I’ve been watching Discovery-Times Channel’s World Trade Center: Anatomy of the Collapse. Over and over they showed film of the second aircraft hitting the tower. The show then details the investigation into what the failure modes were which caused both towers to collapse.
I was in awe that day when the buildings remained upright. I understand the stresses involved in any vertical structure, even though I wasn’t aware of the particulars of these two buildings.
People are still looking for someone to blame for the deaths of 3000 people. Surely, as conventional litigious nature demands, someone should have known this could happen and design for it.
Engineering against such a thing is impossible within the confines of application. Neither can you engineer against stupidity, like the man who uses a lawnmower to trim a hedge, and loses his fingers while lifting it up.
After watching this show, I am even more impressed that a human being could envision and design and build such structures. Litigants be damned.