- Researchers at Purdue University released a simulation of a plane crashing into World Trade Center, which shows that fireproofing material was stripped from the building as the planes crashed into them. Professor Christoph Hoffman told the AP, "One thing it does point out... is the absolute essential nature of fireproofing steel structures. This is something that wasn't done originally in the World Trade Center when it was built. It wasn't code at that time." The simulation was created to help engineers understand the collapse, which the Purdue team attributes to the lack of fireproofing and the fact that the fire knocked out support columns, causing the building to collapse under its own weight.
You can see a video here - researchers used Google Earth to provide city context and it's pretty disturbing. ZDNet has technical details on how the researchers developed the simulations.
- Last fall's Congressional power shift means that the Democrats are now looking over the EPA's September 11 response and Senator Hillary Clinton is having a field day. She accused the EPA of deliberately misleading the public about health risks, by reassuring the public that downtown air was safe in apartments and offices with dust in them when the EPA in reality had questionable methodology for testing the air. She criticized the Bush administration's handling but didn't mention anything about Giuliani's involvement, according to Newsday.
- And the fight over a World Trade Center victim's estate was heard in a Brooklyn courthouse. Elsie Goss-Caldwell claims her ex-husband Leon Caldwell is a deadbeat who does not deserve any part of the $2.9 million awarded after the death of their son Kenneth, who worked on the 102nd floor of the north tower. Yesterday, Goss-Caldwell told a judge, "While I was planning a memorial service, hoping they might find him trapped somewhere," she says Caldwell filed a death certificate with the victim's unit. Caldwell countered that Goss-Caldwell shut him out of their sons' lives after their divorce. The judge will decide what happens with the money, which has been in escrow, after the two sides file their arguments.
