Why use thermite at all?

[Travis]

Outside of all the questions about what evidence there is or isn't for thermite at the WTC I always come back to another question: why use it at all?

Seriously. If you had to do a controlled demolition of the WTC why trust a completely unproven method of skyscraper demolition, a method that would require loads of special infrastructure and that would be highly visible?

I really just can't think of any good reason to do it.

 

[000063]

Or explosives, for that matter. Why bother at all?

 

[NoahFence]

Thermite is only because one retard decided to use it as the mystery explosive, because he had to explain the lack of explosions. Then all the little sheep retards had to keep it up.

 

[cantonear1968]

Why use thermite at all?

Because it's Cool!

 

[000063]

Noah, be nice.

They're more like Lemmings.

 

[Scott Sommers]

Like everything else that's being said on this forum these days, we have had this discussion some time in the past. If it isn't obvious to you by now why thermite was necessary, it never will be. Thermite is crucial for this kind of demolition because it has the special property of doing only whatever was done on 9/11 and nothing else. Nano-thermite is even more like that. Whatever evidence of anything that was found on 9/11 is exactly what nanothermite does.

Isn't it obvious now?

 

[cantonear1968]

Like everything else that's being said on this forum these days, we have had this discussion some time in the past. If it isn't obvious to you by now why thermite was necessary, it never will be. Thermite is crucial for this kind of demolition because it has the special property of doing only whatever was done on 9/11 and nothing else. Nano-thermite is even more like that. Whatever evidence of anything that was found on 9/11 is exactly what nanothermite does.

Isn't it obvious now?

To be fair to Travis, the question he posed is not why Truthers need it to be Thermite (my own facetious response not withstanding ), but why anyone planning an actual controlled demolition would consider using thermite. Yes, the whole "silent explosive" is the most obvious answer, but as he points out the use of this material and its completely unknown properties and response in a precisely timed demolition makes one wonder why anyone could possibly consider using it. Especially when the goal is to be supersecret about it.

That said, while I agree that virtually every topic about 9/11 has been discussed ad nauseum, there are different directions to come at the topic. Asking the TM to explain why this material would be used when it had never-before-been-used in a CD of a large scale building is a worthy albeit brief discussion.

 

[Jackanory]

Outside of all the questions about what evidence there is or isn't for thermite at the WTC I always come back to another question: why use it at all?

Seriously. If you had to do a controlled demolition of the WTC why trust a completely unproven method of skyscraper demolition, a method that would require loads of special infrastructure and that would be highly visible?

I really just can't think of any good reason to do it.

I know, I know......nano-fairydust would have been far more impressive. What idiot thought that therm*te, or it's ugly sister nanotherm*te, could out do the fairy.

Talking therm*te…….A repeat of the 911 Conspiracy Files 10 years on was broadcast on UK TV last night. Alex Jones talking from the back of his throat, wild eyed and referencing his unnamed 'gubmint sources' and the squadron that shot 93 down. Dylan Avery looking bemused at the interviewer trying to ascertain what a 'simile' is. Neils Harrit assuring us of his superior knowledge of CD .......................and old US Marine Officer uncle Fetzer discussing therm*te whilst showing a clip of a bucket of thermite in action. Glowing, fizzing and burning like a 50Omillion watt bulb and smoking like a brigade of Perkins diesel engines. Had to laugh at old Jim being oblivious to what he was talking about. Classic.

 

[sheeplesnshills]

Outside of all the questions about what evidence there is or isn't for thermite at the WTC I always come back to another question: why use it at all?

Seriously. If you had to do a controlled demolition of the WTC why trust a completely unproven method of skyscraper demolition, a method that would require loads of special infrastructure and that would be highly visible?

I really just can't think of any good reason to do it.

The whole Thermite myth can about because the lack of the loud bangs that conventional explosives must make..........

Now if I wanted to do it quietly, I'd use Elektron blocks on the floor support brackets of one floor.....its a stable metal alloy, relative easy to ignite and not exactly new technology!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elektron_(alloy)

anyone checking for magnesium oxides?

 

[Macgyver1968]

Why use thermite at all?

Because truthers NEED something to cause the collapse other than just fire and impact damage to support their "Inside Job" theory. At first, they said it was conventional explosives...then it was pointed out that explosives make really loud sounds. Rather than reconsider their CD theory, they had to come up with something that might have been used that doesn't make a lot of sound....enter thermite. When it was shown that the properties of regular thermite are known, and it wouldn't make a very good demolition device...they came up with nano-thermite...a substance who's properties aren't well known...so they can make it do anything they want.

When nanothermite is discredited, they will just switch to something else...like Elektron as sheeple suggested.

 

[Jackanory]

but as he points out the use of this material and its completely unknown properties and response in a precisely timed demolition makes one wonder why anyone could possibly consider using it. Especially when the goal is to be supersecret about it.

Points obviously ignored or unknown by those fabricating the 'smoking gun' whilst not realising that if they did use therm*te that the 'smoking gun' would have been visible to the men on the moon.......or certainly to those in and around NYC for sure.

Countering the lack of flash, bang and blast signatures of explosives with the supposed silent and none visible signature of therm*te was a remarkably premature ejaculation of the utmost stupidity. Those around the world who have used this stuff laughed from day one and have been laughing ever since throughout the subsequent 'scientific' derailment by paint chips. Thermite simply can't do what we see/hear/find on 911. Yet no matter how many times people are told............

A scientist from Carnegie was asked during the TV broadcast why Jones et al's Bentham Paper on them*te had not been rebutted. He basically laughed and said that the therm*te was paint chips, paper burns hotter than the therm*te found..................................... and he had better things to do.

 

[Julio]

Outside of all the questions about what evidence there is or isn't for thermite at the WTC I always come back to another question: why use it at all?

http://911blogger.com/node/20094

During the discussion, I briefly expressed my hypothesis that nanothermite served as an igniting agent, (...) to ignite more conventional explosives such as C4 or HMX, in the destruction of the WTC buildings

It's obvius, isn't it? To avoid loud bangs of conventional explosives, use thermite to ignite conventional expl... oh, wait!

 

[Travis]

Yep, good old Mythbusters showed why using thermite as a trigger is stupid.


So it would seem that there is no good reason to use thermite for this and the Truth Movement simply didn't think it out when they decided to latch onto it.

 

[Sunstealer]

One of the problems with the use of thermite for demolition is the amount of thermite required. A truther called Jerry Lobdill wrote a paper and did some heat balance equations to determine a theoretical maximum for how many grams of steel are melted per gram of thermite depending on the final temperature of the reaction products. His calculations are sound although some other parts of this work are not.

http://www.journalof911studies.com/volume/200704/JLobdillThermiteChemistryWTC.pdf

So even the if the thermite raised the temperature just enough to melt steel then you'd get a theoretical maximum of 1.96g of iron melted per gram of thermite.

The trouble is that thermite will burn hotter than this and truthers claim silly temperatures so a figure using the 2000°C mark of 1.24g per gram of thermite is more realistic.

Then there are thermal losses to the surroundings and other considerations so a 1g of steel melted to 1g of thermite is probably quite generous.

No truther, to my knowledge, has ever performed any calculation to say exactly which columns or parts of the structure are actually needed to be cut for a collapse.

It's relatively easy to work out how much thermite is needed if you work out how much of each column needs to be melted if you have the drawings of column dimensions or are so bored you've got nothing better to do.

 

[fitzgibbon]

Thermite©. We put the "hush" in hush-a-boom.
Coming soon to an NWO-targeted skyscraper near you!

Fitz

 

[aggle-rithm]

Outside of all the questions about what evidence there is or isn't for thermite at the WTC I always come back to another question: why use it at all?

Seriously. If you had to do a controlled demolition of the WTC why trust a completely unproven method of skyscraper demolition, a method that would require loads of special infrastructure and that would be highly visible?

I really just can't think of any good reason to do it.

The problem is, you're looking at it from the point of view of someone who wants to perpetrate an actual crime, rather than someone who wants to believe in a conspiracy theory. From that viewpoint, it becomes all the more clear that it's a bunch of baloney.

 

[cantonear1968]

Points obviously ignored or unknown by those fabricating the 'smoking gun' whilst not realising that if they did use therm*te that the 'smoking gun' would have been visible to the men on the moon.......or certainly to those in and around NYC for sure.

Countering the lack of flash, bang and blast signatures of explosives with the supposed silent and none visible signature of therm*te was a remarkably premature ejaculation of the utmost stupidity. Those around the world who have used this stuff laughed from day one and have been laughing ever since throughout the subsequent 'scientific' derailment by paint chips. Thermite simply can't do what we see/hear/find on 911. Yet no matter how many times people are told............

A scientist from Carnegie was asked during the TV broadcast why Jones et al's Bentham Paper on them*te had not been rebutted. He basically laughed and said that the therm*te was paint chips, paper burns hotter than the therm*te found..................................... and he had better things to do.

Absolutely. And goes to the point that Scott was making: thermite or any derivative of can be/do whatever truthers need it to be/do in the moment they need it. Their lack of logical reasoning simply immunes them against it NOT being the all magical and powerful substance they think it is.

Now, if one could only get them to make some leaps of imagination to the very points you bring up, maybe...just maybe they could have an epiphany and realize it is utterly the dumbest mechanism possible for a supersecret controlled demolition of a high rise building!

ETA: A point I meant to add to this is that the problem with getting them to make this leap of reasoning is that they can always fall back on the "experts" who are promoting this. It can be a very comforting feeling knowing that people (arguably) smarter than you not only believe thermite was used to demolish the buildings but have actually "proven" it. If you are predisposed to wanting to believe, that can be a very powerful weapon against rational thought.

 

[cantonear1968]

Yep, good old Mythbusters showed why using thermite as a trigger is stupid.


So it would seem that there is no good reason to use thermite for this and the Truth Movement simply didn't think it out when they decided to latch onto it.

Boom!
You nailed it!


ETA: and like the fortune cookie game, you could add that sentence at the end of every single truther claim!

 

[beachnut]

... question: why use it at all? .

Jones made it up. Jones had a break with reality on 9/16/05.
Jones is like a catalyis for insprining nuts to out and join his madness.

http://911research.wtc7.net/talks/wtc/videos.html
http://tinyurl.com/7drxn

WTC collapses due to controlled demolition
Steven E. Jones
Professor of Physics/BYU

I believe WTC collapses to be due to controlled demolition are:

1. My own analysis of the "pancaking" floors model (the FEMA/NIST model) combined with Conservation of Momentum considerations gives a much longer time for the fall (over 10 seconds) than that which was actually observed for WTC-7 (about 6.3 seconds, just over the free-fall time of 6.0 seconds). I find no evidence in their reports that government researchers (FEMA, NIST, 9-11 Commission) included Conservation of Momentum in their analyses.

2. The fact that WTC-7 fell down symmetrically, onto its own footprint very neatly, even though fires were just observed on one side of the building. A symmetrical collapse, as observed, requires the simultaneous "pulling" of support beams. By my count, there were 24 core columns and 57 perimeter columns in WTC-7. Heat transport considerations for steel beams heated by fire suggest that failure of even a few columns at the same time is very small. Adding in the Second Law of Thermodynamics ("law of increasing entropy") leads to the conclusion that the likelihood of near-symmetrical collapse of the building due to fires (the "government" theory) -- requiring as it does near-simultaneous failure of many support columns -- is infinitesimal. Yet near-symmetrical collapse of WTC-7 was observed. (If you still haven't gone to the links above to see the actual collapse for yourself, please go there now.)

Note that the 9-11 Commission report does not even deal with the collapse of WTC-7. This is a striking omission of highly relevant data.

3.Squibs (horizontal puffs of smoke and debris) are observed emerging from WTC-7, in regular sequence, just as the building starts to collapse. (SEE: http://tinyurl.com/7drxn ) Yet the floors have not moved relative to one another yet, as one can verify from the videos, so air-expulsion due to collapsing floors is excluded. I have personally examined many building demolitions based on on-line videos, and the presence of such squibs firing in rapid sequence as observed is prima facie evidence for the use of pre-positioned explosives inside the building.

4. The pulverization of concrete to powder and the horizontal ejection of steel beams for hundreds of yards, observed clearly in the collapses of the WTC towers, requires much more energy than is available from gravitational potential energy alone. Explosives will give the observed features. Other scientists have provided quantitative analysis of the observed pulverizations, and I can provide references if you wish. Here we are appealing to the violation of Conservation of Energy inherent in the "official" pancaking-floors theory-- a horrendous violation, forbidden by principles of Physics. (What is going on for the FEMA/NIST researchers to make such striking errors/omissions?)

5. I conducted simple experiments on the "pancaking" theory, by dropping cement blocks from approximately 12 feet onto other cement blocks. (The floors in the WTC buildings were about 12 feet apart.) We are supposed to believe, from the pancaking theory, that a concrete floor dropping 12 feet onto another concrete floor will result in PULVERIZED concrete observed during the Towers' collapses! Nonsense! My own experiments, and I welcome you to try this yourself, is that only chips/large chunks of cement flaked off the blocks -- no mass pulverization to approx. 100-micron powder as observed. Explosives, however, can indeed convert concrete to dust --mostly, along with some large chunks-- as observed in the destruction of the Twin Towers on 9-11-01.

6. The observations of molten metal (I did not say molten steel!) in the basements of all three buildings, WTC 1, 2 and 7 is consistent with the use of the extremely high-temperature thermite reaction: iron oxide + aluminum powder --> Al2O3 + molten iron. Falling buildings are not observed to generate melting of large quantities of molten metal -- this requires a concentrated heat source such as explosives. Even the government reports admit that the fires were insufficient to melt steel beams (they argue for heating and warping then failure of these beams) -- but these reports do not mention the observed molten metal in the basements of WTC1, 2 and 7. Again we have a glaring omission of critical data in the FEMA, NIST and 9-11 Commission reports.

7. I understand that models of the steel-frame WTC buildings at Underwriters Laboratories subjected to intense fires did NOT collapse. And no steel-frame buildings before or after 9/11/2001 have collapsed due to fire. Thus, the "official" fire-pancaking model fails the scientific test of REPRODUCIBILITY. (Earthquake- caused collapses have occured, but there were no major earthquakes in NYC on that day. And buildings which have collapsed due to earthquakes collapse asymmetrically, as expected -- not like the nearly straight-down collapse of WTC 7 to a small rubble pile!)

8. Explosions -- multiple loud explosions in rapid sequence -- were heard and reported by numerous observers in (and near) the WTC buildings, consistent with explosive demolition. Some of the firemen who reported explosions barely escaped with their lives.

Essentially none of these science-based considerations is mentioned in the Popular Mechanics article on this subject, authored by B. Chertoff (a cousin of M. Chertoff who heads the Homeland Security Dept.) (Squibs are mentioned briefly, but the brief PM analysis does not fit the observed facts.)

I have performed other analyses regarding the WTC collapses on 9-11-01 which may be of interest --let me know if you're interested. The matter is highly interesting to me as a physicist -- and as a citizen of the United States. I conclude that the evidence for pre-positioned explosives in WTC 7 (also in towers 1 and 2) is truly compelling.

Steven E. Jones
Professor of Physics/BYU

This article was posted on 9.16.05

Jones went nuts four years after 911. Got fired spreading nonsense about 911.

Thermite is used because Jones made it up when he had a break with reality, and 911 truth followers are stupid.

 

[Edx]

You'd want to use thermite because its quiet, because you wouldn't want all those explosions to be heard. Thats why they wanted to use enough explosives to hurl heavy steel hundreds of feet.

Oh wait...