- SOUTH BEND -- The laboratory
director from a South Bend firm has been fired for attempting to cast doubt
on the federal investigation into what caused the World Trade Center's
twin towers to collapse on Sept. 11, 2001.
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- Kevin R. Ryan was terminated Tuesday from his job at
Environmental Health Laboratories Inc., a subsidiary of Underwriters
Laboratories
Inc., the consumer-product safety testing giant.
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- On Nov. 11, Ryan wrote a letter to the National Institute
of Standards and Technology -- the agency probing the collapse --
challenging
the common theory that burning jet fuel weakened the steel supports holding
up the 110-story skyscrapers.
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- Underwriters Laboratories Inc., according to Ryan,
"was
the company that certified the steel components used in the construction
of the WTC buildings."...
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- Ryan wrote that last year, while "requesting
information,"
UL's chief executive officer and fire protection business manager disagreed
about key issues surrounding the collapse, "except for one thing --
that the samples we certified met all requirements."
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- UL vehemently denied last week that it ever certified
the materials.
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- The National Institute of Standards and Technology is
conducting a $16 million, two-year investigation of the collapse of the
twin towers. The agency expects to issue a draft report in January, and
UL has played a limited role in the investigation.
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- Ryan wrote that the institute's preliminary reports
suggest
the WTC's supports were probably exposed to fires no hotter than 500
degrees
-- only half the 1,100-degree temperature needed to forge steel, Ryan said.
That's also much cooler, he wrote, than the 3,000 degrees needed to melt
bare steel with no fire-proofing.
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- "This story just does not add up," Ryan wrote
in his e-mail to Frank Gayle, deputy chief of the institute's metallurgy
division, who is playing a prominent role in the agency investigation.
"If steel from those buildings did soften or melt, I'm sure we can
all agree that this was certainly not due to jet fuel fires of any kind,
let alone the briefly burning fires in those towers."
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- He added, "Alternatively, the contention that this
steel did fail at temperatures around (500 degrees) suggests that the
majority
of deaths on 9/11 were due to a safety-related failure. That suggestion
should be of great concern to my company."
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- Ryan declined to comment about his letter Thursday when
reached at his South Bend home.
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- But his allegations drew a sharp rebuke from UL, which
said Ryan wrote the letter "without UL's knowledge or
authorization."
The company told The Tribune "there is no evidence" that any
firm tested the materials used to build the towers.
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- "UL does not certify structural steel, such as the
beams, columns and trusses used in World Trade Center," said Paul
M. Baker, the company's spokesman.
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- Ryan was fired, Baker said, because he "expressed
his own opinions as though they were institutional opinions and beliefs
of UL."
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- "The contents of the argument itself are spurious
at best, and frankly, they're just wrong," Baker said. Seeking to
head off controversy just months before its report is released, the
National
Institute of Standards and Technology issued its own statement
Thursday.
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- Some steel recovered from the WTC was exposed to fires
of only 400 to 600 degrees, the institute said, but computer modeling has
shown higher temperatures of 1,100 to 1,300 degrees or greater were
"likely"
experienced by steel in regions directly affected by the fires.
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- The institute believes impact from the jets dislodged
fireproofing surrounding some of the steel, and the higher temperatures
led to the buckling of the towers' core columns.
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- Wrangling on the Web
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- Ryan's statements have generated interest on many Web
sites, including some advocating sharp scrutiny of the federal government's
WTC probe.
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- Ryan copied his e-mail to David Ray Griffin, author of
"The New Pearl Harbor," and to Catherine Austin Fitts, a board
member of 911Truth.org -- a Web site organized by citizens who believe
the government is covering up the true cause of the Sept. 11 terrorist
attacks.
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- One day later, Griffin requested and received permission
to distribute Ryan's letter to other parties. An official from 911Truth.org
called Ryan to confirm his authorship. They said Ryan made it clear he
is speaking for himself only, not on behalf of his laboratory or the
company,
but that others at UL were aware of his action.
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- The letter was published Nov. 11 on the Web site
septembereleventh.org,
site of the 9/11 Visibility Project. On Tuesday, organizers of the
911Truth.org
Web site noted Ryan had been fired.
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- In his letter, Ryan appeared confident in his statements
about the WTC's fire protection levels.
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- "You may know that there are a number of current
and former government employees that have risked a great deal to help us
to know the truth," he told the institute's Gayle. "Please do
what you can to quickly eliminate the confusion regarding the ability of
jet fuel fires to soften or melt structural steel."
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- UL moved immediately to discredit Ryan.
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- The company said Ryan "was not involved in that
work and was not associated in any way with UL's Fire Protection Division,
which conducted testing at NIST's request."
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- The company said it "fully supports NIST's ongoing
efforts to investigate the WTC tragedy. We regret any confusion that Mr.
Ryan's letter has caused 9/11 survivors, victims' families and their
friends."
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- "We prefer to base our conclusions, and NIST would
say the same, on science rather than speculation," Baker said.
"We
anxiously await the outcome of the NIST investigation."
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- Organizers of 911Truth.org came to Ryan's defense
Thursday,
although they couldn't persuade him to speak publicly.
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- "He just saw too many contradictions, and it set
off his sense of what was the right thing to do," said David Kubiak,
911Truth.org's executive director. "It's unfortunate for the country,
and it's particularly tragic for him, but inspiring as hell."
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- "The way things are working in the country right
now," Kubiak added, "it's only going to be citizens like this
who take their professional knowledge and sense of personal integrity,
and put it ahead of the strange status quo, that we will see truth and
justice out of the system."
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