A friend emailed me and some other friends a note mentioning that he had attended an evening with Ed Asner doing a play reading. “He is convinced that there was a 9/11 conspiracy, and cites the collapse of World Trade Building #7, an implosion-type collapse at the same time as #1 and #2.  And #7 is a couple of blocks away.  Insurance payoff was generous.” Below is a revised version of my response to our group.

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Here is # 7 before noon on 9-11, with an arrow to #6 --

Seven is the tall dark one just left of center, going up out of the frame. The dark grey clouds of smoke are coming from pretty much all its windows on one side.

The familiar looking white building far left is the Verizon Building. Standing in front of both it and #7 are the still standing 9 stories (I've seen 8 given, also.) of Building #6. To the right of it and in the center-right of the picture are the remains of WTC #1.

Here's a map-photo. #7 is just rubble in it. Text marking its lower part on this image is “(47 Stories).” And I’ve inserted a red line under the text. To its left is the white facade of the Verizon Building. You can figure out about where the photographer was standing when he took the photo above before #7 fell.

Some people say WTC1 pancaked down to this pretty much as a result of weakening of the steel structure due to fire, and others say it must have been brought down by a carefully planned demolition. But neither explanation makes sense in view of the photo above that shows how little of the tower remains on the ground.

Demolition folks expect from 10 to 15% of the demolished building’s original height to remain on the ground after they do their thing. For WTC1 that would mean a minimum of 11 stories. Maybe 15. But the still-standing WTC6, an 8 or 9 story building, can be seen behind the remains of WTC1 in the top photo, and from the perspective of the photograph it’s plain to see that we only have maybe three or four stories of WTC1 remaining, at most.

That raises the interesting question of Where did the towers  go?

Before I get into a few more details, I want to offer a real-life comparison of tall-building demolition or pancacking, here is the tallest building to be brought down by demolition in Europe before it went. It's 38 stories, 116 meters high.

Notice the white-blue buildings immediately behind it to the right. They seem to be 6 stories tall with maybe another as the roof.

Now near the end of this video (2.53) of the implosion (taken from a similar but more distant point of view) you can see the same white-blue buildings as well as the rubble of the 38 stories and some buildings to the right. If 15% of the building in height was left over, which would be six stories, that would appear to be about right for this.

That perspective and all the dust make the judgement of how-high-the-rubble-is rather uncertain, but the six-story read is confirmed more easilily in this photo, apparently taken looking back toward the building from which the video above was taken. In judging the height of the rubble pile, be sure to take into account perspective.

Let’s return now to that photo taken before building 7 was brought down:

Explanations I have heard (for the failure of the debris to make it up to even 8 or 9 stories) that are unsatisfactory are 1) that there were 7 stories below ground for the building to fall into and 2) they hauled most of it away and 3) most of the building was blown out to the sides. It is easy to show that the 7 stories below ground were not filled with WTC1's rubble (there are below-ground photos and, in any case, much of the standing remnant is manifestly from the first floors of WTC1 ) and, of course, this photo is taken before noon on the day of the disaster, so there was no time for hauling the rubble away. Explanation three doesn't fit with other photos taken on the same day which do not show anything like the missing ten or so stories of stuff. Nor did people report such a massive blowing out, which would have damaged many of the buildings all around. And you don't see it in the many videos of the thing. Still there was stuff blown out to the side, just not nearly that much, and it certainly did damage some of the other buildings.

The explanation that makes best sense to me is that the buildings were mostly turned to dust. They didn't fall down. You can read about that theory here: drjudywood.com/new.html. I have a copy of that book if you’d like to borrow it. I see that Amazon is selling it now for about $50 a copy. Where did the towers  go?

bob