be kept secret, assuming they actually exist. barfo
That's what I mean by multiple opportunities. You come down a little wrong, move up and try again a thousand feet later. You can hesitate a few times before touching down. No such chances at the Pentagon. The building may be big, maybe 100 yards, but that's not 15,000 feet. You get one chance to come down exactly right. As for going around again, I thought you said they only knew how to fly the middle part, not the takeoff or the landing. He lacked the skill to circle and hit his target again. He had one chance and that was it. You have picked the wrong issue in this thing. This is a dead end for you. You're the only one anywhere on the internet I've ever seen who thinks the Pentagon crash was easier to do than a regular landing. Experts agree that it was very, very hard.
Going around doesn't involve takeoffs or landings. He obviously knew how to make turns, unless somehow the plane was pointed directly at the Pentagon when they hijacked it. And besides, we've seen the flightpaths they took, and they do involve turns. Oh no! My internet arguing license is being revoked! Internet experts are by and large full of shit, especially when it comes to conspiracy theories. Me included, of course. barfo
Irrelevant to why brilliant spec-writing would be lawsuit-proof for the WTC but not for any other building. The writing course those engineers take is standard at all schools. The construction techniques had nothing to hide on the macro level. Maybe the inner structure of the bricks had fortification no one has ever seen before (developed in space by DARPA), but nothing that a camera on a parking lot pole could see.
