http://www.bedoper.com/pentagon/asce

Accompanying photos at above link.


Problems With the ASCE Report On The Pentagon Cast Further Doubt on 757 Story

By Jason Christie
8/8/2004


Three years after 9/11, there is still little to no evidence indicating a 757 struck the Pentagon. Indeed, there seems to have been no "official" investigation into this topic at all. Many who claim a 757 hit the Pentagon cite an American Society of Civil Engineers building study as proof. I contend that the ASCE report, despite its assumptions regarding the day in question, actually supports the belief that no 757 hit the Pentagon.


The report, some sixty pages long, was released in January of 2003. Its stated purpose was not to investigate the events that caused damage to the Pentagon, but to examine the performance of the building after the incident in question. It makes certain base assumptions regarding the assumed presence of a 757, and works forward from there.


While there are an impressive number of PhDs behind the building performance report, some of the logic is rather spotty, and the report seems to include at least one falsehood. Other areas of the report openly contradict the claims many have made in support of the 757 theory.


The most serious error in the ASCE report can be found in section 3, "Review of Crash Information". Figure 3.3, a still frame from the unofficial, yet released Pentagon security camera footage, incorrectly labels the white smoke trail in the still "Approaching Aircraft". If the many building performance experts on the panel who assembled the report cannot tell the difference between a white, bumpy smoke trail and a 757, their credibility is questionable, at best.


Smoke trail mislabled as 757.

Figure 3.4 clearly shows an extension of the same smoke trail reaching all the way to the Pentagon, which would make this "757" hundreds of feet longer than a real 757. That is, of course, ignoring the fact that this supposed 757 lacks any wings, a tail, or any marking that would indicate it is an airliner.


Smoke trail remains in place. Clearly, that was not a 757.


In fact, the ASCE report is the only place I have seen this bumpy, irregular smoke trail referred to as a 757. I believe this piece of disinformation is deliberate. If it is unintentional, then the ASCE should correct this report in order to save their credibility. There is nothing in the still frames that remotely resembles a 757, so it is difficult to believe a team of engineers could make a mistake of this magnitude.


The ASCE report also aids supporters of the 757 theory by misrepresenting the width of the initial impact damage. While the photograph in figure 3.8 indicates that only two windows, and a single column are missing from the second floor, the drawing placed beside it (figure 3.10) shows a total of four missing windows. This illustration does not correspond to any known photograph. Its inclusion is yet another reason to doubt the veracity of the report.


Note the fencing in place, where the left wing clearly would have struck, had a 757 hit the Pentagon.


The ambiguous presence of the two windows on the second floor are revealed only under magnification. No columns are shown on the bottom floor.


This is crucial, as the small size of the initial entry point, along with the stunning lack of debris, is the main reason so many doubt the claim that a 757 struck the Pentagon to begin with.


Careful reading of the report shows that only a single column and two windows from the second floor were removed. This makes the width of the damage at the top of the entry point somewhere between sixteen and twenty feet. Of course, part of the top of the column is still evident in photographs, which calls into question the possibility that a massive 757 inflicted the damage, yet left this piece of the building in position.

Note the lack of tail damage.
Two windows wide, with the top part of the column hanging down. Total lack of tail damage above presumed impact area.


The damage to the first floor columns, based on photographic evidence and the ASCE report text, shows only 5 columns were removed at that point. However, figure 3.10, again, seems to show a much larger area of damage. This confusion aids many 757 theorists by enabling them to claim, falsely, that the entry hole into the Pentagon was one hundred to one hundred and twenty feet wide. This figure, as revealed in the ASCE text (section 6.1), actually refers to damage to the Pentagon’s façade, and not the actual entry hole.


Deceptively, both missing and damaged columns are assigned the same color. In the front wall, only columns 10-14 were removed, in fact.

Finally, the diagrams 6.2 and 6.3 show another fallacy of the 757 story, and illustrate a dramatic lack of critical thinking on the part of the report’s authors. The supposed exit point of the alleged 757 is commonly referred to as the "AE punch-out". It was a circular hole approximately eight feet wide in the rear wall of the Pentagon, where the remains of the aircraft are claimed to have exited.


An amazing number of columns in front of the AE punch-out "exit hole". Did a giant pachinko ball strike the Pentagon?


However, as diagrams 6.2 and 6.3 clearly illustrate, at least four columns remained in place in front of the claimed exit hole. It is difficult to imagine something with the size and mass required to create this exit point weaving around the columns like a giant pachinko ball in order to reach the rear wall and create this circular-shaped hole. This facet of the damage in not questioned in the ASCE report.


Whatever made this hole couldn't have been a 757, or even a missile, due to the columns in front of it. Probably man-made.

Furthermore, the supposed 757 engines remain unaccounted for in the ASCE’s study. With these obvious holes in the 757 theory, and the lack of debris, supporters of the 757 story are reduced to reliance on eyewitness testimony. This testimony, hearsay evidence, would not even be allowed in court unless presented by the eyewitness themselves, and certainly cannot account for the lack of 757 debris or explain the other serious flaws in the 757 theory.


There is an ambiguity to the World Trade Center case that allows for endless debate on the issues involved. There is considerably less "wiggle room" when it comes to the Pentagon, and that is probably why FEMA neglected to study the Pentagon at all. A formal report on the cause of the damage itself would have renewed debate, and put FEMA on the defensive.


Unless definitive evidence indicating a 757 is uncovered, the most logical conclusion that can be reached when studying all of the available evidence is that no 757 hit the Pentagon, and a subsequent cover-up was attempted. And of course, if no 757 struck the Pentagon, then all of the events surrounding 9/11 must be questioned. I invite all interested parties to read the ASCE report for themselves and consider the many flaws in this building performance report.

So all the witnesses who saw the plane actually go into the Pentagon must be lying

The physical evidence and eyewittness testimony shows you are wrong.

Read this article from abovetopsecret.

__________________
Howling from the Shadows

It must be fun to lead a life completely unburdened by reality. --- JayUtah

You can't reason an irrational person out of an irrational belief. --- Noclevername

Apollo: The History and the Hoax
Enter the World of Athran

Are you Jason Christie? Do you have Jason Christie's permission to post this article? You gave a link; why then also post the entire contents here?

__________________
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Erm, no.

I've read that thread. I've posted to that thread. If you think that Catherder post ties up all the many loose ends, you'd be incorrect.

I guess we can take apart, point by point, in here, if you feel that's necessary or desirable. The issues I raised in that thread went unanswered, for what it's worth.

Thanks for that insightful analysis of the essay in question, though.

I appear to have Jason Christie's permission to do absolutely anything I want. I posted it here for the people who won't follow the link.

What's it to you?

Have you ever actually examined the "eyewitness" accounts in depth?

What do you mean? Like:

Sean Boger, Air Traffic Controller and Pentagon tower chief - "I just looked up and I saw the big nose and the wings of the aircraft coming right at us and I just watched it hit the building," Air Traffic Controller and Pentagon tower chief Sean Boger said. "It exploded. I fell to the ground and covered my head. I could actually hear the metal going through the building."

But I failed read later that:

Sean Boger also said "It was amazing, real trippy. Mind you, I was snorting a lot of coke and high as a kite at the time, so I suppose it could well have been a hallucination".

Do you mean something like that?

__________________
"For ignorance to reign, all it takes is for knowledgable people to say nothing"

Lonewulf

How about the guy who said the "757" ripped an antenna off of a Jeep Cherokee?

; )

More 9/11 CT malarkey. The Pentagon was struck by a passenger plane. That's bad enough IMO. The Pentagon "phantom plane" is old news Jason.

Let's hear what you think really happened. Include the how and why .. although if it has anything to do with Reptilians, don't bother.

Well, you could address the essay above, I guess. I don't think a 757 hit the Pentagon.

Okay. So a 757 didn't hit the Pentagon. What's your evidence? How do you refute the eyewitness testimony? How were all of those witnesses "mistaken"? And/or how were they fooled?

__________________
"A long habit of not thinking a thing wrong gives it a superficial appearance of being right." -- Thomas Paine

Being intelligent is not a felony. But most societies evaluate it as at least a misdemeanor. -- Heinlein

Creationists make it sound as though a "theory" is something you dreamt up after being drunk all night. -- Isaac Asimov

Ok. I agree.


You could start, or perhaps someone else, by addressing the essay I posted here. Still waiting for someone to, you know, do that.

As for the "eyewitnesses", how hard is it to get a few military people, USA Today editors and members of a military-related publishing company to lie?

In what scenario does "eyewitness" trump "physical evidence"?

84 video cameras, and none of them show a 757?

I already did. I'm not buying it. Are you here just to pick lint too?

CT promoters like to avoid the big picture, preferring to dwell on snory minutiae (see some of those WTC threads) but for me, you have to tell me how it was done and even more importantly, why. That's the Achilles' Heel of the whole 9/11 conspiracy hokum. There's no "ends" to justify the alleged "means."

I want to know what you think really happened and why it happened. If you're not up for that just say so.

I COULD play Devil's Advocate here for a moment. No, really.

Okay. Let's assume that the Government is in control by some group or another -- some private group that has the whole "Ends justify the means, and the Ends are only understandable by us, thus, we're always justified" group...

Then let's assume that Bush is part of this group, or at least has something to gain from a relationship with said group.

Okay. So we have a conspiracy already. But now the conspiracy gets worse -- take in that Bush's family dealt with oil, and that they needed an excuse to go to Iraq. Well, if you attack the twin towers, and then attack the Pentagon, two stong symbols in America, you run into the little area of patriotism. Add in the patriotic music videos and ideals in the prevailing month, and you suddenly have time where the people can be moved into acts of patriotism.

The Patriot Act, which basically lets the Government imprison whoever they want, as long as they "think that they're terrorists" is passed; many of those arrested, some of which are undoubtably innocent, are moved into secret camps and tortured.

I dunno, if you ask me, I can actually see a motive here. You can't assume to know all of the picture in a conspiracy, but enough of it is clear to say "motive"... you just have to make assumptions. Like, say, the moral bankruptcy of those in charge, and a conspiracy group good enough to hide all the facts.

But that's the key -- I can explain *WHY* decently enough (at least, enough to seem plausible); but the "HOW" floors me. How do you do all of that without confuzzling every physicist, engineer, construction worker, etc., across the nation (and in other nations as well)?

Edit: Now that I'm really thinking about it, isn't it kinda interesting that the majority of Americans are really starting to realize the dwindling abilities of fossil fuels? Ironically, just when we're practically finishing up an occupation into a country that holds a vast amount of oil reserves.

Y'know, I should probably stop being devil's advocate before I actually convince myself >.<

__________________
"A long habit of not thinking a thing wrong gives it a superficial appearance of being right." -- Thomas Paine

Being intelligent is not a felony. But most societies evaluate it as at least a misdemeanor. -- Heinlein

Creationists make it sound as though a "theory" is something you dreamt up after being drunk all night. -- Isaac Asimov

Just to let you know guys, this fellow has been on USENET with this nonesense, and pulls the same evasive junk. He uses a load of aliases, so search for the website in his .sig. You won't get anywhere with him. He just ignores anything inconvenient to his faith.

They laughed him out of aviation.disaster with his silly claims. Its was fun when he pretended to know more about planes than the people who work with them.

IMO, the "whys" I've heard regarding 9/11 conspiracy theories have more holes than Swiss cheese.

To me the 9/11/Iraq correlation is weak. First of all, if Bush wanted to invade Iraq he didn't have to "stage" a terrorist attack. He could always claim they had uh .. WMD. Other possibilities? .. maybe stage a sort of "Gulf of Tonkin" incident with the no-fly zones. I can think of other "reasons" he could use to try to justify invading Iraq, but it all comes down to this - the need to kill our own people wasn't necessary for Bush to try to "sell" Iraq. If he was supposedly willing to go to such an extreme as to attack his own country to try then I think we ought to ask why we didn't "find" WMD over there. Planting them would be child's play compared to the sophistication needed to pull off a 9/11.

I actually feared martial law was a possibility in the days following 9/11, not for the reasons the CTers spout, but because of the uncertainty of followup attacks. It never happened. I won't go into the Patriot Act due to FAQ constraints but like it or no, it isn't martial law.

No I haven't.

But when I see an interview on the National Geographic channel and one of the witnesses states that he say the plane go into the Pentagon and he saw the windows of the jet pass by him as the plane went into the building. That's good enough for me.

Was that the guy who said he said he saw the faces of the passengers at 400mph?

; )

If only everyone were so uncritical and accepting as you.