9/11 20 Years Later

34 Comments on “9/11 20 Years Later

  1. I was walking into work at 6 am our time when someone flagged me down and asked if I had heard what was going on.

    I peddled to work that day so no radio.

    Stunned and horrified. Locked cockpits with the right doors would have prevented that. We saw it coming for years (not on that scale).

    I was delighted on AK Airlines response, we have a door ready to go, we are installing them (they had a close call with a nut case and their maint operation designed the door prior)

    All the other airlines were saying, FAA has to approve, AK said, we put it on now and the heck with approvals, they can fine us, we don’t care.

    They gave the door design to other Airlines free.

    • A disadvantage of reinforced cockpit doors being that they unfortunately allow rogue actions in the cockpit, as in the case of Germanwings 9525.

      • I can blow some holes in that theory.

        Start off with EgyptAir Flight 990. Didn’t do the pilot any good back in the cockpit did it?

        Or FedEx 705. A full fledged attacker is defeated by seated pilots.

        So you base the theory on the cockpit response stays the same and the guy doing the suicide just gives up?

        Or that an intervener is fully prepared to take someones life (axe?) and then get control of an aircraft?

        Or the person flying simply does not flip the aircraft upside down?

        We saw the outcome of Flight 93, brave people who took action, knowing they would die doing so. They minimized the catastrophe to as small a number as possible in a choice of no good outcomes.

        Outcome is a crashed aircraft per the evidence to date.

        Changing A and then presupposed a good outcome fails the logic test.

        • None of which changes the fact that a reinforced cockpit door allows rogue actions in the cockpit, as in the case of Germanwings 9525.

          • The MAX corner.
            A lot (all?) of those “Duhh, simple, just .. ” ideas
            have unintended consequences
            and contract the solution space for the future.

          • Bryce:

            What you claim to know is what would have occurred if the door and been open.

            If you can foresee the future you should be in Vegas making boo coo bucks.

            As you are not one has to question that you can predict the future.

            Back in the day that sort of linkage was known as superstitions.

          • @ TW
            As usual, you need to read more accurately.

            Once again, none of your rant changes the fact that a reinforced cockpit door allows rogue actions in the cockpit, as in the case of Germanwings 9525.

    • Thankyou Leeham.

      Excellent of Alaska to start installing better door – just do it! (They had expertise inhouse and Boeing up the road.)

      I cover prior knowledge of probable methods of Islamic Totalitarian terrorist warriors in http://www.moralindividualism.com/prior.htm.

      Must look up the Alaska Airlines case, there was a PSA tragedy in 1987. “That is, real-world demonstration that a motivated person could enter a cockpit and eliminate the pilots.”

      • I read that some airlines are adding a second door to the flight deck.

        I can envision one between forward lavatory and forward galley of Original 737s, which would give pilots access to lavatory and to food the FAs could put on a stand/cart between the doors.

        But would further slow down pax trying to take charge, as they tried on Flight 93.

        As for a pilot going rogue, paying attention to psychology – behaviour, is key.

  2. You may well censor this….. 9/11 was the international community threw out the book of physics.

    • One would first have to be able to understand the comment before deciding if it needed censorship.
      I’ll venture a guess that the comment may be some sort of reference to the collapse mechanism of the towers in NY — but, contrary to various wild theories that circulated at the time, the collapse appears to have been in full accordance with structural/physical laws. The south tower collapsed first because there was a larger static load above the impact zone, which therefore caused more stress on the (damaged and heat-softened) steel beams in the impact zone. The impact zone was also more off-center than for the north tower, causing higher-order stresses such as shear. Because the floors below the impact zone were only designed to carry static load, they failed successively upon each percussive impact of the load above them once the beams in the impact zone finally failed.

      • It is worth noting that one persons off logic take is another persons logical fact based but that in turn does not extend into other areas.

        • “It is worth noting that one persons off logic take is another persons logical fact based but…”

          Well, people do claim ‘fact’ when the correct word is ‘fantasy’.

          Conspiracy theory of cause of collapse of the WTC towers is an example, as is the claim that the moon landings were faked. Scary is those nut cases have a vote.

      • Thankyou for presenting facts, which 911Truthers will ignore of course.

        Softening of steel in beams by fire a key factor.

        There was debate over insulation on beams, but I understood some claims to be wrong.

        The collapse of a strata title apartment building in FL illustrates progressive collapse of floors though different start than Twin Towers (probably began in basement). No survivors in collapsed floors.

        If Scott Hamilton ventures into increasingly unsafe downtown Seattle he might go past the tower on the southerly side of 4th IIRC, opposite the perhaps now old main Library. It is the same design concept as the Twin Towers – much strength in closely spaced vertical members in walls, and a strong central core for utilities and elevators/stairwells.

        (I forget if the Seattle tower was at one time the IBM or the SeaFirst Bank tower.
        Nearby to the east approximately, on northerly side of 4th, a later building had a shuttle elevator system like the NYC Twin Tower I was in once – you take an elevator to an intermediate floor from which you take another elevator to the top. Great view from the social room on the top, and from the women’s washroom I’m told (host might offer tours of it to males).

        • ” It is the same design concept as the Twin Towers – much strength in closely spaced vertical members in walls, and a strong central core for utilities and elevators/stairwells.’

          You do know that both buildings you mention were designed by the same person?
          ” Though he left for New York after graduation, the architect visited Seattle with a regularity that allowed him to form important professional contacts, to influence architects in the region (such as Bindon, Wright, and Partners, and Harmon, Pray and Detrich), and to design three buildings that continue to define the character of Seattle architecture: the Pacific Science Center, the IBM Building, and the Rainier Tower. Because these three buildings realize some of the same artistic intentions that went into the design of the World Trade Center, interpreting them is a way to appreciate some of the deeper meanings that were embodied in the vanished towers.”

        • Seattle First National Bank being an example of a company that bet too heavily in some fields – petroleum and real estate.

          The lady who later became President of US Bank of WA was renowned for avoiding that trap.

          Lesson not learned by Imelt in GE.

          And a limitation of startups – only one product, though perhaps a motivation to do the job well and work at selling, likely the reason Hyundai succeeded in its first foray into Canada. Even companies with more than one product line can err by concentrating too much on one product and one function in the company.

          (The 50-storey building in Seattle that I claim was a predecessor in design to the WTC towers was SeaFirst, now named Safeco (a big insurance company).

          The nearby newer taller one is Columbia Center, confusingly having had SeaFirst in its name originally. Wikipedia says it has a public observatory at top (I was a guest at a private function).

          Reported to have been on terrorist list of targets for September 11, 2001, as the tallest building in WA state.

    • Whacko comment – does ravioli become toxic when spoiled?

      (Serious problem in societies like the US with people who do not grasp that freedom feeds, many have such a negative psychology that they work against it. See my quote elsewhere in this thread from someone who actually worked for freedom.)

    • Also bizzare I was working with European area citizen at the time.

      I have yet to see the type of comment he made characterized, he thought it was funny. I told him he needed to move on because he was about to get a fist to his face.

      I got called in for threatening him. Yep I did, and you might counsel him that some of us take this personally, he is welcome to go back to X. Write it up if you want, I will be happy to take this one to the top.

        • Or perhaps he made an inconvenient remark about the rather “relaxed” security standards at US airports at the time?

          • No, to both of you.

            He thought the fact that the NY skyline was now clear was funny.

            I did not.

            I hope no one else thinks 3000+ people (crash and post crash) causes was anything to do with humor.

          • “Funny” is also a synonym for “odd”…perhaps your comprehension skills failed you.

          • equivalences.

            excessive death caused in humongous amounts abroad
            in frivolous interventions never bothered anyone in the US much.
            But strangely it turns personal when the situation is reversed.

      • ‘Funny’ is an odd reaction.

        Many Modern Liberals did praise the attacks, they are Marxists at root, often they are against the US and its Jewish ally Israel (which Islamic Totalitarians have promised to annihilate).

        “The failure to surrender to their victorious opponents [supporters of capitalism] has led tattered “socialist” parties like the NDP and their leftist members and supporters to mindlessly, recklessly and uncritically support cruel, feudal, racist and terrorist regimes and movements as long as those villains are also anti-American.
        The reason: The United States is simply the symbol of the failure of their life’s work and dreams. Defeat and resentment have rendered these formerly idealistic individuals and organizations vulnerable to new and pernicious forms of anti-Semitism and other political foolishness.”
        — Bob Friedland, Victoria lawyer and former civil rights activist, in the Vancouver Sun of July 25, 2002.

        • I do think that you have no inkling on what you are talking about.
          Angst driven reflexivity.

  3. How times have changed.
    Now, all phones and notebooks are hacked by governments, even when constitutions don’t allow this.
    Less people are trusting governments. It goes so far that people think that vaccines could be poison.
    Governments won’t be elected again. Soon will happen in Germany.

    Too much garbage in this world. 9/11 and other dates happened because of hate.
    Good that Airbus, ATR, Embraer are not Boeing. Need more Good, less hate.

  4. In remembrance of my friend Kathleen Nicosia. She was a 30 year flight attendant for AA and was working flight 11 that morning. AA 11 was the first airplane to slam into WTC #1. (North tower).
    My niece, Kay, worked for Morgan Stanley in the north tower that morning and her office was on the 84th floor, but that morning she was in a meeting on the 42 floor and made it out alive!
    Please take the time to read the story about the man who put together the evac plan for WTC. He was manager of security for Morgan Stanley. His name is Rick Rescorla….. he died that day helping people get out. He predicted after the first bombing in 1993 that the terrorist’s would strike again.

    • Nat Geo ran a whole series of documentaries this weekend concerning the events of 9/11.
      Rick Rescorla was explicitly named in one of them, and was praised for his devotion to safety, including his system of holding monthly drills in which large groups of people had to evacuate via the stairwells all the way down to the ground floor.
      For the convenience of other readers, here’s a Wiki link regarding this man:
      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rick_Rescorla

      • Air Doc:

        thank you, most overlook or are ignorant of the first attack on the towers.

        One of my mechanical magazine subscription covered the mechanical systems failures that resulted after the parking garage bombing.

        It was an eye opener on failure modes for systems that were not designed with a bombing (or air attack) in mind.

        • Any particular reason why you posted that message as a reply to me rather than to AirDoc? AirDoc’s message does, after all, have its own “reply” button. You do understand the way the message indentation here works, don’t you?

        • Would have succeeded toppling one tower into the other if could have packed more explosive power into size of truck that could fit into the parking garage.

          • you would have needed something with the power of a Davy Crokett “thingy”.

            Basement and lower floors are the strongest parts of the building.
            Now hitting in the upper half, starting a massive fire while the impact will have blown away the fire protection from the structure …

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