Professor Of Engineering To Destroy Glasgow Tower To Understand How Towers Came Down

Glasgow tower block to shed light on 9/11 fire

http://news.scotsman.com/scitech.cfm?id=1068572006

NICHOLAS CHRISTIAN
7/23/2006

A PROFESSOR of engineering is to destroy a Glasgow tower block in an effort to understand why the Twin Towers collapsed in the 9/11 attacks.

Jose Torero, Professor of Fire Safety Engineering at Edinburgh University, will set the disused building in the east end of Glasgow alight and study the effects.

He and his team will fill a room in the tower with hundreds of pounds of sophisticated equipment, including heat and light sensors, along with nine miles of cable in an effort to examine the effects of a raging fire in a multi-story tower block.

His colleagues will also be able to open and close windows while the fire is raging in order to study the behaviour of the blaze.

The disused tower block is at Millerfield Place in the Dalmarnock area of Glasgow. It was built in 1964 but has lain disused for more than a decade.

The Peruvian-born academic is one of a number of experts across the world who believes that the Twin Towers should have stayed up after they were hit by hijacked airliners on September 11 2001.

Torero believes that by studying why the buildings did collapse, future structures can be made safer.

He said: "Those buildings should have withstood burnout. From my perspective, those buildings were designed to last structurally for between three to four hours, enough time to get everyone out who had survived. At least that's what you expect."

Further studies since 9/11 have indicated that the key to the Twin Towers' collapse may have been the fact that the fires raged through several floors. Experts now want to understand why the fires spread so quickly and how to stop it happening in future.

Torero, who previously taught at the University of California at Berkeley, said: "If you allow the fire to grow through several floors the building will come down.

"The concept is that if we can get an accurate idea of what is happening inside the building, I can lead people to safety and minimise the growth of the fire.

"Basically, you want to make buildings foolproof in the case of an emergency so that people don't have to think - they will simply be told what to do. We'll take the human factor out of the equation as far as possible."

If he wants to reconstruct the collapse, here's a tip: place thermite in the tower block.

Tower block fire aids 9/11 debate

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/s...st/5216788.stm

http://newsimg.bbc.co.uk/media/image...kone203300.jpg
The fire captured in a derelict tower block in Dalmarnock

7/26/2006

A high-rise block in Glasgow has been set alight in an attempt to understand how blazes affect buildings and ensure future safety in emergencies.

Jose Torero, professor of fire safety engineering at the University of Edinburgh, conducted the experiment on a 24-storey tower block in Dalmarnock.

He also hopes it will shed light on why the Twin Towers collapsed on 9/11.

Prof Torero said he believed the World Trade Centre in New York should have "withstood burnout" after it was hit.

The collapse of the towers in September 2001, after they were hit by hijacked aircraft, resulted in the deaths of almost 2,800 workers and 350 firefighters and emergency workers.

Prof Torero said: "It didn't even cross my mind the buildings would collapse.

"From my perspective, those buildings were designed to last structurally for between three to four hours, enough time to get everyone out who had survived.

The experiment took place in a block of flats on Millerfield Place and Allan Street.

In one room, more than nine miles of cable and sensors were installed.

He said: "The concept is that if we can get an accurate idea of what's happening inside the building I can lead people to safety and minimise the growth of the fire."

A BBC Horizon programme, to be broadcast in the next few months, is looking at Prof Torero's experiment.

Experts re-enact 9/11 in Glasgow high-rise

http://www.eveningtimes.co.uk/lo/features/7024021.html

7/26/2006

THERE were dramatic scene when experts torched a Glasgow tower block - to find out why New York's World Trade Centre collapsed when it was hit by hijacked planes.

The experiment, filmed for a BBC documentary, was carried out in a 22-floor high rise in Dalmarnock due for demolition by Glasgow Housing Association.

Experts from Edinburgh University have been at the east end site for around a month preparing the block for the "freeburn" blaze, which was over in just 25 minutes yesterday.

Scientists draped heat sensors over the front of the building to analyse data and record the temperature of the fire.

A "truss" similar to the steel building frame used in the construction of the Twin Towers was also installed on the fourth floor to discover how it would react to flames and intense heat.

Some experts believe the World Trade Centre would not have collapsed on September 11, 2001, if it had been built along more conventional lines.

Glasgow production company Lion Television filmed the event for the Horizon TV programme.

Around 10 cameras, including a cameraman on a 50ft cherry picker, recorded the fire, which was started at 12.10pm.

A crowd of neighbours and onlookers gathered to watch the spectacle at 4 Millerfield Place as the director shouted "Lighting the fire now", followed by "Please exit the building, the flat's on fire".

Within minutes, smoke could be seen filling the two-bedroom flat, which contained a couch, desks, a computer and bookshelves. It seeped through the edge of the windows and billowed out.

Soon the windows could be heard popping as the fire reached temperatures of up to 900C.

A member of the TV crew said: "They're cracking, I can hear them cracking."

At 12.15pm, what appeared to be the seal of the windows melted and floated to the ground, watched closely by a team of 10 Strathclyde firefighters.

Plumes of smoke changed colour from grey to black as the first window shattered, sending glass tumbling to the ground. The acrid smoke filled the air as a window round the corner crashed to the ground.

Minutes later, flames could be seen licking the window frames of the flat and a second window facing the front caved in.

Once the property was fully on fire, a signal was given to fire crews to put out the blaze.

The spectacle was all over by 12.35pm and only the smouldering devastation and blackened windows were left.

Experts will set the tower block on fire again tomorrow, when a second-floor flat, identically set up, will be torched.

However, this flat will be rigged with remote-controlled sensors which will open doors and windows to test the effects of ventilation on the fire.

Jose Torero, a Peruvian professor of fire safety engineering at Edinburgh University, who led the fire experiment after tests on computer models, said: "It didn't even cross my mind the the Twin Towers would collapse.

"We are trying to evaluate the structures which people use to build buildings and to test how fire burns in buildings."

Three GHA tenants still living in the block have been put up in hotels while filming takes place. They are due to be moved to new accommodation shortly.

The controlled blaze comes after a tower block in Toryglen was sprayed with thousands of litres of coloured paint on Saturday and Sunday.

The empty high-rise was filmed for a TV commercial for a Sony high-definition TV.

A spokesman for Strathclyde Fire and Rescue said of yesterday's blaze: "We hope as a result of this major experiment Mr Torero and his colleagues will come up with new information about fire behaviour that will save many lives in the future."