Are 4 to 4.5 hour office fire simulations valid?

Tony Szamboti

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I am curious to hear the voices of those who frequent this forum as to whether 4 to 4.5 hour fire simulation times are valid for WTC 7 studies such as those contained in the NIST and Weidlinger Associates analyses. The ARUP study used just one hour in its fire simulation.

We have all heard that the fires will burn up the fuel in any one area in about 1 to 2 hours maximum and also that the fires reach temperatures above 600 degrees C for about 40 to 60 minutes and then start to cool. This was shown in the Cardington test data.

See http://www.mace.manchester.ac.uk/pr...aBase/TestData/FullScaleFireTestBRE215741.pdf

It is also interesting that the Cardington test data for protected steel does not reach temperatures which would produce failure. WTC 7's steel was protected.
 
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Tony Szamboti said:
I am curious to hear the voices of those who frequent this forum as to whether 4 to 4.5 hour fire simulation times are valid for WTC 7 studies such as those contained in the NIST and Weidlinger Associates analyses. The ARUP study used just one hour in its fire simulation.

We have all heard that the fires will burn up the fuel in any one area in about 1 to 2 hours maximum and also that the fires reach a peak temperature for about 30 to 40 minutes and then start to cool. This was shown in the Cardington test data.
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That depends on if a chimney effect was present, chimney effects redistribute soot as fuel,
Causing a fire to be hotter and last longer, in structures, such as buildings and debris or garbage piles.
If you an the other members of the Idiotic AE/911 truth had actually studied fire chemistry
From actual fires you wouldn't be asking dumb questions or making insane limited case statements about proof in the first place.

Just for you Tony, a picture of an A325 bolt 7/8th inch in diameter.
bolt1_zpsjc64mef0.jpg
 
Tony, could you please cite where you get the "4 to 4.5 hour fire simulation times" from? What section of the NIST report did you find these numbers in? Are they an assumption fed into a simulation software, or a result coming from a simulation software run? If the latter, perhaps you are not posing a useful question.

I think I remember that NIST checked the results of their fire sim against real world observations - what windows showed what evidence of fire at what times - and considered it a good enough match. Do I remember correctly? Then why do you think the time frame poses a problem?
 
Tony Szamboti said:
We have all heard that the fires will burn up the fuel in any one area in about 1 to 2 hours maximum...
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And yet my wood stove ticks over all night and is often sufficiently hot in the morning to self-ignite when I open the vents and toss on a few small logs. Same thing happened after a big bonfire - I went to the same spot next day to load the next batch of prunings and the damn stuff caught fire with no prompting from me.

Perhaps what you meant was "flames will subside in x hours"? That doesn't mean heat isn't still being produced, does it? Fire crews will damp down a building fire for many hours once the flames are under control, to prevent re-ignition.

Or perhaps you're just grasping at any straw whatsoever.
 
Oystein said:
Tony, could you please cite where you get the "4 to 4.5 hour fire simulation times" from? What section of the NIST report did you find these numbers in? Are they an assumption fed into a simulation software, or a result coming from a simulation software run? If the latter, perhaps you are not posing a useful question.

I think I remember that NIST checked the results of their fire sim against real world observations - what windows showed what evidence of fire at what times - and considered it a good enough match. Do I remember correctly? Then why do you think the time frame poses a problem?
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Chapter 10 in the NIST WTC 7 report and pages 20, B-83, B84, and B-85 of the Weidlinger report.
 
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Tony Szamboti said:
Chapter 10 in the NIST WTC 7 report and page 20, B-83, B84, and B-85 of the Weidlinger report.
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No. Chapter 10 does not contain the number "4.5" [hours].
You can't have found your claim of "4 to 4.5 hour fire simulation times" in Chapter 10 of NCSTAR 1-9.
 
GlennB said:
And yet my wood stove ticks over all night and is often sufficiently hot in the morning to self-ignite when I open the vents and toss on a few small logs. Same thing happened after a big bonfire - I went to the same spot next day to load the next batch of prunings and the damn stuff caught fire with no prompting from me.

Perhaps what you meant was "flames will subside in x hours"? That doesn't mean heat isn't still being produced, does it? Fire crews will damp down a building fire for many hours once the flames are under control, to prevent re-ignition.

Or perhaps you're just grasping at any straw whatsoever.
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Wood stoves use a controlled air to fuel ratio, to limit amount of fuel consumed over a given time span, wind currents control open burning, as well as convection, and redepostation of fuels.

Also an insulation coverage, like gypsum dust can cause a smoldering fire, wind can blow the dust of initiating flame up though deoxidation of hot coals.

Fires are very complex chemical events especially in structures.
 
My phone won't open the Cardington page TSz linked but if memory serves it was a three storey test structure built within its test facility. Not nearly, not even close, to the floor area involved in any of the Manhattan fires on 9/11/01.

Of course we await citation confirmation for a 4.5 hour simulation run.
 
My first house had a small wood pile at the back of the property. It had sat untouched for years, the wood furnace had burned through the firebox and was unusable.
One spring as the snow began to recede I decided to get rid of the pile of partially rotted fire wood. I dumped a pint of gas on it and lit it. Despite being punky, wet, and now frozen, despite being surrounded by snow, it continued to burn all through the night and for half the next day. Reduced the entire pile to ash. There was not a thing left when I shoveled snow on the still smoking ground.
This, and above anecdotes, do not relate directly to office fires but illustrate that hard rules about burn time just do not apply.

Typical truther binary thinking though Tony. Sarns had the same either/or drive behind his "fire simulation".
 
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Oystein said:
No. Chapter 10 does not contain the number "4.5" [hours].
You can't have found your claim of "4 to 4.5 hour fire simulation times" in Chapter 10 of NCSTAR 1-9.
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The figures in the NIST report show heating in one area for nearly 4 hours. However, the NIST report has also been shown to be non-explanatory due to girder trapping and the inability to break through the next floor down.

The figures in the Weidlinger report show heating in one spot for 4.5 hours, so let's talk about the Weidlinger report. You didn't comment on it. Why not?
 
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Tony Szamboti said:
The figures in the NIST report show heating in one area for nearly 4 hours. However, the NIST report has also been shown to be non-explanatory due to girder trapping and the inability to break through the next floor down.

The figures in the Weidlinger report show heating in one spot for 4.5 hours, so let's talk about the Weidlinger report. You didn't comment on it. Why not?
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(According to your unproven limited case hypothetical), why can't you be honest and include that part, your's is a hypothetical case of maximum resistance to collapse nothing more.

Heating does not mean burning in the area convection heating do to air flow as well as refined fuel transport from one area to the other by air movements comes into play.
 
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Tony Szamboti said:
I am curious to hear the voices of those who frequent this forum as to whether 4 to 4.5 hour fire simulation times are valid for WTC 7 studies such as those contained in the NIST and Weidlinger Associates analyses. The ARUP study used just one hour in its fire simulation.

We have all heard that the fires will burn up the fuel in any one area in about 1 to 2 hours maximum and also that the fires reach temperatures above 600 degrees C for about 40 to 60 minutes and then start to cool. This was shown in the Cardington test data.
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There is a problem. First of all, explain to us, how WTC 7 burned for almost 7 hours and then, explain why WTC 7 buckled. In other words, explain the buckling process of WTC 7 before that building collapsed?

You might as well throw away your CD theory and accept the fact that fire, in conjunction with impact damage, was responsible for the collapse of WTC 7 because that is the only evidence there is.
 
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skyeagle409 said:
There is a problem. First of all, explain to us, how WTC 7 burned for almost 7 hours and then, explain why WTC 7 buckled. In other words, explain the buckling process of WTC 7 before that building collapsed?

You might as well throw away your CD theory and accept the fact that fire, in conjunction with impact damage, was responsible for the collapse of WTC 7 because that is the only evidence there is.
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Don't do that, the more money AE/911 twoofers, scam off the ignorant unwashed masses that believe them, the less they will breed.

Do you want the ignorant unwashed masses breeding?:D

Tony is doing the human race a favor and holding down the reproduction of twoofer dumb, and I do mean Dumb.
 
Tony Szamboti said:
The figures in the NIST report show heating in one area for nearly 4 hours. However, the NIST report has also been shown to be non-explanatory due to girder trapping and the inability to break through the next floor down.

The figures in the Weidlinger report show heating in one spot for 4.5 hours, so let's talk about the Weidlinger report. You didn't comment on it. Why not?
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The max temperature recorded in the Cardington study you linked was 1108 C, with many elements (including beams, bolts, end plates, etc. reaching temperatures of 800-1000 C). Given that the test structure (a narrow, 8 floor building) was a great deal smaller than wtc 7, and the fires in the test structure burnt for a far shorter time over, it's really hard to compare the two. The linked study temperatures look in line with the WAI temperatures and the temperatures observed in the scale model test of the WTC 1 fires, in any case.
 
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Tony Szamboti said:
The figures in the NIST report show heating in one area for nearly 4 hours.
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Which figures?
Which area?
And so what?

Tony, you are an engineer, you say? You are awfully imprecise and unfocused!

Tony Szamboti said:
However, the NIST report has also been shown to be non-explanatory due to girder trapping and the inability to break through the next floor down.
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Yeah, bla bla bla poison the well bla bla bla.

What is this crap thread about? Make a point like an engineer would! Don't jump around and make us guess what your beef is!

Tony Szamboti said:
The figures in the Weidlinger report show heating in one spot for 4.5 hours,
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Which figures?
Which area?
And so what?

Tony Szamboti said:
so let's talk about the Weidlinger report. You didn't comment on it. Why not?
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You din't cite it. Apparently, you were not interested in anyone whatsoever looking at it, or else you would have provided a proper citation, ideally complete with a working URL.

Are you this terribly sloppy in your professional dealings, too?
 
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benthamitemetric said:
The max temperature recorded in the Cardington study you linked was 1108 C, with many elements (including beams, bolts, end plates, etc. reaching temperatures of 800-1000 C). Given that the test structure (a narrow, 8 floor building) was a great deal smaller than wtc 7, and the fires in the test structure burnt for a far shorter time over, it's really hard to compare the two. The linked study temperatures look in line with the WAI temperatures and the temperatures observed in the scale model test of the WTC 1 fires, in any case.
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I think the Weidlinger report is problematic with continuous heating of one area for 4.5 hours. They reference the fire analysis conducted by Beyler (2010) for Hughes Associates, who was also involved in the NIST report, but they don't provide it or explain how it supports the claim for 4.5 hour heating of one area.
 
Tony Szamboti said:
I think the Weidlinger report is problematic with continuous heating of one area for 4.5 hours. They reference the fire analysis conducted by Beyler (2010) for Hughes Associates, who was also involved in the NIST report, but they don't provide it or explain how it supports the claim for 4.5 hour heating of one area.
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How will this help your CD fantasy? As Gage goes more nuts on 9/11, how will you recover from pushing the lie of CD. Gee, Gage believes in a stand down, how paranoid and crazy can Gage go before you expose him as a loon?

Failed to present evidence for CD, so you make up BS about the NIST report. Fire caused the collapse, your silent explosives remain fantasy.

I can't wait until you complete SIOP for 9/11 is explained. Here you are stuck on Flight 11, and Flight 175; what great fantasies do you have for Flight 77 and Flight 93; after this tangent of BS attacking NIST fails?
 
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All this dodging and twisting Tony.
You haven't done anything, engineering-wise, have you?
All these assertions and grasping at straws, dodgings, changing the subject.
Show us a freebody.
 
Tony Szamboti said:
I think the Weidlinger report is problematic with continuous heating of one area for 4.5 hours. They reference the fire analysis conducted by Beyler (2010) for Hughes Associates, who was also involved in the NIST report, but they don't provide it or explain how it supports the claim for 4.5 hour heating of one area.
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It is called air flow, if you were an engineer, you would understand where and how that matters in a building fire.

Air goes in one point out the other and draws out the heat from combustion.

Look at the structure figure it out like an engineer would, or ask q real life engineer to explain it to you.

Simple as that.
 
Crazy Chainsaw said:
Don't do that, the more money AE/911 twoofers, scam off the ignorant unwashed masses that believe them, the less they will breed.

Do you want the ignorant unwashed masses breeding?:D

Tony is doing the human race a favor and holding down the reproduction of twoofer dumb, and I do mean Dumb.
Click to expand...


It is simply amazing that anyone in this world could have been so easily duped without a shred of evidence.
 
beachnut said:
How will this help your CD fantasy? As Gage goes more nuts on 9/11, how will you recover from pushing the lie of CD. Gee, Gage believes in a stand down, how paranoid and crazy can Gage go before you expose him as a loon?

Failed to present evidence for CD, so you make up BS about the NIST report. Fire caused the collapse, your silent explosives remain fantasy.

I can't wait until you complete SIOP for 9/11 is explained. Here you are stuck on Flight 11, and Flight 175; what great fantasies do you have for Flight 77 and Flight 93; after this tangent of BS attacking NIST fails?
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The NIST WTC 7 report was shown to be invalid by the ARUP analyses, since the NIST push off can't work due to girder trapping. The ARUP analyses were then shown themselves to contain fatal errors by me and the Weidlinger report.

We are now looking at the Weidlinger report (October 2010) to see if it shows fire could have caused the collapse without any of the fatal flaws exhibited in the other two reports (NIST in November 2008 and ARUP in April 2010).
 
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Tony Szamboti said:
The NIST WTC 7 report was shown to be invalid by the ARUP analyses, since the NIST push off can't work due to girder trapping. The ARUP analyses were then shown themselves to contain fatal errors by me and the Weidlinger report.

We are now looking at the Weidlinger report (October 2010) to see if it shows fire could have caused the collapse without any of the fatal flaws exhibited in the other two reports (NIST in November 2008 and ARUP in April 2010).
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The hours-long duration of uncontrolled fires, major impact damage and structural buckling made it quite clear as to the cause of the collapse.
 
skyeagle409 said:
The hours-long duration of uncontrolled fires, major impact damage and structural buckling made it quite clear as to the cause of the collapse.
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Maybe if the NIST and ARUP report authors had you on board they could have avoided the errors they made and we wouldn't be having this discussion.

In the meantime, the only report still standing is Weidlinger and its 4.5 hour fire heating in one spot needs to be scrutinized as it is not the norm.
 
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Tony Szamboti said:
Maybe if the NIST and ARUP report authors had you on board they could have avoided the errors they made and we wouldn't be having this discussion.
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Errors or not, it is quite clear that fire, in conjunciton with impact damage, was responsible for the collapse of WTC 7.
 
Tony Szamboti said:
The NIST WTC 7 report was shown to be invalid by the ARUP analyses, since the NIST push off can't work due to girder trapping. The ARUP analyses were then shown themselves to contain fatal errors by me and the Weidlinger report.

We are now looking at the Weidlinger report (October 2010) to see if it shows fire could have caused the collapse without any of the fatal flaws exhibited in the other two reports (NIST in November 2008 and ARUP in April 2010).
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But Tony, you do get that none of these reports is intended to prove a specific scenario happened, right? And that they don't actually contradict each other because they are all looking at different scenarios, right? They are all examining what could have happened in reasonable--but different--fire scenarios, and they all rely on different tools and assumptions.

ARUP's reports, for example, were designed to illustrate reasonable scenarios in which the unfilled flutes (i.e., negligent construction) could have caused a collapse where filled flutes would not have. WAI is intending to show, in response to ARUP's limited scenarios, that collapse would have occurred with or without filled flutes.
 
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benthamitemetric said:
But Tony, you do get that none of these reports is intended to prove a specific scenario happened, right? And that they don't actually contradict each other because they are all looking at different scenarios, right? They are all examining what could have happened in reasonable--but different--fire scenarios, and they all use different tools and assumptions.

ARUP's reports, for example, were designed to illustrate reasonable scenarios in which the unfilled flutes (i.e., negligent construction) could have caused a collapse where filled flutes would not have. WAI is intending to show, in response to ARUP's limited scenarios, that collapse would have occurred with or without filled flutes.
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ARUP actually does contradict NIST in that they specifically show that girder A2001 cannot be pushed off its seat at column 79 to the west. This is the NIST initiating event.

Weidlinger then shows neither NIST or ARUP can break through the next floor down with girder A2001 falling off its seat. This was independently shown by myself six months ago, prior to my seeing the Weidlinger report in June of this year.
 
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Tony Szamboti said:
ARUP actually does contradict NIST in that they specifically show that girder A2001 cannot be pushed off its seat at column 79 to the west. This is the NIST initiating event.

Weidlinger then shows neither NIST or ARUP can break through the next floor down with girder A2001 falling off its seat. This was independently shown by myself six months ago, prior to my seeing the Weidlinger report in June of this year.
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No, ARUP shows that in the specific heating scenarios they examined that the girder could not be pushed off to the west. They never independently tested NIST's heating scenario or any of the other infinite possible heating scenarios beyond their choice scenarios. If you put NIST's exact temperature model into the ARUP model and the girder got trapped, then you would have a good argument that ARUP showed NIST's model was flawed for omission of certain parts, but that's not what ARUP did.
 
Tony Szamboti said:
ARUP actually does contradict NIST in that they specifically show that girder A2001 cannot be pushed off its seat at column 79 to the west. This is the NIST initiating event.

Weidlinger then shows neither NIST or ARUP can break through the next floor down with girder A2001 falling off its seat. This was independently shown by myself six months ago, prior to my seeing the Weidlinger report in June of this year.
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Bravo.

Can you demonstrate multiples of 192 explosive detonations spread (according to you) over approx. 1 second just prior to global collapse?

I think you should start there, with actual evidence, rather than hinting that fire-induced collapse was impossible therefore there must have been multiples of 192 explosions.

Collapse following damage and fire has many ways to lead to collapse, but the explosives only one. You have zero evidence of explosives.
 
Tony Szamboti said:
I think the Weidlinger report is problematic with continuous heating of one area for 4.5 hours. They reference the fire analysis conducted by Beyler (2010) for Hughes Associates, who was also involved in the NIST report, but they don't provide it or explain how it supports the claim for 4.5 hour heating of one area.
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At what point does this line of questioning dovetail with controlled demolition?
 
Tony Szamboti said:
Maybe if the NIST and ARUP report authors had you on board they could have avoided the errors they made and we wouldn't be having this discussion.

In the meantime, the only report still standing is Weidlinger and its 4.5 hour fire heating in one spot needs to be scrutinized as it is not the norm.
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What is?
 
Tony Szamboti said:
Maybe you should write your own report.
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I could keep it very simple and easily debunk the WTC 7 CD theory based on available evidence and facts on what it takes to bring down a steel frame building with explosives.

What can you tell us about the following report?


Chief Peter Hayden, FDNY

"Early on, we saw a bulge in the southwest corner between floors 10 and 13, and we had put a transit on that and we were pretty sure she was going to collapse. You actually could see there was a visible bulge, it ran up about three floors."


In reference to WTC 7, what did the 'visible bulge' indicate?
 
Tony Szamboti said:
I am curious to hear the voices of those who frequent this forum as to whether 4 to 4.5 hour fire simulation times are valid for WTC 7 studies such as those contained in the NIST and Weidlinger Associates analyses. The ARUP study used just one hour in its fire simulation.
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Would you support a longer study over a much larger area?

Certainly the condition of the building as a whole is more important than focusing on one area in isolation. Would you agree?
 
Tony still has not explained and properly sourced what his 4 (NIST) and 4.5 (WAI) hours of ... something refer to, and what he wants to claim they are relevant to.

As far as NIST is concerned, he so far pointed to Chapter 10 of NCSTAR 1-9. This chapter contains no fire simulation and thus cannot contain any justification for any duration of heating applied to any region within the structure.
It is entirely unclear, what region, and which 4 hours of what he is even speaking about.

As for the WAI study: A URL would be nice, followed by a couple of quotes with page number or some such, to start establishing something to talk about.

Somehow, Tony feels that 4 to 4.5 of something someway hot are somehow not quite right, but he hasn't even begun to construct an argument.

I suggest we all first wait for Tony to present an argument.
 
Tony Szamboti said:
I am curious to hear the voices of those who frequent this forum as to whether 4 to 4.5 hour fire simulation times are valid for WTC 7 studies such as those contained in the NIST and Weidlinger Associates analyses. The ARUP study used just one hour in its fire simulation.

We have all heard that the fires will burn up the fuel in any one area in about 1 to 2 hours maximum and also that the fires reach temperatures above 600 degrees C for about 40 to 60 minutes and then start to cool. This was shown in the Cardington test data.

See http://www.mace.manchester.ac.uk/pr...aBase/TestData/FullScaleFireTestBRE215741.pdf

It is also interesting that the Cardington test data for protected steel does not reach temperatures which would produce failure. WTC 7's steel was protected.
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If WTC7 is one of the big towers, they know the heat protection on the structural steel was blown off by the crashes on the floor(s) they impacted due to the dustification on contact of the planes as they crashed in (due to speed).

That was on television within a couple of months as intelligent analyses had started being available - as opposed to the near immediate crap ideas from the loose brains tools!!!
 
Oystein said:
Tony still has not explained and properly sourced what his 4 (NIST) and 4.5 (WAI) hours of ... something refer to, and what he wants to claim they are relevant to.

As far as NIST is concerned, he so far pointed to Chapter 10 of NCSTAR 1-9. This chapter contains no fire simulation and thus cannot contain any justification for any duration of heating applied to any region within the structure.
It is entirely unclear, what region, and which 4 hours of what he is even speaking about.

As for the WAI study: A URL would be nice, followed by a couple of quotes with page number or some such, to start establishing something to talk about.

Somehow, Tony feels that 4 to 4.5 of something someway hot are somehow not quite right, but he hasn't even begun to construct an argument.

I suggest we all first wait for Tony to present an argument.
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You can find the WAI report here: http://www.thorntontomasetti.com/projects/world_trade_center_7_collapse_investigation/

The report cites an expert report by Dr. Craig Beyler (a world renowned fire science expert and Chair of the International Association for Fire Safety Science) that provides the basis for WAI's temperature model. The Beyler report is not independently available, as far as I know (like the main WAI report itself, it seems to have been prepared for the defense in the Aegis litigation but never ultimately filed with the court since that case was won on summary judgment, but it was not released with the WAI report). There are, however, references in the report to a 4.5 hour time frame for the peak temperatures in the collapse-initiating area resulting from the fires modeled. If you look at page 17 of the WAI report, fore example, you can get a sense for the fire modeled. Based on the hockey stick of the temperatures, it seems he was likely modeling a traveling fire that only reached peak intensity at the collapse area in the hour before the collapse initiated.

And, just because I like reminding people that these engineering issues really are of great interest to (and not ignored by) the structural engineering community, I'll also note that the WAI WTC 7 report won the following awards:

2015 Grand Award, American Council of Engineering Companies, World Trade Center 7 Collapse Analysis and Assessment Forensic Study, New York, New York
2015 Diamond Award, American Council of Engineering Companies of New York, World Trade Center 7 Collapse Analysis and Assessment Forensic Study, New York, New York

This also answers the question as to why the report, though not ultimately filed in the Aegis litigation, was ultimately released to the public and touted on WAI's website sometime this year--they are celebrating it as a substantial professional achievement.

EDIT: here is a video of Dr. Abboud receiving his award for the WAI WTC 7 investigation: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6VGDqoJWXf0
 
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fuelair said:
If WTC7 is one of the big towers, they know the heat protection on the structural steel was blown off by the crashes on the floor(s) they impacted due to the dustification on contact of the planes as they crashed in (due to speed).

That was on television within a couple of months as intelligent analyses had started being available - as opposed to the near immediate crap ideas from the loose brains tools!!!
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Just in case: at speed, the outer metal skin and softer parts were mostly turned to tiny particulates moving at high speed inward towards rooms, walls and structural material. The structural material had initially fireproofing coating that would have inhibited the possibility of heating to softness, but, the high speed particles of aircraft scraped off pretty much all the fireproofing/heat insulating material so the supports were now able to be heated enough to weaken and allow the floors to break down/past/throughwith them.
 
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