According to a theory advanced by a SINTEF materials scientist, a mixture of water from sprinkler systems and molten aluminium from melted aircraft hulls created explosions that led to the collapse of the Twin Towers in Manhattan.

Just before the two New York skyscrapers collapsed on September 11, 2001, powerful explosions within the building could be heard, leading many people to believe that overheated steel beams in the building were not the cause of the collapse.

(Photo on right: Jim Collins / AP / SCANPIX)

The explosions fed the conspiracy theories that someone had placed explosives inside the towers. 

At an international materials technology conference in San Diego, the audience heard senior scientist Christian Simensen of SINTEF Materials and Chemistry (picture) present an alternative theory based on the physics of materials of what happened in the towers when they were attacked by the aircraft. The SINTEF researcher believes that his theory is much more likely to reflect the actual situation than the official explanation of the collapse.

In the wake of the conference Simensen had an article published in the journal "Aluminium International Today", describing his theory.

Explosive meeting of molten aluminium and water

Simensen believes that it is overwhelmingly likely that the two aircraft were trapped inside an insulating layer of building debris within the skyscrapers. This leads him to believe that it was the aircraft hulls rather than the buildings themselves that absorbed most of the heat from the burning aircraft fuel.

The SINTEF scientist believes that the heat melted the aluminium of the aircraft hulls, and the core of his theory is that molten aluminium then found its way downwards within the buildings through staircases and gaps in the floor – and that the flowing aluminium underwent a chemical reaction with water from the sprinklers in the floors below.

“Both scientific experiments and 250 reported disasters suffered by the aluminium industry have shown that the combination of molten aluminium and water releases enormous explosions,” says Simensen.

Just before the two skyscrapers collapsed on September 11, 2001, powerful explosions within the building could be heard, Photo: Jim Collins / AP / SCANPIX