Learning A REAL Lesson From 911

Putting aside Karl Rove’s political piffle that attempted to say a lesson of 911 was to never trust those evil Democrats who just didn’t support the government after the terrorist attack (an assertion a cabbage with arms could find is false by doing a few minutes of Google search), here is a REAL LESSON of 911 — specific suggestions on how to better protect the public:

NEW YORK – Tall buildings in the United States could be easier to evacuate, less vulnerable to fire, and sturdier structurally as a result of the 9/11 terrorist attacks.



After an exhaustive three-year analysis of the causes of the collapse of the World Trade Center’s Twin Towers, the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) is recommending sweeping changes to building codes around the nation to ensure that in the case of tragedy – fires and other natural disasters as well as terrorist attacks – the maximum number of people will be able to survive.

The Christian Science Monitor piece goes on:

The 30 recommendations from a draft report include increasing the width of stairwells so as workers evacuate there will be enough room for the fireman going up. It also suggests that elevator shafts be “hardened,” and one set aside to be used exclusively by emergency responders. And it calls for structural improvement to prevent the kind of kaleidoscopic collapses at the Twin Towers.



The recommendations, which were made at a press conference near the World Trade Center site, are expected to generate a fair amount of controversy in the construction and building code community, in part because such changes could increase the cost of construction. But for the engineers who undertook the study, the main concern is safety.



“[The] NIST strongly urges the building and fire safety communities to give immediate and serious consideration to these recommendations in order to achieve appropriate improvements in the way buildings are designed constructed, maintained, and used in evacuation and emergency response procedures,” says Dr. Shyam Sunder, the lead investigator at the NIST which is part of the US Department of Commerce.

Read the rest and you’ll see 30, specific recommendations — recommendations that could save lives. A TRUE lesson derived from 911.