I am not one of the ones claiming the steel melted.
My position is that given the load stresses on a building of that height, and the structural damage from the impacts and subsequent fires/explosions, the stresses on the individual structure members were altered profoundly. At that point, all that was needed was to change the temper on the steel to weaken it. Once weakened enough, a beam or three would bend/shift/twist and start to move. Any movement and the already dangerous balance of forces begins to shift. Once significant movement of the structure starts, it wont be stopped.

The second tower hit came down first because it was struck lower. The lower strike meant much more weight/force above the impact zone. Also a larger angle on the impact so even more imbalance to the strain after impact.

Melting the steel would not be required. Temper changes do not need that kind of heat. And temper changes can weaken a steel structure enough to fail.

Most of its strength was the outer shell by design. But once a span dops and moves down, the floors start to pancake, and its over. It is coming down and will not stop.

Ok, oxygen does make a difference on the flame temperature. It still strains reason to believe that oxygen would come from somewhere well enough to melt steel at the WTC.
If you take an honest and diligent look at the plane crashes of 9/11 and compare to others, you can't say with any credibility that they were typical. Start with Flight 93 please. That was the crack in the door that led me into full awareness.

Thanks Zero. That's a very good point and example. I learned something from you.
It still is unrelated to too many other disturbing pieces of evidence from that day. For instance, the flight data for Flight 93 (which hit the Pentagon) released by the government shows that the cockpit door open signal was never activated. Hmmm....as I said, scratch the surface and weird things show up all over.

Well, you could look at these potential reasons for initial failure of the girders. You still have to reconcile that with the rest of the ACTUAL evidence that is available to you.

Not that I really want to play - but a bellows in a forge proves the point about oxygen and temperature.

What I've seen?
"Steel and concrete don't turn into ash clouds when they fall into each other from gravity." I never said anything on that matter either way. In fact, all I did was offer a different look at the potential reason for the failure of the girders.

Well, I honestly don't know what you have seen, and not seen. I know what a building collapse would have and should have looked like. I also know what an explosive cloud looks like. Steel and concrete don't turn into ash clouds when they fall into each other from gravity. The buildings were designed to withstand a direct hit from an airliner actually. Plenty of information to find out there if you look for it.

Because of how they were engineered they would have collapsed as they were designed to - as they did.

"Are you aware that molten steel can be verified to exist from multiple independent sources?"

I didn't say no steel melted - its very likely some had. I just stated that it didn't have to melt for its load bearing capacity to be adversely impacted and for gravity to do the rest.

Actually the example I would use would be an oxy-acerylene torch. Add oxygen acetylene flame can be upped from yellow in free air to blue. Very hot at thatbpoint, push the oxygen feed and it gets hotter still to cut With. Amount of available oxidizer at combustion point does matter.

As for the passport, in every plane crash I have ever seen data or reportage on a surprising amount of wallets, purses, etc survive. Not only survive, but in fairly good condition and aid in identification.

Hi AJ. I'm assuming you are sincere and have honest intentions, so let me ask you some questions. Are you aware that molten steel can be verified to exist from multiple independent sources?
After I collected and digested lots of evidence, I realized that what I saw wasn't two buildings collapsing on themselves. Here's a hypothetical question to test your premises: if the twin towers were brought down by controlled demolition, what would that have actually looked like?

Really? That's not how combustion works as I know it. For example, you are saying paper burns hotter in a pure oxygen environment than air with 20% oxygen? We probably agree it burns faster.
Good thing the intense fire that melted steel (not just weakened it) didn't detroy the passport of one of the terrorists that someone found in the debris. Amazing and convenient, eh? Quite a passport protector he must have had.

When you see extreme temperatures without any oxygen source to keep combustion going, you have an exothermic reaction. You'll find that documented at the WTC site if you look for it.

Yes, the implications are what prevent most people from an objective and diligent look at the evidence IMO. This is why it is imperative for those of us who truly want to live in a Gulch and not the other world of Atlas Shrugged need to get busy creating that better reality for ourselves.

I have done a lot of research since 911 myself, along with my husband. It is so very hard to come to grips with something this sinister perpetrated by the monsters governing us and by corporate America. But come to grips I must. There is compelling proof on both sides of the issue, but one side tilts more. I hate what our country has become.

My suspicion is some quite powerful people planned much of this and the rest of government played along because they viewed it as much worse if the actual truth came out. I don't think they failed to see as much discrepancy as I do.

I believe there was an in country plot to make it go down the way it did. How much of an external plot was capitalized upon and from what stage I can't say. But I don't for a minute believe things like hitting the pentagon with a large passenger jet doing impossible maneuvers over an hour after we know we are under some kind of attack when it has its own anti-aircraft batteries and is some of the most guarded airspace in the country. That doesn't happen without some powerful help. If did happen with no help then something is very seriously amiss in our defenses. Nor do I believe that in mere minutes any skyscraper is going to collapse from fire. much less another that wasn't even on fire in the first place.

No, too many things went too maximally wrong to be mere happenstance or for the official story to make sense. I don't know exactly what happened. But I am 99% certain that the official story is not exactly and only what did happen.

Andrea and others, I could make many replies within this thread but let me make my first comment as a new item.
By 2012, I had been heavily involved in two private and independent investigations into major commercial aviations accidents (TWA800 and AA587). As an aerospace engineer and Objectivist committed to knowing the truth and acknowledging reality, I became certain that the official findings were a total lie. I can point you to websites if you like but you can use Google yourself if you care (and think you can handle it, as Jack Nicholson's character would say). These experiences led me to be more curious about the Pentagon attack on 9/11. One thing led to another. In a nutshell, the govenrment's conspiracy theory or hypothesis (the same language applies) is a mile wide but only one inch thick. It is up to each person to have the courage, logic, and honesty to investigate the facts and stories for themselves. It took me over 1 year to come to terms with it. Many questions still remain, but there is ample evidence and physics to prove controlled demolition of 3 buildings and it was no airliner that hit the Pentagon. Fantastic claims, but I've stopped trying to pretend otherwise.

I think it seems way beyond 'very odd' that there would be any un-reacted thermite. Un-reacted thermite doesn't exist in nature.

I can't say 'what really' happened, only what really didn't happen. Bldg.'s 1 and 2 didn't collapse from two planes crashing into them and Bldg 7 didn't collapse from office fires at free fall. And nano-thermite particles aren't generated in kerosene fires and don't exist in nature.

I meant the 'you' as the general term, not you personally. But you bring up another problem which is that we will never have all the facts. That's the trick the government always manages to pull off in these situations. The facts might have been there in the days immediately following the collapse, but the 'We're investigating' answer puts the rest of us in a 2,3,4,5 year delay. By then, what can be determined beyond all doubt.

So what do you think really happened ?

Eric Snowden is my hero!

According to this article about the firestorm in Dresden Germany in WWII, the temperature hit 1500 degrees C (2700 degrees F) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bombing...

If a similar effect occurred in the WTC attack, the steel could have melted.