Why did the planes explode on 9/11? Like what was there that caused the jet fuel to ignite?

Question

like what caused the planes to just explode? It doesn't seem like they would just explode like that. I mean I know they were flying very fast, but still, it seems like they would just go through the building or stop and crumble or something. Because in order for an explosion to have occured there has to have been something to ignite the jet fuel, i.e a fire or something. But there were no fires in the building when the planes struck. So what ignited the jet fuel? It can't just ignite on its own without an initial fire. I know the explosion and the subsequent fire was created by ignited jet fuel, but what caused the jet fuel to ignite?

Answer 1

Friction from a metal object traveling 600 miles per hour will cause catastrophic explosions. Guess what, when 1950DA hits the earth in 877 years from now, it will equal 600,000 megatons of TNT, and that's not even metal.....friction can cause alot of damage.

Answer 2

There weren't any bombs on the planes that crashed into the World Trade Center. The planes didn't actually explode. They ripped apart when they hit the World Trade Center at 300+ miles per hour. The buildings weren't meant to take an impact like that and therefore weren't built to take impacts as such. Like anything that crashes together at a very high velocity of speed both plane and buildings were ripped open . There were big holes in each building where the planes crashed.Then a chain reaction began to happen, there was fuel from the plane dripping everywhere, exposed wiring from the building's walls and airplane's were sparking. There were also flammable gasses as well as the fumes from the fuel in the immediate vicinity of the crash. After a few minutes the fuel caught fire. After another few minutes the whole place was burning. A few minutes later the buildings crashed in on themselves because their inner structures had been damaged and couldn't support their own weight any longer.

This is at least the theory of basic logic and the American Government. Who knows though, the government may not be telling the whole truth about what exactly happened that day. Maybe there was a bomb....

Maybe there were about 100 people in the immediate impact zone. They probably had missing arms and legs, were bleeding to death, and choking from all the smoke in the air. The electricity had probably been knocked out, and it was probably dark and I bet most of them didn't even have a clue as to what happened. One of them might have lit a lighter or some matches to see what was going on and boom. The fumes of the fuel and other flammable gasses caught fire and then the whole place lit up...

Who knows, but I'll tell you what I am very sorry for all the innocent lives that were lost that day and I am sure as hell glad I wasn't there that day to tell you exactly how that fire got started.

Try these sites as they may give you some real insight as to what happened on September 11, 2001.

http://www.voicesofsept11.org/dev/index.php
- stories of 9/11 survivors.

http://911digitalarchive.org/
- an electronic compilation of media to present the history of 9/11.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/September_11,_2001_Terrorist_AttackWikipedia
- Extensive hyperlinked overview of the 2001 terrorist attacks, including a timeline of the history leading up to the attacks, a tribute to the victims of the attacks, and links to additional resources.

http://news.uns.purdue.edu/UNS/html4ever/020910.Sozen.Pentagon.html
-New simulation shows 9/11 plane crash with scientific detail

Answer 3

Jet fuel is very volatile. It takes very little to set off an explosion. The next time you fly commercial, watch out under the wings as the gas trucks come to refuel the aircraft. Before they remove the gas cap or the hoses from the truck, they attach a steel cable to a metal grounding post in the cement and another to the aircraft. This equalizes the electrical charges between the truck, the tarmac, and the aircraft. A spark invisible to the human eye is enough to set off an explosion with jet fuel.

Friction causes heat, and an aircraft traveling at over 100 MPH going through glass, steel, drywall, etc., is going to create a lot of heat. The collision also creates sparks. Either of which is fully capable of igniting the jet fuel.

Let's not forget that electrical cables ran through the buildings. When the aircraft struck, the electrical lines created an hellacious amount of electrical arcing which will ignite jet fuel.

Also keep in mind that the engines on the aircraft were running. The become extremely hot and when ripped from the wings and then having jet fuel sprayed over them, the end result is an explosion.

I could go on with a bunch more examples, but these are the most likely sources.

Good luck!

Will D
Enterprise AL
http://www.notagz.com

Answer 4

Jet fuel is far more explosive than gasoline. It is essentially highly refined kerosene. It doesn't even need a flame to ignite, just heat. The amount of energy expended when these planes collided with the buildings was huge, and created a lot of heat. Combine that heat with atomized jet fuel, and you end up with an explosion. The terrorist's knew that commercial airliners make excellent bombs. Now on to a myth(a little off topic I know) There are those who think that steel buildings wont collapse due to fire. This is wrong as wrong can be. While it takes a temperature of more than 2000 degrees to melt steel, steel loses about half of it's strength at about 750 degrees. If you want fire insurance for a steel framed home, it is significantly higher than a similar house framed with wood. Wood structures will remain standing after much more of a fire than it takes to bring down a steel framed house. Edit Jay, Steel buildings collapse almost every day due to fire. Ask a fireman. A few months ago, a bridge collapsed in California due to a tanker crashing and burning under it. The crash alone did very little damage, but the fire did. I hate to get personal when I answer questions on here, but anyone who thinks steel structures don't collapse from fire only are COMPLETE IDIOTS. Get your head out of the sand man.

Answer 5

Jet fuel, due to it's make up, is highly flamible. Impact causes sparks and heat (metal on metal will do that). With the sparks and heat, the fuel ignites. Jet fuel is very hot burning, and will create a lot of heat when it is on fire (they need it - the more heat a fuel conducts, the more energy it creates, and the further the plane will go). All of the planes hijacked were all cross country flights, so they were carrying a lot of fuel. That was the reason the flights hijacked were chosen.

Answer 6

The planes exploded because the planes shattered on impact they're just aluminum cans the fuel is then sprayed about fuel in mist form is very volatile and used in fuel air bombs. There would be multiple ignition sources the engines ,electrical sparks and friction sparks perhaps all of the above.

Answer 7

To completely answer your question you need to research and take physics 101. Highly Flammable Liquid plus heat plus friction of one mass rubbing against another mass will equal explosion and fire.

The ignition point was the sudden stop of the plane into the building, the tears in the wings and fuselage of the plane, the heat of the crash at such a speed and you have Highly Flammable high octane fuel and you have a simple explosion.

If you can not understand that... if you have gas fumes in the air, and you strike a match the gasoline does not ignite but the fumes ignite first. Please don't try this at home, research and check out the videos of this kind of testing. Leave the fire to professionals.

Answer 8

When jet fuel is fed into the engine, it is sprayed into the combustion chamber to burn more efficiently just like a cars engine.
When the planes hit the towers, the fuel tanks were ruptured, spilling vast amounts of highly flamable jet fuel everywhere. When the fuel vapor made contact with an ignition source(sparking electrical wires) it exploaded, ignighting every other possable flamable material around it.

Answer 9

Well, there are also some gas lines running through the building. The force of impact riped open the fuel containers and the sparks ignited it. Jet fuel is very flammable, just the slightest spark would set it off.

Answer 10

It's called CGI added as real to make Americans angry. The first reports said it was small private airplanes that *parked* into the buildings.

If you research you will find where *people* jumped from and where the office paper was flying out is false floors with nothing on them. Strangely when all is said and done there should've been dead bodies everywhere on the sidewalks and airplane pieces.

The buildings if it were not pulled would've slowly crumbled away with the weakspot where the airplane struck crumbling first then the rest of the towers leaning in a weird angle making the buildings uninhabitable for years as US Congress decides what to do with it.

Answer 11

Dude, a plane is a huge piece of metal lined with lots of wires and stuff, and buildings are full of fluorescent lights and wires too. As soon as the fuel hit any of the shattered lighting, it probably ignited. And heat is enough to cause fuel to ignite too. Don't fall for that "Loose Change" conspiracy rubbish. I thought it was well thought out, until I saw a rebuttal which made the whole thing look so stupid. The makers of the "Loose Change" conspiracy videos didn't do good research at all, and they overlooked some common-sense facts (namely, why would a government publish something that lays out the details of a covert plan!). If you still think there's a conspiracy, search google video for "Screw Loose Change" and watch the videos all the way through. Seriously, there's no conspiracy. If there is, it isn't anything like what "Loose Change" is trying to popularize. The footage they use in "Loose Change" is clouded by smoke; the people they question are not experts and have limited knowledge of the things they speak of; irrelevant comments are taken out of context to support their story; and many of their ideas are contrary to known facts. If you haven't seen "Loose Change" yet, I guess you'll have to watch it first to really understand "Screw Loose Change". But do yourself a favor and watch "Screw Loose Change" too! They're all on google video. Good night!