Reply #157: Seminar at BYU on WTC 7 collapse and other 9-11 anomalies

[Prof Jones]

Yes, I did present a seminar on the puzzling collapse of WTC-7 and other 9-11 anomalies, on 9-22-05. Sorry I don't have time to post very often, but this from an email I sent out to colleagues on 9-23-5:

Approximately 50 were in attendance, with representatives from the following Brigham Young University and UVSC (Utah Valley St. College) departments:

Physics, Civil Eng., Mechanical Eng., EE, Geology, Psychology, Mathematics. There were several I did not recognize, so other departments were probably represented also. I’ve had particularly encouraging comments from four Physics Profs. and a Math Prof especially, and one of the psychology profs., himself an active democrat...



As you can imagine, there was considerable hostility especially at first. A lot of questions – which I fielded throughout the presentation.

The EE Prof. emailed me before the seminar that this was all “conspiracy theory” and “claptrap.” However, he did – to his credit – look at the website referenced in a previous email, which is Jim Hoffman’s site. <http://911research.wtc7.net/sitemap.html>



During the seminar, it was clear he -- and many others -- were coming around. He admitted that the collapse of WTC 7 was VERY strange, very hard to explain as due to fires. And he’s reading up on all this now.



We started just after 3 pm and had to quit at 4:55 pm as there was a class coming in at 5 pm. One or two left at about 4 pm, when I had covered most of the WTC7 material, but I was pleased that most of the group stayed and we carried on for NEARLY TWO HOURS. Many favorable comments were received afterwards and this morning. People were impressed by the DATA and my critiques of the FEMA and NIST and 9-11 Commission reports.



The most “hostile” was a geology professor. He raised the point that “the Twin Towers were a special case since hit by jets.” Fortunately, I had previously shown a slide discussing “Pathological Science” – and this business of “special case” is one of the red flags for bad science. (I’m well known around here for being among the first, if not the first, to debunk claims of Pons and Fleischmann in 1989.) And he had to admit that WTC7 was NOT hit by a plane.



The approach I took was that we need to have data released (not destroyed, as were most of the steel beams) – and an independent investigation conducted. This was the approach also encouraged by Prof. Weyland – thanks, Jack – it worked extremely well. My goal was clear, and all except one (the geology prof.) agreed with my conclusion that data held by NIST, etc. should be released – and an independent investigation conducted. And several in the group are now doing some investigation on their own – climbing the learning curve.



The next day <9-23-05>, this geology Prof. told me privately that he hoped I could get the information for further investigation. I’m particularly after a sample of the molten metal found in the basement of WTC7 (also in the basements of the Towers).



The tilting of the South Tower was also intriguing to many, squibs from the North Tower less so – but I spent most of the time on WTC 7. Also, the letter of Kevin Ryan carried weight evidently, along with protests about the destruction of the steel beams. My slides on Pathological Science were very useful in countering claims of the "official" theory.



That’s it for now.
Oh, you’ll notice in my talk an appeal to the Book of Mormon – which speaks over and over about “secret combinations”, “secret plans”, “secret societies” in the “last days.” This provided a means to overcome the barrier of “conspiracy theory nonsense” with this group. Won’t work for everyone, but this really is something we Mormons believe in and watch for….



Best Regards,

Steven E. Jones