Okay, I wasn’t going to get any further into this conspiracy stuff, but I have decided, given the recent comments by Revolution Harry and James Higham, that I must proffer a defence.
Those of us who see the official versions of such events as 9/11 and 7/7 being more credible than those offered by the truth movement are, apparently, abandoning our critical thinking skills. Nothing could be further from the truth. I have applied my critical thinking skills – along with a slice or two with Occam’s razor, and despite my distaste of government, the official versions still have more credibility than the proffered alternatives.
Why, then, is this? We are shown testimony from experts who regale us with assertions that something “definitely” happened a particular way, that it “definitely” couldn’t have happened as the official report suggests. I’d have more faith in such experts if they allowed themselves a get out by couching their statements with words such as “possibly” and “maybe” because, you see, the other side will wheel out their experts who will gainsay the truthers’ experts and so it goes on. However, in my own small way, I am an expert.
During my rail career, I have managed incidents. None so large as the two I have just mentioned, thank God. Indeed, nothing so devastating as Ladbroke Grove, but all incidents follow the same pattern as decreed in the UK by the Civil Contingencies (2004) Act and all will have anomalies. Indeed, as an erstwhile incident manager, I’d be suspicious if there weren’t any anomalies.
When an incident occurs and the incident manager speeds to site, so too, do all sorts of other folk. It never ceased to amaze me where these bods came from. All I knew was that they were stomping with their size tens all over my perishing evidence. So, first things first; get the oiks off site pronto. Assess the situation, because sure as eggs is eggs, control will be asking how soon they can have their railway back and I’ve only been on site a couple of minutes – and they want an accurate assessment. Oddly, I was pretty good at judging that. This is, perhaps because I over estimated and added a number I’d just thought of and when I came in under target, I was a genius. Well, I thought so, anyway.
Then there’s all sorts of stuff to arrange. Liaising with the emergency services for cordons, rescue, recovery and triage. Getting someone to help with setting up site safety – evacuating if necessary, and onward transport of people and belongings. Not to mention setting up an investigation team to look at the evidence and preserve any that is left after the oiks have walked all over it. And this is all happening within the first half hour or so of arrival – and if the press turn up, I have to prepare a brief, factual statement to keep them happy until the corporate folk sort out someone to help me.
And, did I mention that I have to keep a contemporaneous log of events? Oh, yes, indeedy. The trouble with that is, there is no such thing as a contemporaneous log. Even if you delegate the task, so much is happening at any one time, the note taker will invariably be playing catch-up, trying to recall who said and did what, where and when. The result is an inevitable anomaly in the time line. Several if you are lucky.
Managing an incident – even a relatively small one – is much like that circus chappie keeping all the plates spinning in the air. When the conspiracy theorist sees an anomaly and questions that need to be answered, I see some poor sap who dropped a plate or two.
A war story here. Because I was involved in incident management – and the training of incident managers, I was also used in an advisory capacity by people planning and running emergency exercises. Some years back, Railtrack as it was then, ran a joint exercise with BNFL as BNFL send their irradiated fuel by train. Consequently, they are legally charged with planning for catastrophe. So, we set up our little catastrophe and discovered that BNFL’s emergency plan didn’t match Railtrack’s or those of the Emergency Services.
The various incident responders turned up. The fire brigade carried out the immediate rescue of the train crew and then stepped back from the potentially leaking fuel flask. They waited. We waited. An hour later, the BNFL person turned up to give the all clear and the rest of the recovery could start.
Fortunately, this mismatch was picked up in an exercise. That is why we run exercises after all. If it had been a real incident, the conspiracy theorist would have demanded that questions be answered – and the reply that, well, someone cocked up, while being the truth, would never be a satisfactory reply. Yet, applying Occam’s razor, it is the most rational one.
This is why I don’t see patterns in the events of 9/11 or 7/7. I see chaotic events with fairly simple explanations. The only questions that are relevant are those for the folk who may have been able to prevent them. Did they have enough intelligence to act? In the case of 9/11, there were serious failings of communications between agencies that might, in different circumstances, have led to a different outcome. Of course, we will never know, but the idea of agencies keeping their secrets close to their chest doesn’t smack of conspiracy to me, it is plain old fashioned human nature.
So, that’s me done. I’m drawing a line under this one. Be assured, that just because on this occasion, I regard the explanations proffered by the governments concerned as more credible than those posed by the truther movement, it doesn’t mean that I automatically trust them or believe what they might say tomorrow. I will do as I have always done, remain skeptical.
And, please… No, I am not going to wade through any more “evidence” or youtube footage. The whole thing was a bore nearly a decade ago. It is more of one now. I for one, plan to let it rest in peace.
Enough already.
Good, interesting post, and even without your experience I tend to agree.
I have a pretty low opinion of our govt but a slightly higher one of the security service, and I cannot see them killing dozens of innocent people for some vague motive.
Good to have input from someone with experience in these areas. However, having read the official report of the twin towers’ collapse, which very logically explains how the heat of the fires caused the floors to sag and collapse the outer walls, I can’t reconcile this with the images that show the central core collapsing first along with the radio mast.
CSI on channel five would have worked it out lol
On a serious note I didnae realise the conspiracy nutters were still running with this one.
I remember years ago when I was 18 or 19 and worked down the Pit, a poor man was killed by the paddy (underground train)and before any H&S got to the site of the tragedy everything had been brought up to scratch regarding stonedust, safety etc. If I recall right I think mines and railways were covered by the same umbrella act , but maybe im wrong. Must be harder these days though.
Come to think of it , the Paddy guard threw the points over so the train could go on the other line , and as you probably know they are weighted for ease of use , anyway they bounced back without him realising and anyway you can imagine the rest. There isn’t much room down a Pit and he had nowhere to go. Although the Paddy must have been going pretty fast , end of shift and all that. Maybe the extra stonedust was to cover up the blood etc as there was a full shift about to alight the paddy. Plus the NUM were a powerful union then, so im sure everything was dandy. Always had my doubts though.
“as decreed in the UK by the Civil Contingencies (2004) Act”
This is the bit which always makes me laugh about the evidence for conspiracies over 7/7. My own company is required under the above act to have a disaster management plan and we’re just a small business employing barely 100 people. Those who wonder why a major public sector employer was running drills in the days leading to the attack are very ignorant of obligations placed on such services. It would have been more surprising if they hadn’t been doing so.
Don’t ever think you can change a conspiracy theorist’s mind. They keep switching to ever more arcane rumours and minutiae until you wonder why you’re wasting your life watching stupid youtube videos to argue with crazy people. The BBC did a pretty good Conspiracy Files programme on WTC7 which covered the issues fairly comprehensively. The only thing I don’t understand is why WTC7 had to be demolished for the conspiracy to work. Why carry out an incredibly complicated operation which was almost certain to be detected for so little gain?
What annoys me about the OoL post is the idea that sceptical libertarians should be 9/11 conspiracy theorists. Sceptical doesn’t mean believing anything but the official version of events, it means using reason and logic to come to an educated conclusion. And libertarianism means having very little faith in the ability of governments to organise things effectively. Both of these are completely incompatible with conspiracy theories.
l still laugh at people’s perception of a plane crashing into a building … they actually believe you should see the outline of the plane in the wall of the building … like you do in cartoons! 😀 😆
Scene management in first response is the most arcane combination of physics, medicine, psychology, environmental science and meteorology that you can imagine, plus 50%. Note that the NY/NJ fire chiefs would have had to have Ph.D.-level expertise in numerical analysis and materials science to be able to predict what would happen to the towers’ steel structure as it was subjected to a prolonged gasoline fire (and know that the structural beams were under-insulated). If they’d have had any idea that a collapse was feasible, we wouldn’t have had 343 dead firefighters.
I’ve come to the conclusion that effective incident scene management involves more dumb luck than any teachable or learnable skill. Any account of how a major incident happened that doesn’t include several complete fuck-ups from the people on-site can be dismissed out of hand.
And, of course, every incident is different, so what you learned last time around doesn’t happen this time around – something else happens that catches you out.
Fascinating.
I have some knowledege of Rail operations, and find RAIB reports fascinating reading – some of the older HMRI classics of “famous” accidents are also illuminating.
Incidentally, with your professional background, sensitive subject, why can’t you get back in? I would have thought it would pay reasonably….
On 11/9/2001…
One “conspiracy” video purported to show something “wrong” with the image just before impact.
I worked out it was a REFLECTION, not a SHADOW. But they didn’t want to know.
Oh dear.
1. NIST was shown to have selected some evidence and not others. It is laid out in black and white.
2. Nanothermite was found in the dust at all buildings and was analysed by scientists. The reports on that are in that post. There was no cause for that material to have been there.
It’s nothing to do with “credible” – it’s to do with evidence and proof. NIST lied and things were present which shouldn’t have been.
If this was any other topic, e.g. JFK, David Kelly, the sphere would be up in arms demanding an independent enquiry.
Why not here? You can’t refuse an enquiry because you’re not convinced – that’s horse and cart. You need the enquiry to table the evidence from all sides from which you can then judge whether something is credible or not.
NIST has been debunked, lR. Ipso facto – an enquiry is needed.
There is a second point too. It matters little whether we are right or wrong – you or me – here but if sufficient people believe something was amiss.
The Zogby global poll:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:911worldopinionpoll_Sep2008_pie.png
… showed that only a large minority accept Al Qaeda as the sole reason. I’m not saying that proves it’s otherwise. I’m saying that it warrants an independent enquiry.
Error – sorry, not Zogby but University of Maryland, College Park poll.
I used to work for the Health & Safety Executive (HMFI) accidents we were taught were always the coincidence of a number of cockups, so will always root for cock up theory first. Conspiracies that rely on any more than two factors are
usually very suspect as it is difficult to ensure the third, fourth and fifth factors actually happen. Thatis why the best laid plans go awry with the first contact with the enemy.
If this was any other topic, e.g. JFK, David Kelly, the sphere would be up in arms demanding an independent enquiry.I wouldn’t. Public inquiries are little more than pantomime combined with a little witch hunting all conducted via kangaroo court. The outcome is that we get to find out what we pretty much knew already, so those who wanted it will inevitably cry foul and accuse the whole thing of being a whitewash. Given the cost of such things, in the middle of a recession, I suggest that money not be spent of a wasteful exercise looking into an event that is done and dusted and has been for nearly a decade.
I’m working on it and yes, they do. The problem for me is that my expertise is in a narrow field. If I was a signalling engineer, there would be plenty of possible outlets for my skills. As it is, there is only one employer who wants people with operational signalling competence, so I have to chase the few roles that there are.
IA Richards, in Science and Poetry [1926], said:
We believe a scientist because he can substantiate his remarks, not because he is eloquent and forceable ion his enunciation. In fact we distrust him when he seems to be influencing us by his manner.
The debunking side, so far, has been all bluster and shoddy science, not remotely interested in pursuing the actual science of the matter and trying to beat down the opposing view through calling it names.
Whatever I subsequently found, and I did find much, that was always uppermost in the mind.
And don’t forget Gary Jones:
One of the indicators of the anti-intellectualism of the intelligentsia is their refusal to think about socio-political events. They don’t engage with the world in any sort of collective cognition that evaluates different ideas or information. They don’t listen to the words of others or read for comprehension, instead they behave like lawyers arguing a case and react to each bit of testimony or evidence with the objective of refuting it, even if true or insightful, because they only wish to win their case.
While you are speaking to them they are thinking of counter arguments, not the possible significance of what you are saying. It takes very little mental effort to find some way for them to continue to slide along in well worn mental ruts, and are only comfortable when slotted into their path in such a fashion, on mental rails that go to the same old destinations.
The science of the 911 dust has not been answered, the experts in their filed have not been answered. All there’s been on the other side is abuse [and Chris Snowdon was at it yesterday], bluster and no science offered to address what Harrit, Basile and Chandler asked and showed the results of.
And how do you answer Tom Sullivan? And what about John Gross, one of the lead engineers of the NIST report, caught lying by a student who asked him a question at a college address?
This is never addressed – just broad strokes of the debunker brush, nothing specific. It’s not just pathetic, it’s dangerous that people would be so hoodwinked and more than that – happy to be hoodwinked.