Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2011/03/13
[Author Prev] [Author Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Author Index] [Topic Index] [Home] [Search]That is some story! I thought using substandard material is a third world problem. Cheers Jayanand On Mon, Mar 14, 2011 at 4:01 AM, Lawrence Zeitlin <lrzeitlin at gmail.com>wrote: > When she looked at the picture of Manhattan harbor showing the World Trade > Center in the background, my wife reminded me of an incident that occured > nearly 35 years ago. Wes Hurley, our neighbor, was Chief Engineer of the > Port Authority. Early in 1967 while the buildings were going up, he came to > our house, very agitated, looking for someone to talk to. He confided that > tests run by his department showed that some of the concrete being used to > construct the twin towers had failed strength tests and clearly was of > substandard quality. He felt that the buildings would not be able to meet > their objectives of withstanding a 200 year storm. He had a moral dilemma > since he was near retirement and any complaint would cause a firestorm of > criticism because his boss, Austin Tobin, then Director of the Port > Authority was anxious to get the buildings erected as soon as possible. > Anyway, Wes kept quiet and retired as soon as he was eligible. I had lunch > with him a few times in the Port Authority executive dining room before he > left and he said that he always felt uneasy going to his office in bad > weather and called in sick when violent storms were expected to strike the > city. The sudden buckling of both towers shows he may have been right. > - - - - - > > >From the Wayback machine. Manhattan harbor small boat anchorage. Taken > 1990 > with a Leica IIIc, 5 cm. Elmar. I don't know what film was used but it is > quite grainy. Certainly not Kodachrome. > > http://gallery.leica-users.org/v/Larry+Z/Manhattan+harbor_+1990.jpg.html > > Larry Z > > _______________________________________________ > Leica Users Group. > See http://leica-users.org/mailman/listinfo/lug for more information >