"We were looking at two large bodies of fires that neither of us in our 33-year careers had ever seen anything that enormous." –FDNY Chief of Safety Albert Turi – Source



"It was the most unbelievable sight I ever saw, up until that point. I had been in some very busy units during my time in the fire department. I broke in, in Engine 46 and Ladder 27 in the South Bronx when the South Bronx was burning down. I was in Rescue 3, which was extremely busy; they covered the Bronx and Harlem. And then as a lieutenant, I was in the Lower East Side when that was burning down. As a captain, I was in Chinatown. I saw some unbelievable fires in Chinatown. What I saw pales in comparison (sic) to anything else I had seen previously." –FDNY Captain Jay Jonas – Source

9/11 conspiracists desperately try to force reality to fit their beliefs. Rational people know that won't work. Conspiracists don't care. Their goal is to perpetuate the conspiracy theory, not to find the truth. One of their most reprehensible methods – which I have spent hundreds of hours combating – is misrepresentation of 9/11 eyewitness accounts.A dramatic and maddening example is the sad story of former FDNY firefighter John Schroeder , whose deeply confused account was egregiously misused by conspiracist interviewers who knew enough to clear up his confusion butto remain silent.The most common conspiracist misuse of eyewitness accounts involves descriptions of loud noises in and around the Twin Towers. "Controlled demolition" theorists claim that such descriptions indicate that explosive devices were at work in the towers, even, for some unfathomable reason, long before the collapses. To them, all descriptions are literal and figures of speech don't exist. When Hursley Lever, who was in the north tower basement when flight 11 hit, said "I heard a bomb," but then explained that he thought the noise was a transformer explosion and went back to work, conspiracists will focus on "bomb" and omit the rest.In 2005, north tower janitor William Rodriguez changed his story and began publicly claiming that he believes explosives were used in that tower, somewhere from one to seven seconds before flight 11 struck. His new story is not supported by any evidence and is contradicted by eyewitnesses and by physical evidence. Read about Rodriguez's many false statements and his refusal to adjust his beliefs to the facts here In 2006, "Scholars for Truth and Justice" members Gordon Ross (a mechanical engineer) and Craig Furlong wrote a paper in which they claim to have found seismographic proof that a large explosion occurred at the WTC, 14 seconds before flight 11's impact. While ignoring the obvious fact that this supposed massive explosion was undetected by every person and alarm there, and ignoring the fact that the seismographers who recorded and analyzed the data say it does not show explosions, Ross and Furlong based their entire paper on a laughably bad error: they misread the seismograph's timeline . This typical truther ineptitude passed "peer review" at Steven Jones' Journal of 9/11 Studies, and the paper remains online and uncorrected, although its authors were advised of their error. Such is the willful ignorance of these people who claim to stand for the truth. (Note: Craig Furlong has since admitted his errors, retracted that claim, and joined the side of rationalism, but the paper remains online.)What about explosions or sounds like explosions before the towers collapsed, as the fires progressed? Such would not be surprising, and perhaps would be expected. During the huge fire in Madrid's Windsor building (during which the structural steel that was on the fire floors failed, leaving the building's concrete core exposed), "Explosions could be heard within the building and authorities cordoned off a zone some 500 metres in diameter in case it should collapse."Needless to say, that building was not hit by an airliner, nor were explosive devices suspected to be at work. In the towers there were partial floor collapses, falling elevators, likely debris falling down elevator shafts, fuel vapors igniting, bursting pipes, and perhaps steel failing, electrical systems shorting, and pressurized containers from the buildings and aircraft exploding. None of these things would be surprising during such events. As veteran firefighters said,Following are 16 WTC first responder descriptions of explosive noises well before the towers collapsed:"Sounded like bombs" –Keith Murphy"A huge explosion" –Gerard Gorman"Sound of popping and exploding" –Alwish Monchery"Explosions" –William Burns"Kept hearing these large boom, boom" –Rosario Terranova"Sounded like explosions." –Anthony Fitzgerald"Like a shotgun going off" –Mark Meier"Sounded like explosions" –Wilfred Barriere"Sounded like bombs, like blockbusters" –John Murray"You could hear explosions" –Richard Smiouskas"Sounded like an M-80, that's how loud they were" –Tim Pearson"Sounds like a shotgun" –Eric Ronningen"Sounded like an explosion" –John Morabito"There were lots of explosions" –Jeff Birnbaum"Under the assumption that the sounds were secondary bombs." –Andrew Rodriguez"Sounded like bombs. Like a bomb going off. I mean, it was huge." –FDNY Deputy Chief Peter HaydenIt would be dishonest of me to represent these accounts as anything but what they are: descriptions of bodies from the towers hitting the ground. But members of the 9/11 "truth" movement have no such compunction about misrepresenting dozens of other eyewitness accounts.David Ray Griffin, in his book, and Dylan Avery, in hisvideos, use the account of Teresa Veliz, whom they say was in the north tower, to support their claims that explosives were planted in the towers. From

Veliz went down a staircase with a coworker to the concourse level. In the mall, they got onto an up-escalator as the South Tower collapsed, causing a rush of wind which knocked them down. In the pitch black, Veliz and her coworker followed someone carrying a flashlight:



"The flashlight led us into Borders bookstore, up an escalator and out to Church Street. There were explosions going off everywhere. I was convinced that there were bombs planted all over the place and someone was sitting at a control panel pushing detonator buttons. I was afraid to go down Church Street toward Broadway, but I had to do it. I ended up on Vesey Street. There was another explosion. And another. I didn't know where to run."

Mike Athemas, a 46-year-old volunteer fireman, headed downtown once the bomb went off and didn't leave until midafternoon. "Everywhere you turned, there was someone taking bodies out of the rubble," he said. Making matters worse, documents that had been blown from the building were catching fire and igniting vehicles outside the World Trade Center. "There were 20 cars and trucks -- police cars and emergency vehicles -- on fire," said Mr. Athemas. Source

"Then you could see little fires, like paper fires. ...I remember just walking up that block. That first block, all the cars were on fire. They weren't totally engulfed in flames, but there was fire on them and their tires were exploding. Walking up that block, everything was quiet except for the explosions of tires and stuff like that." –Firefighter James Murphy, FDNY oral testimony transcripts



"On the southwest corner of Vesey and West, there was a parking lot that was just roaring. Every car was transmitting to the next car." –Firefighter Kevin Monahan, FDNY oral testimony transcripts



"The Scott cylinders [firefighters' air packs] and the oxygen cylinders were all letting go. They were blowing up left and right." –Firefighter Todd Heaney, FDNY oral testimony transcripts



"We continued our efforts until the combination of dust, smoke, and secondary explosions along with reports of gas main leaks, bombs, small arms fire and buildings about to collapse forced us to again relocate further north on West Street." –PAPD Lt. Daniel Carbonaro, PAPD 9/11 after-action reports



The New York firefighter's account on Thursday sounded like his worst nightmare.

"It was like snow flakes coming down, with no one around," 53-year-old Ernie Armstead said.

"The ambulance blew up, then the fire truck blew up, six police cars blew up, one after the other.

"I was in shock. I was in smoke and the debris." Source



Veliz wasn't in the north tower then. She was on the street and was describing eventsthe collapse of the south tower, as reported in Dean Murphy’s book. Note what Griffin and Avery dishonestly omit in order to give a false impression:What would have been exploding on the street after the south tower collapse? Many things:The report above, which was written for the Associated Press on 9/11/01, says "once the bomb went off," but that is either a reporter's misunderstanding in the heat of the moment, or a figure of speech. The AP does not claim that any bombs were used.

The collapses , truther denial, Graeme MacQueen's "118 witnesses" paper



1) In discussing my "not a demolition" video, conspiracist "LastChild" insists that the enormous detonations that would have been necessary to do what the truthers say was done to the towers, were either drowned out by other noises or were somehow removed by the audio circuitry in all the video cameras that recorded the events. He stands by this insistence despite the fact that my video shows many demolitions in which much smaller detonations are resoundingly captured by video cameras– and in every case they are much louder than the collapses themselves. Then he arrogantly dismisses professionals who take the time to explain to him exactly why his claims are nonsense.



2) Conspiracist "thewholesoul" tells an outrageous lie: "the vast majority of firefighters testimony contend that explosives or secondary devices were used in the building." In fact, of the hundreds of firefighters who were on the scene, only one, John Schroeder, has claimed that he thinks explosives would explain the damage he saw. As I detail in my paper linked at the top of this page, he made that statement only in 2007, under very troubling circumstances, to interviewers who neglected to inform him that the "explosives" damage was caused by the collapse of the south tower – an event of which he was unaware.



3) Conspiracist "einsteen," who is apparently a Dutch engineering student, made a short "counter" video to mine, in which the very first clip had fake audio of the north tower collapse, and in which none of the other clips contain anything like detonation sounds. He then backpedals, says the "minor issue" of fakery has been removed, and says, "I don't care about those distinct booms [distinctly fake, that is], but the rumbling sound." When pressed to explain why a skyscraper collapse shouldn't make a rumbling sound, he remains silent. Starting with the first week I got involved with 9/11 conspiracists, at least 20 times I've asked them to describe what a skyscraper collapse should sound like, since they claim to know that it shouldn't sound like what we hear on the 9/11 recordings and what is described by hundreds of eyewitnesses. Not a single conspiracist has answered that question.



4) Conspiracist and Swedish naval architect Anders Bjorkman, posting as "Heiwa," first revises the laws of physics, then claims that photo and video evidence that plainly refutes his claims about the tower collapses are likely "Hollywood manipulations." And again. And again. And again. Repeat ad nauseum.



People in the "described something like a bomb” category – 31



Number who did not actually mention anything about bombs, explosions, devices, etc. – 1 (Walter Kowalczyk). I have no idea why MacQueen included Kowalczyk's account, which includes nothing about explosions, sounds like explosions, or any suggestion of explosives or explosive devices. That's truther "scholarship" for you.



Remaining people in "bomb" category – 30



Number who were describing the collapse of a tower – 30



Number who had no idea at the time that what they heard was the collapse of a tower (usually because they were inside another building). – 15



Number who saw the collapse of a tower, at least partially – 7



Number who explained that they knew the sounds were collapses – 2



Number who said they had no idea what was going on during the event – 4



Number who said, as of the interview date, that they thought they'd actually seen or heard explosives – 0



Number who have claimed since 2001 that they believe there were explosives in the buildings – 0

Bessler, Paul– Thought south tower collapse was secondary explosion or plane strike. Heard on radio, "Imminent collapse. This was a terrorist attack. Evacuate."



Borrillo, Nicholas– In north tower: south tower plane hit sounded like small explosion.



Brodbeck, Michael– In north tower, heard on radio that floors 68-70 of north tower collapsed: was actually south tower collapse.



Brosnan, Neil– Didn't know sequence of events until a week later.



Butler, John– Even after being on site for a while, didn't know plane had hit.



Camacho, Fernando– From north tower lobby, thought south tower collapse was small collapse. Saw north tower leaning before collapse.



Campagna, Frank– In north tower, didn't know plane had hit their building. From 30th floor, thought south tower collapse was explosion.



Cassano, Salvatore– Thought 2nd plane was secondary explosion from north tower.



Conzo, Joseph (E.M.S.)– Thought collapse of south tower was another plane strike.



Delgado, Manuel (E.M.S.)– Didn't know about 2nd plane until evening. Thought it was a secondary explosion.



Diaz, Jr., Roland (E.M.S.)– In #5, thought south tower collapse was airplane strike



Dixon, Brian– Heard second plane hit, thought was north tower explosion. Looked like bottom fire floor of south tower exploded out, then realized it was just a collapse. "Not that there was an explosion but that the windows blew out." Worried about secondary devices.



Dorritie, Robert– Thought south tower collapse was secondary device.



Drumm, John– In north tower 31st floor didn't know south tower came down until later in the day.



Fenyo, Christopher– Many people had felt that possibly explosives had taken out 2 World Trade Center. "That debate ended pretty quickly because tower 1 came down."



Fitzpatrick, Brian– Thought it was debris or an explosion or a secondary explosion or another plane. Warned that north tower leaning just before it fell.



Galasso, Joseph– Didn't know both buildings had come down. South tower, sounded like a waterfall.



Hansen, Eric (E.M.S.) – Didn't know 2nd plane hit, didn't know towers collapsed.



Ippolito, James– Thought south tower collapse was another plane. Second plane hit sound like train derailing.



King, Stephen. Battalion Chief – Didn't know north tower or south tower were hit by planes. In north tower, thinks south tower collapse is north tower coming down. "You can feel the air pressure building up. I mean, literally, it blows the windows in (the north tower from outside).



Kreuger, Conrad, PAPD P.O.– Didn't know until later that day that both towers were down.



Lakiotes, Art– Re: collapses: we all thought it was secondary explosives or more planes or whatever.



McCabe, Kevin– Thought south tower collapse was 3rd plane hit.



McGimpsey, Jason– south tower collapse sounded like a plane or bomb or something like that.



McNeur-Mccarthy, Linda (E.M.S.) – Thought south tower collapse was another plane hit.



Mecner, Edward– From north tower 23rd, sounded like a missile was about to come through the window. Didn't know south tower had fallen.



Mera, Wayne– Thinks they could lose top 15-20 floors. Second plane hit = massive explosion, thought it might be a bomb. Doesn't realize until later in the day that both towers totally collapsed.



Molina, Michael, PAPD Detective– Didn't realize until later that day that both towers were gone.



Murphy, James– Thought south tower collapse was 3rd plane hit.



Murray, Kevin– Thought south tower collapse was 3rd plane hit. Heard report of 65th floor collapse.



O'Flaherty, Brian– Thought north tower collapse was plane strike.



Olszewski, Janice (E.M.S.)– Didn't know south tower collapsed. Thought might be a bomb, another plane, etc.



Ondrovic, Patricia (E.M.S.) – Didn't know planes had hit the buildings. Tried to enter lobby of 6. Thought 6 blew up on her. Cars exploding. Coat caught fire. Thought she saw a plane explode over New Jersey. (FDNY transcripts and here)



Orlando, Thomas– In north tower, thought south tower collapse was missile attack.



Piambino, Thomas– In north tower: didn't know "explosion" was the south tower falling.



Puma, Frank (E.M.S.) – Thought first plane strike was a bomb.



Reilly, Gerard– Thought south tower collapse was explosion in Vista Hotel. Didn't know tower had collapsed.



Reynolds, William– Many thoughts of various possible threats. Thought WTC 2 was destroyed by a bomb.



Ryan, William– Was on-scene just after collapses but didn't realize until about 3:00 that both towers were down.



Smiley, Gary (E.M.S.)– FBI people saying there were bombs in different parks and just running from one area to the next.



Sweeney, Frank– Some think second plane was a bomb. Didn't know north tower damage was caused by a plane. "The rest of the day we spent running from bomb scares and gas leaks."



Trojanowski, Stanley– Thought south tower collapse was bomb going off because north tower blocked his view.



Walker, Dan – Thought south tower collapse was north tower elevators falling.



Wall, William– Heard sonic boom from fighter plane: thought it was bombs.



Walsh, William– Didn't know south tower fell. Rumors of federal buildings being hit.



Wernick, Michael– Thought south tower collapse was airplane strike.

like light bulbs popping," as Ondrovic described.

Lessons not learned



Now, people have tried to get me to describe what it was like while the collapse was happening. It was a montage of different sounds and experiences. The sounds were a combination of sounds. This building collapsed in what’s called a pancake fashion. In other words, one floor would hit another floor and would collapse that floor and then collapse the next floor. And every time a floor would hit another floor, it created a loud boom and tremendous vibration.



The entire collapse of this 110-story building took 13 seconds. So it sounded like boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, you know, like that. And every time that happened, it shook the entire building. It shook the whole floor. So every time a floor would hit another floor, we’d be literally bouncing off the floor. We were being thrown around the stairway.



There was also this very loud sound of twisting steel all around our heads. These massive steel beams and girders were just being twisted around our heads just like they were twist ties on a loaf of bread. And a very loud, like a steel screeching sound, almost like a lot of trains coming into a subway station at the same time and all of them hitting their brakes at the same time.



There was tremendous air movement with the building coming down. The air movement was so strong that one of my fireman was standing on the fourth floor. You’ve got to figure with his gear and everything on, he’s well over 200 pounds. He’s about 180 pounds and with his gear, you gotta figure he’s about 250 pounds. This wind kind of picked him up and threw him down two fights of stairs.



We were getting hit with all kinds of debris. Thank God it was nothing that was going to really hurt us, but after it was all over, it was almost like we kind of got mugged. We were all bruised up and small cuts and things like that.



And then the collapse stopped.



In a day of first experiences for everybody, well here’s another one. I can’t believe we just survived that. It was very quick and during the collapse you couldn’t help but think that this is it. It’s over. This is how it ends. I kept waiting for that big beam to hit or that big piece of concrete to come down and crush us.



It never came. Source

In one of the most bizarre rationalizations attempted by a 9/11 truther, Dr. Steven E. Jones posits that the vehicles (and somehowthe vehicles) at the WTC may have been set aflame by " thermate residue ." Dr. Jones, why not just strap on wings, rap your magic wand against the basement paneling three times, and proclaim that "bad pixie dust" was responsible?Conspiracists sometimes try to pass off a video snippet of a firefighter saying "there's a bomb in that building" as referring to the towers. It doesn't. The firefighter was standing outside Stuyvesant High School, which had been used as a staging area and was the site of one of the many false alarm bomb scares that day. Many firefighters mentioned this in their oral testimonies. First responders were trained to be on the lookout for secondary devices after a terrorist attack. Stuyvesant was also the site of a reported gas main leak: another false alarm. See videos of the Stuyvesant bomb scare here and here My video World Trade Center Not a Demolition shows how 9/11 truthers desperately try to hide the fact that there were no detonations at all preceding or during the three skyscraper collapses. It also shows the wildly absurd explanations that many leading conspiracists give for easily-explainable events. The wind created by the collapses pushed clouds of dust down the streets, as rational people would expect to happen. Conspiracists say these dust clouds were "pyroclastic flows" – high temperatureevents.I could give several hundred examples of similar truther retreat into denial and fantasy. Four examples from the JREF forum, in the past week alone, are representative:These are desperate people, whose inability to face reality results in lying, dismissal of expertise, dismissal of evidence, refusal to answer simple questions, and retreat into fantasy. They are excellent representatives of the 9/11 "truth" movement, which is nothing more than a club for intellectual cowards.One of the most commonly-cited conspiracist works is Graeme MacQueen's " 118 Witnesses: The Firefighters' Testimony to Explosions in the Twin Towers ," which is fittingly published in that compendium of breathtaking ineptitude, the "Journal of 9/11 Studies." MacQueen, who calls himself " a scholarly sort of guy ," reveals either his agenda, his incompetent scholarship, or both, in the title of his paper, which properly should be called "Firefighters' testimony which includes words like "explosion" to describe events at the World Trade Center." Says MacQueen, "I believe most of the terms on which my research focuses, such as “explosion” and “bomb,” are less subject to ambiguity."Really? Let's look at the accounts MacQueen includes of firefighters who use the words "bomb," "explosives," "secondary devices," etc. He lists 31 such accounts. Here's my analysis:To date I have reviewed over 600 accounts by people who described what the tower collapses looked and sounded like. Only 11% used terms like "explosion." Again (and this can't be stressed enough) the recordings conclusively disprove the truther claims that explosive detonations brought down the towers, pulverized concrete to powder, and tossed tons of steel around the site like matchsticks. That simply didn't happen.Far too numerous to list here are the accounts of firefighters who were in the north tower when the south collapsed and had no idea what was happening because they could not see the other tower. Almost all assumed that some other event was responsible for the tremendous shaking, noise, and wind they experienced, and their accounts,, reflect that confusion and those assumptions. Those of us who didn't live through that terror can never know what it was like, but the following notes will give a small idea of the tremendous confusion and "fog of war" experienced by the first responders, as collected in the FDNY oral testimony transcripts That paints a picture of massive confusion, (which was enhanced by poorly-working FDNY radios, the abandonment of the OEM center in WTC 7, and nearly nonexistent inter-agency communications). Some first responders didn't know that planes had hit the buildings. Some thought the second plane strike was a bomb blast. Many thought the south tower collapse was a plane strike. Some fleeing from the south tower collapse didn't know the building was coming down and thought an explosion had happened. Some on the scene during and long after the collapses did not know that the towers had fallen. Some didn't learn the sequence of events until days and weeks later. Sixafter the 9/11, John Schroeder didn't know that the south tower had collapsed before the north.E.M.T. Patricia Ondrovic's accounts are revealing. She arrived on Vesey Street in her ambulance after the plane strikes and did not know that planes were responsible for the damage and fires she saw. When the south tower collapsed, she heard a roar and saw people run, and instinctively ran also, but after only a few steps was caught by the debris cloud. She did not know the tower was falling. She tried to enter nearby WTC building 6 (U.S. Customs Building) but was waved away by security guards. She saw flashes and heard popping noises along the ceiling of the lobby of building 6 and, even well after 9/11, thought those were demolition explosives detonating. As she headed west, she says an exploding car set her coat on fire. Near the waterfront, she thought she saw a plane explode over New Jersey. When she flagged down an ambulance, she asked to be driven out of the city. She was terrorized.Just as Teresa Veliz, on the street, was "convinced that bombs were planted all over the place and someone was sitting at a control panel pushing detonator buttons," Patricia Ondrovic really thought she saw demolition explosives at work in building 6. Of course we know that didn't happen. Demolition charges don't make noises "They create enormous blasts and powerful pressure waves that would be deafening, unmistakable, destructive to property (and certainly to windows), and likely fatal at close range. There were security guards in the lobby where those flashes and pops were. No one was killed there when the south tower collapsed. The building stood (although very heavily damaged by the north tower collapse and subsequent fires) and afterwards was searched for victims, then examined by engineers to determine its stability and the best way to tear it down. There was no attempted explosive demolition in building 6, nor did bombs detonate there. Ondrovic was simply confused. Similar pops and flashes were seen low in the south tower as it collapsed from the top: perhaps these were electrical shorts.The lesson for conspiracists? These accounts must be put in context and must not be used to support a fantasy that neither the first responders nor the audiovisual, seismic, or physical evidence support.Grame MacQueen has not learned that lesson. He falsely states, "Over 23 per cent of our group [of 503 first responders] are explosion witnesses." Further, his "explosion" category includes witnesses who describe the booming "pancaking" of floors as the collapses progressed, because the NIST investigation disproved floor "pancaking" as the cause of the collapse. The proximate cause of the collapses was the failure of the east face of the south tower and the south face of north tower. These failures caused the top sections of the towers to "pile drive" through the lower sections. Out of ignorance or from a desire to deceive, MacQueen commits a common truther error: he conflates the cause of collapse initiation with the result of the continuation of the collapses, which of courseinvolve floors being sequentially pounded into each other by the huge, accelerating mass above.FDNY Captain Jay Jonas, who survived in a 6th floor core stairwell of the north tower as the building collapsed around him, describes that experience:Again, to be clear: the collapses didn't start by floors breaking loose and pancaking into other floors, but floors were hit sequentially as the tops of the towers were pile-driven by gravity through the lower sections. Below, a four-story tower section that "pancaked" into a block a few feet high. Portions of the corrugated steel floor pans on which the floor concrete rested are visible.

Loose Change, MacQueen is content to publicly state that because all these FDNY first responders do not support the conspiracist claims, they all must have succumbed to "persuasion" to change their minds about what killed 343 of their brothers and friends and to never speak of it again.



real cause of the WTC collapses. Contrast these ignorant conspiracist opinions with the reality of the firefighter unions' public claims after a 2007 fire at 130 Liberty Street killed two firefighters:



City's Fire Unions Accuse FDNY of Cover-Up at Deutsche Bank Building

Firefighters and their unions don't hesitate to demand that safety issues be addressed. At Farrell's bar in Brooklyn, which is a firefighter and cop hangout, I asked one of New York's Bravest how he would respond to someone who said the 9/11 first responders were keeping quiet about what killed their brothers. He laughed, shook his head, and said, "There better not be a

These are despicable accusations, similar to conspiracy nut James Fetzer's condemning structural engineers to "a special place in hell" because they obviously are keeping quiet about thecause of the WTC collapses. Contrast these ignorant conspiracist opinions with the reality of the firefighter unions' public claims after a 2007 fire at 130 Liberty Street killedfirefighters:Firefighters and their unions don't hesitate to demand that safety issues be addressed. At Farrell's bar in Brooklyn, which is a firefighter and cop hangout, I asked one of New York's Bravest how he would respond to someone who said the 9/11 first responders were keeping quiet about what killed their brothers. He laughed, shook his head, and said, "There better not be a Halligan around. I'd put it through his fucking skull." At the center of Farrell's back bar stands a cross made from WTC steel and a portrait of longtime Farrell's bartender Vinny Brunton, a FDNY Captain with Ladder 105, who died on 9/11. Finally, MacQueen states, "The oral histories show that many people who originally thought they had witnessed critical explosions were later persuaded that they had not, and it appears that the pancake hypothesis was the main alternative they were offered." The oral histories show no such thing. MacQueen offers no evidence – none – to support this assertion. Like Jason Bermas of, MacQueen is content to publicly state that because all these FDNY first responders do not support the conspiracist claims,





– The Higgins family: Retired FDNY Captain Ed, FDNY firefighter brothers Joe, Mike, and Bob, and NYPD Sergeant Mike, whose son and brother Timothy died on 9/11.



– Lee Ielpi, one of the most decorated firefighters in FDNY history and his son, firefighter Brendan, whose son and brother Jonathan died on 9/11.



– Captain John Vigiano, whose firefighter sons John and Joseph died on 9/11.



– Jimmy Boyle, retired FDNY union president, whose firefighter son Michael died on 9/11.



– Chief Jim Riches, whose son James died on 9/11.



– Chief Eddie Schoales, whose son Thomas died on 9/11.



– Captain Bill Butler, whose son Jonathan died on 9/11.



– Battalion Chief Joe Pfeifer, whose brother Kevin died on 9/11.



– Lieutentant Tommy Brunton, whose brother Vincent died on 9/11.



– Lieutenant Dennis O'Berg, whose son Dennis died on 9/11.



– Lieutenant Paul Geidel, whose son Gary died on 9/11.



– Fire Patrolman Mike Angelini, whose firefighter brother Joseph and nephew Joseph Jr died on 9/11.



– The Harrell family, whose firefighter brothers Stephen and Harvey died on 9/11.



– The Haskell family, whose firefighter brothers Thomas and Timothy died on 9/11.



– The Langone family, whose firefighter brothers Peter and Thomas died on 9/11.















Mr. MacQueen, Mr. Bermas, Alex Jones (a professional conspiracist and Executive Producer of Loose Change Final Cut), and the other conspiracists who make these accusations will never have the nerve to tell these people that they really should care more about what killed their loved ones: