Profile: Sergei Dudarev

’Iron atoms in steel: Black balls show irregularities that disrupt magnetic fields, weakening steel.’ [Source: BBC]Sergei Dudarev, a scientist with Britain’s Atomic Energy Agency, says that newly-discovered properties of steel could explain why the World Trade Center towers collapsed. Dr. Dudarev researches steel that can withstand the extreme temperatures inside a nuclear fusion reactor. He says that at about 500° Celsius, a temperature often reached in building fires, tiny irregularities in the structure of steel can cause a softening of the metal, although that is still far below the melting point. Dudarev says: “The steel didn’t melt, it just became soft. It is an unusual state and the temperatures in the Twin Towers were high enough to cause it because the thermal insulation was knocked off the girders through the impact with the aircraft.” [Guardian, 9/9/2008; BBC News, 9/10/2008; Independent, 9/10/2008; ABC Radio National (Australia), 9/20/2008]