Third letter to O'Reilly at Fox News (no response)
(c) 2001, Mike Barkley
From: "Michael Barkley", mjbarkl@inreach.com
To: oreilly@foxnews.com
Subject: WTC stairwells - How many killed by Port Authority Greed?
Date: Sun, 25 Nov 2001 16:52:37 -0800
Continuing discussion on the "DesignCommunity Architecture Forum" bulletin board ,
,
http://www.designcommunity.com/discussion.html ,
starting 11/12/01:
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Posted by Patrick J. McNierney on November 19, 2001 at 21:08:59:
In Reply to: Re: WTC stairwells - How many killed by Port
Authority Greed? posted by Mike Barkley on
November 13, 2001 at 00:40:44:
Mike,
Thank you for your compliment.
You said that I am "More objective than you..."
I am also more knowledgeable and experienced
than you on WTC issues.
I risked my own life, health and job in a way that, in concert
with many other volunteers, assisted in the evacuation
of seven survivors of the WTC.
What did you do except speculate on your so-called "Greed" of
the Port Authoirty?
My father joined the PA in 1963 as an architect and
his retirement was posponed due th the 1993 bombing.
(He put in his paperwork in January and the Bomb went off in
February.) The following Monday, he was
provided with a cot, free food, etc...in his office in Tower 1
of the WTC to assist the repair efforts.
I guess you have nothing better to do than to find fault with
others...and to use negative words like "Greed" and "House of
Cards..."
Patrick J. McNierney, P.E.
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You are exactly correct. I have done nothing but question.
Of course, that is because I am the ultimate consumer of
Developers like the Port Authority and their engineers and
architects. It is up to them whether, upon my entry into their
projects, I proceed to safety or to my death. That makes me
skeptical when confronted with a monstrosity like the WTC. I
regret I could not be there to assist in the cleanup and rescue
but even had I made the journey I would not have been allowed
near Ground Zero.
I have continued accumulating WTC evacuation barrier quotes at
http://www.mjbarkl.com/locked.htm
. It's become more obvious to
me that the locked doors are only a small part of it, that the
real barrier was the ratio of stairwell space to occupancy,
especially when combined with the local Fire Department's
"high-rise 'defend-in-place' policy" that forbade rooftop
evacuations and sent hundreds of firefighters up those stairways
to certain death.
It's incredible to me that the Port Authority thought each
tower needed 99 elevators, but that 3 (or 4) stairwells that
would hold a *grand total* of 6 (or 8? or 10? depending on whose
project description is correct) people abreast was sufficient
to evacuate 25,000 people from 110 stories in a reasonable
amount of time, that time being the usual one or two hour
burn-through protection offered by conventional sheetrock.
And leaving the evacuation of disabled people, including as
it turned out aged, overweight, out of shape, or injured, to
blind chance. It's incredible to me that the Fire Department
Administration sent those firefighters on a climb that would
take longer than those burn-through times, let alone to floors
above the point where the water supply may have failed. I'm
surprised at how many lessons were learned from the 1993
bombing, cataloged in the U.S. Fire Administration report at
http://www.usfa.fema.gov/pdf/usfapubs/tr-076.pdf
only to be ignored long enough to kill on September 11. I'm
appalled at the way Mr Giuliani and his staff ignored the
pleas of the 700 people on the top of Tower One for
helicopter rescue--they said it wasn't safe, but it was
apparently safe to send all those firefighters up the
stairwells?
The Port Authority is the worst type of Developer, one without
the control of local codes and local procedures, one allowed to
develop a project of a size that far out-stripped rational limits
of public safety, and one that is so arrogant it cannot see its
own faults.
It's criminal.
--Mike Barkley, 161 N. Sheridan Ave. #1, Manteca, CA 95336
(H) 209/823-4817 , mjbarkl@inreach.com - MS is not Microsoft.
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Return to Sentinel Home.
--Mike Barkley, 161 N. Sheridan Ave. #1, Manteca, CA 95336 (H) 209/823-4817
mjbarkl@inreach.com