Hi Lawrence, I think we've probably flogged all the other matters long enough. As you say, we must now await specialist opinion and a public enquiry.
Let me confine myself to my emergency exit idea: At 13:22 30/09/01 -0400, you wrote: (KH) > As to my suggestion of a firemens' pole type of emergency exit -- well, > imagine that the buildings had about 50/100 firemens' poles running right > down through them. The poles would be nicked every 12-20 feet or so. > Imagine at the side of every pole on every floor there'd be spring-loaded, > ratcheted 'life-wraps' available on each floor to which individuals would > strap themselves and then clip onto the poles. Evacuees would then drop > down at pretty high, but constant, speed, all the way down in a matter of > minutes. Such firemen's poles and the storage of 'life-wraps' (which would > not need to be larger than, say the lifejackets on airplanes) would not > cost the earth, nor occupy much volume on each floor. (LDeB) Interesting idea... I wonder how much thinking has been done on this kind of thing. Gravity brakes might do the trick. Got to figure out how to avoid all the escapees landing on each others heads at the bottom. There's no reason why the evacuees should land on each others' heads. Galileo demonstrated a long time ago that bodies of different weights accelerate at the same rate. There'd be no accumulation at any stage of descent. The "gravity brakes" you mention are precisely the spring-loaded ratchets and the nicks in the pole that I've described above. People would drop fast -- but not too fast or too far before being arrested by the next nick. How far the nicks should be spaced, and how many poles per floor is something on which research should be done. However, I don't think anything like this will ever be done -- for the same reason that air passengers are not given parachutes. It would draw too much attention to the potential dangers of working (or living) in high-rise buildings. Keith ___________________________________________________________________ Keith Hudson, General Editor, Calus <http://www.calus.org> 6 Upper Camden Place, Bath BA1 5HX, England Tel: +44 1225 312622; Fax: +44 1225 447727; mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] ________________________________________________________________________
