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William,
I do have strong feelings about this, but I sincerely
don't understand where I have clouded the issue.
I am a firefighter on a ladder company in the Seattle
Fire Department. You obviously have a good
understanding of building construction. With the
exception of your statement that I have clouded the
issue, I agree with everything you said.
My previous response was simply to refute the
allegation that the F.D.N.Y. "screwed up royally".
This kind of armchair quarterbacking by sedentary
individuals who have never fought fire really
irritates me.
The FD's job is to take a situation that is out of
control and somehow make it better. Given the insane
circumstances on Sept 11, I think the FDNY did the
best job it could. They deserve accolades, not
condemnation.
-Lance
--- William Brower <1000mileman@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>
>
> Clearly you have strong feelings on this issue but
> you have let them cloud
> the issue. The Fire Department has no
> responsibility for the design
> characteristics of buildings, some of which include
> the materials used, the
> fire resistance ratings of the structural members
> and the structural
> behavior under various conditions (fire, wind load,
> vibration, settlement,
> shear, racking). The design requirements for such
> structures are firmly
> embedded in specifications set forth by various
> design and testing firms
> and adopted by local government agencies. Design
> engineering firms use
> these guidelines for producing the building plans
> and specifications. City
> building inspectors are charged with enforcement of
> the building code. The
> Fire Department is eventually charged with the
> responsibility of
> controlling fires and saving lives.
>
> The fireproofing used on the steel in the WTC was
> most likely blown
> completely off some of the structural members.
> Fireproofing comes in many
> forms but to build a skyscraper, the accepted form
> is called spray-on
> fireproofing. It is a mixture of cementious
> material mixed with fire
> retardant. It is soft and can be scratched easily
> with your finger. It is
> very likely that portions of that material were
> dislodged during the impact
> of the plane and then the fire weakened the steel
> which led to the
> collapse. Interior structural members, known as the
> core of the structure,
> are often the most critical to the stability of the
> structure. That is
> often where the diagonal bracing is located. The
> core is usually
> fireproofed with cement masonry units (CMU), better
> known as concrete
> blocks. These walls were also likely to have been
> knocked down at the time
> of the impact. The underlying core steel members
> would then be totally
> exposed. The collapse would then be unavoidable.
>
> OK, so how do we build buildings to prevent this
> type of disaster. Very
> simple, you define the type of blast and fire you
> anticipate and then build
> the structure to meet these requirements. Based on
> what we have seen so
> far, the sky scraper of the future would probably
> have 110 stories with 20
> feet of reinforced concrete exterior walls with no
> windows. No matter what
> you build, the terrorist has the ability to choose a
> weapon to attack the
> structure you build. It is not a game you can ever
> win by redesigning the
> buildings. You need to prevent the attack in the
> first place.
>
> At 10:04 AM 9/22/01 -0700, you wrote:
> >Hello Omega list,
> >
> >I'm writing mainly in response to Jack Griffin's
> >statement in which he "condemns" F.D.N.Y. for not
> >"knowing" that the World Trade Center buildings
> were
> >going to collapse.
> >
> >I'd also like to shed some light on the purpose of,
> >and limitations of fire sprinkler systems in
> response
> >to Mark Brown's post.
> >
> >Jack Griffin wrote: Come on, the Fire Department
> >should have thought about it. So if you won't
> condemn
> >them I will. It was their job to know this (that
> the
> >WTC’s would collapse). It was even in the stupid
> >building design that the steel could only last 2
> hrs
> >at best in a fire. They screwed up royally…
> >
> >I am almost as stunned by the ignorance of this
> >statement as I am by the fact that men would fly
> >planes into buildings.
> >
> >Jack, I assure you that the F.D.N.Y. did, in fact,
> >give some thought to the possibility of collapse.
> >Allow me to educate you about why we have Fire
> >Departments, and what their priorities are. The
> >acronym L.I.P. adequately sums up the FD’s incident
> >priorities. L.I.P.
> >stands for: L Life safety. I Incident
> >stabilization. P Property conservation.
> >
> >Upon arrival at the WTC incident, or any “typical”
> >building fire, the Incident Commander must weigh
> the
> >benefits versus the risks of sending firefighters
> into
> >the building. Probably the most important question
> the
> >IC has to consider is, “are there victims inside
> this
> >structure who can be saved by aggressive interior
> >tactics?” If the answer to this question is yes (as
> it
> >was at the WTC incident), then any IC worth their
> salt
> >will send firefighters into the building in an
> attempt
> >to save lives.
> >
> >Basically, if there are lives to be saved,
> >firefighters will put themselves in harms way to
> save
> >those lives. Even if building collapse is a
> >possibility. There was no way to “know” that the
> WTC
> >towers would collapse so quickly.
> >
> >Although most people intuitively understand this,
> Jack
> >apparently fails to get it.
> >
> >Imagine the following scenario. It’s 2:00 am, the
> >kitchen, living room, and attic of your parent’s
> home
> >are completely involved in fire, and the rest of
> their
> >home is being charged with thick smoke. Your
> parents
> >are asleep behind their closed bedroom door, and
> >because of carbon monoxide, they fail to awaken at
> the
> >sound of the smoke detectors going off. When the
> fire
> >department arrives, they decide it’s too dangerous
> to
> >try to enter the home and save your parents because
> >there is a possibility the roof might collapse due
> to
> >the lightweight truss construction in the attic.
> How
> >would you feel about this fire department after
> your
> >parents died in their bed of smoke inhalation,
> their
> >bodies untouched by fire? At that point, do you
> think
> >you might become a fan of aggressive fire
> department
> >tactics?
> >
> >The F.D. at the WTC was faced with similar
> decisions,
> >on a massively larger scale. What if the fire
> >department didn’t go into the WTC towers, and they
> >didn’t collapse, and thousands of people died in
> the
> >fire? What would you think then?
> >
> >Jack, it’s easy to play Monday morning quarterback,
> >after a ballgame or a tragic incident. Until you’ve
> >worn a set of turnouts and crawled around in a
> burning
> >building, you don’t have the right to condemn any
> fire
> >department, because you don’t know what you’re
> talking
> >about.
> >
> >
> >Moving along…
> >
> >
> >A typical fire sprinkler will discharge
> approximately
> >25 - 35 gallons of water per minute when activated.
> >Fire sprinklers are activated by a fusible link
> that
> >opens the sprinkler head when the temperature
> reaches
> >a given level. Only those sprinklers in direct
> contact
> >with the fire's heat will react.
> >
> >When jumbo jets slammed into the WTC buildings,
> most,
>
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