It was my understanding that one or morebuildings adjacent to WTC's 1 and 2 were damaged to the point of decrepitude and were "totalled" by some appropriate authority and set for demolition.
I also recall reading about rescuers who worked on the pile being cleared out on occasion by some horns that indicated another building was coming down.
Is same-day-demolition a pretty typical thing, then? I thought it took a lot more setup and planning than that...
Every building I've been aware of, that was being imploded, took weeks and sometimes months to prepare. They've showed some programs on TV, that detailed the preparation. It's a lot of work.
If the building was severely damaged and in danger of collapse, I would think that in some cases, it would be worth the risk to induce a collapse, like causing an avalanche. It doesn't sound like that was the case.
The webpage has doesn't engage the fact that the building collapsed the same way WTCs 1 and 2 did: structural integrity failure due to fire. In the cases of the towers, the jet fuel fueled fire weakened the structure of the building, which was only designed to resist a fire fueled by the stuff one makes into offices.
That the buildings (WTCs 1,2, and 7) dropped straight down is a no-brainer-- buildings fall straight down because they're built so stable in the first place so as not to fall over. Even when part of the building falls faster than another part, you see the roof tear apart and two level roofs falling at different rates. Despite the fact that things are tall, they aren't just sitting on their lots, but they're reinforced for vertical stability. The NOVA special on the WTC (1&2) collapse mentioned that the top of the building would have to move sideways over 100 feet before the tower became unstable enough to fall over. It didn't move anywhere near that when the planes hit and exploded. WTC7, lacking any lateral force, fell straight down because that was the only failure mode it had to work with.
Also, if the building was in fire, even in small amount, there's no way in hell the FDNY would let the mayor set up his command center in there, despite the facilities meant for that purpose. (A good decision, in light of the proximity to the endangered towers.)
It's possible that it was just considered a contained danger that wasn't threatening to human life (having been evacuated hours before) and the over-taxed (and now seriously debilitated) fire department decided to call it a loss. "Pull it." Pull back from it. Pull it from the list of jobs to do. *shrug*
Occam's Razor in action. :)
I think part of the question is the amount of fire...there aren't indications that it's *that* intense...a bunch of jet fuel you could see causing problems, setting all that paper on fire, but...
I've no value to add except to say that I'm freaked out that you can hear me breathing.