Reply #16: My name isn't Pat, it's John Q. Citizen. It was I who welcomed

[John Q. Citizen]

you DU. I assure you I wouldn't attempt to move the goal posts on you.

I suppose the format here can be a little confusing, even for someone who has many friends that attended a prestigious engineering program.;-)If you look at the upper left hand corner of the post you are replying to, you will see what the name of the poster is.

I can't answer your questions that you directed to Pat, as I can only speak for myself.

I haven't read the comments of the fire and police who were at WTC#7 that you write about, but if you would post a link to those interviews/comments I would certainly read them. To the best of my knowledge the 9/11 commission report mentions nothing about WTC#7, nor does the NIST report. This has been one of the concerns of some members of the 9/11 truth movement. I have heard and read interviews of fire, police, EMT, reporters, workers in the towers, and citizens on the street who say they heard secondary explosions at the Towers, and I have heard what appear to sound like secondary explosions on audio tapes and video taken by the media at the scene. I do not believe this constitutes proof of anything, yet it is eye witness testimony. (there is a difference)

I am glad Dr. Jones is doing research on his hypothesis that controlled demolition of the WTC towers and
#7 is a stronger argument than the so far unproven hypothesis of the 9/11 commission as formulated by NIST,(the so called pancake theory.)To the best of my knowledge, neither NIST not the 9/11 commission did any research into the possibility of controlled demolition being a cause of the 3 collapse on 9/11

I do know however that before one can be published in an Academic Journal (including Engineering Journals) that the peer review process comes first, as does independent testing of the hypothesis. Only after that may a person's research be submitted to a journal for consideration for publishing. Please check with your many structural and civil engineer friends if you doubt me on this.

As I'm sure you are aware, there are literally thousands of various theories concerning the events of 9/11, including the theories put forth by the 9/11 commission and by NIST. I believe that only by testing the many theories can we approach knowing the truth of that terrible day.

Since the Director of the FBI has stated on the record that they are still unsure to the identities of many of the accused hijackers, http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/1559151.stm (Director of the FBI's comments in the last paragraph) I believe keeping an open mind is more important that a rush to judgment, and it is certainly in the best interests of the security of the US.