Context of '10:28 a.m. September 11, 2001: WTC North Tower Collapses'

A helicopter flying above the burning World Trade Center. [Source: History Channel]Minutes after the collapse of the south WTC tower, police helicopters fly near the North Tower to check on its condition. The pilot of one helicopter radios, “About 15 floors down from the top, it looks like its glowing red,” and adds, “It’s inevitable.” Seconds later, another helicopter pilot reports, “I don’t think this has too much longer to go. I would evacuate all people within the area of that second building.” While these warnings are relayed to police officers, fire and rescue personnel do not hear them, as they operate on a different radio system. [New York Times, 7/7/2002; Inter Press Service, 8/25/2005; National Institute of Standards and Technology, 9/2005, pp. 224] The North Tower will collapse 21 minutes later (see 10:28 a.m. September 11, 2001).

Andi Ball. [Source: White House]Laura Bush, the president’s wife, and her entourage are driven from Capitol Hill to the Secret Service headquarters in Washington, DC, for their own security, but their journey is slowed by the heavy traffic. [Woodward, 2002, pp. 17; National Journal, 8/31/2002; Kessler, 2006, pp. 136; Bush, 2010, pp. 200-201] Bush has been at the Russell Senate Office Building in Washington, where she was originally scheduled to testify before a Senate committee. [CNN, 9/12/2001; Woodward, 2002, pp. 16-17] Her Secret Service agents have said they are going to take the first lady and her staff to a secure location. [Kessler, 2006, pp. 136] After the Secret Service emergency response team arrived for her, Bush was escorted out of the Russell Senate Office Building and to her limousine (see (Shortly After 10:00 a.m.) September 11, 2001). Bush and those accompanying her leave Capitol Hill at 10:10 a.m., according to Noelia Rodriguez, the first lady’s press secretary.
Agents with Guns Drawn Protect Motorcade - Secret Service agents protect Bush’s motorcade with their guns as it heads to the secure location. Ashleigh Adams, the first lady’s deputy press secretary, will later recall, “It felt like we were in a war, because the Secret Service was driving next to the motorcade and they were hanging out of the windows with their machine guns out.” She will add that she has “been around the agents” before, but has “never seen them with their guns.”
Motorcade Delayed by Traffic - However, the motorcade is slowed by the heavy traffic. Bush will describe, “Outside our convoy windows, the city streets were clogged with people evacuating their workplaces and trying to reach their own homes.” Rodriguez will say, “In the car, we seemed to be going in slow motion.” [National Journal, 8/31/2002; Bush, 2010, pp. 200] “The traffic was so bad that everything was stopped,” Andi Ball, Bush’s chief of staff, will recall. One of the Secret Service agents escorting Bush and her staff will later say a car sideswiped them during the journey.
Secure Location Is Secret Service Headquarters - The “secure location” that Bush and her staff are being taken to turns out to be the Secret Service headquarters. [Kessler, 2006, pp. 136] The Secret Service headquarters, according to journalist and author Ronald Kessler, is “an anonymous nine-story tan brick building on H Street at Ninth Street NW in Washington.” [Kessler, 2009, pp. 23] It is located a few blocks from the White House. After the Oklahoma City bombing in 1995 (see 8:35 a.m. - 9:02 a.m. April 19, 1995) it was reinforced to survive a large-scale blast. Bush and her entourage arrive there through an underground entrance. [Washington Post, 8/23/2009; Bush, 2010, pp. 200-201]
Journey Reportedly Takes 45 Minutes - The exact time they arrive at is unclear. According to Washington Post reporter Bob Woodward, “In the traffic jam from the Capitol, it took 45 minutes to get [Bush] to Secret Service headquarters.” This would mean the first lady arrives there at around 10:55 a.m. [Woodward, 2002, pp. 17] However, Bush will write that she watches the North Tower of the World Trade Center collapsing “live in front of my eyes,” on a screen at the headquarters. [Bush, 2010, pp. 201] If this is correct, she must arrive at the headquarters sometime before 10:28 a.m., when the North Tower comes down (see 10:28 a.m. September 11, 2001). [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 311] White House spokespeople will refuse to disclose where the first lady has been taken to, only saying she is at a “secure location.” [Associated Press, 9/11/2001; CNN, 9/12/2001; CNN, 9/11/2002]

The North Tower collapses in a matter of seconds. [Source: Ray Stubblebine/ Reuters/ Landov] (click image to enlarge)The North Tower of the World Trade Center tilts to the south and then collapses. Its north side was hit by Flight 11 at 8:46, 102 minutes earlier. [CNN, 9/12/2001; New York Times, 9/12/2001; MSNBC, 9/22/2001; Kim and Baum, 2002 ; Associated Press, 8/21/2002; National Institute of Standards and Technology, 9/2005, pp. 33] After the antenna starts to move (see (10:28 a.m. September 11, 2001)), the next sign that the top section of the building is moving downward is on floor 98, at the top of the impact zone. [National Institute of Standards and Technology, 9/2005, pp. 22, 87] The angle of the tilt will be disputed after 9/11 (see September-November 2005), as will the time it takes the towers to fall to the ground (see September 12, 2001-September 2005). [Scientific American, 10/9/2001; Eagar and Musso, 12/2001; PBS Nova, 5/2002; National Institute of Standards and Technology, 8/30/2006] The death toll could have been much worse—an estimated 15,000 people made it out of the WTC to safety after 8:46 a.m. [St. Petersburg Times, 9/8/2002]

Jeffrey Scott Shapiro. [Source: University of Florida]Larry Silverstein, who recently took over the lease of the World Trade Center complex (see July 24, 2001), discusses possibly bringing down WTC Building 7 in a controlled demolition in a telephone conversation with his insurance carrier, according to a reporter who is at the WTC site this afternoon. [Fox News, 4/22/2010] WTC 7 is a 47-story office building located just north of the Twin Towers. The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) will say it suffered some structural damage (see 10:28 a.m. September 11, 2001) when the North Tower collapsed (see 10:28 a.m. September 11, 2001) and it has fires on several floors (see (10:28 a.m.-5:20 p.m.) September 11, 2001). It will collapse at 5:20 p.m., apparently becoming the first tall building ever to come down primarily as a result of fire (see (5:20 p.m.) September 11, 2001). [National Institute of Standards and Technology, 11/2008, pp. xxxv-xxxvi ]
Silverstein Allegedly Wants WTC 7 Demolished - Investigative reporter Jeffrey Scott Shapiro, who is at the scene of the attacks in New York, will later recall: “Shortly before [WTC 7] collapsed, several NYPD officers and Con Edison workers told me that Larry Silverstein… was on the phone with his insurance carrier to see if they would authorize the controlled demolition of the building, since its foundation was already unstable and expected to fall. A controlled demolition would have minimized the damage caused by the building’s imminent collapse and potentially save lives.” Shapiro will add: “Many law enforcement personnel, firefighters, and other journalists were aware of this possible option. There was no secret.” [Fox News, 4/22/2010] Preparing a large building for demolition usually takes weeks, or even months. This time is spent on operations such as wrapping concrete columns to ensure pieces do not fly off. [Baltimore Sun, 2/26/1995; PBS NOVA, 12/1996; Construction Equipment Guide, 2/24/2005]
Discussion of Demolition Later Denied - Silverstein will later recall discussing WTC 7 over the phone with the commander of the New York Fire Department, and telling him, “We’ve had such terrible loss of life, maybe the smartest thing to do is pull it” (see After 12:00 Noon September 11, 2001), but a spokesman will subsequently claim that Silverstein was referring to withdrawing firefighters from the building, not bringing WTC 7 down with explosives. [US Department of State, 9/16/2005; BBC, 7/4/2008] At the end of a three-year investigation into the building’s collapse, NIST will say WTC 7 “did not collapse from explosives,” but critics will dispute this conclusion (see August 21, 2008). [Associated Press, 8/21/2008; New York Times, 8/21/2008]

Following the attacks, there is no agreement on the speed with which the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center collapsed on 9/11 (see 9:59 a.m. September 11, 2001 and 10:28 a.m. September 11, 2001). The 9/11 Commission says that the South Tower collapsed in “ten seconds” and the National Institute of Standards and Technology says that tops of the buildings came down “essentially in free fall.” [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 305; National Institute of Standards and Technology, 9/2005, pp. 146] In the dispute over the reason for the WTC’s collapse after 9/11, it is claimed that, if the towers fell in ten seconds, then this is evidence they were destroyed by explosives. For example, David Ray Griffin, a theologian and outspoken critic of commission’s report, writes, “For a 1,300-foot building, however, ten seconds is almost free-fall speed. But if each floor produced just a little resistance, so that breaking through each one took half a second, the collapse of all those floors—80 or 95 of them—would have taken 40 to 47 seconds. Can we really believe that the upper part of the buildings encountered virtually no resistance from the lower part?” [Griffin, 2004, pp. 16] But according to Canadian scientist Frank Greening, who studies the Twin Towers’ collapse, the freefall time would be about 9.6 seconds, and he calculates that it takes longer for the buildings to fall—twelve to thirteen and a half seconds—and states this does not indicate that explosives were used. [Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, 8/25/2005]

Both towers of the World Trade Center tilted to one side before beginning to fall on 9/11 (see 9:59 a.m. September 11, 2001 and 10:28 a.m. September 11, 2001). The National Institute of Standards and Technology, which investigated the collapses (see August 21, 2002), states that the South Tower, which was hit on its south side, tilted about 7-8 degrees to the east and 3-4 degrees to the south, and the North Tower, which was hit on its north side, tilted about 8 degrees to the south, before starting to fall. [National Institute of Standards and Technology, 9/2005, pp. 300, 308 ] However, these findings are criticized by Canadian scientist Frank Greening. After examining photo and video evidence, Greening says that the South Tower tilted by no more than two degrees and the North Tower by no more than three degrees before collapse initiation. Greening also says that the tilt angles NIST gives cannot correspond to the downward movement of the towers’ walls NIST claims before they started to fall, and points out that the tilt angles NIST uses are inconsistent throughout its reports. Though Greening agrees with NIST that the towers were destroyed by the plane impacts and fire damage, he concludes that its computer model is “highly inaccurate and therefore of no value in explaining the demise of the Twin Towers.” [Greening, 11/2005 ] Greening is a leading figure in the post-9/11 dispute over why the WTC collapsed and publishes a series of papers dealing with various aspects of the Twin Towers’ collapse. For example, a CBC documentary uses Greening for analysis of the WTC’s fall. [Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, 8/25/2005]