In the summer of 2011, after finishing my 22 respectful YouTube rebuttals of
Richard Gage’s Blueprint for Truth (keywords chrismohr911), I decided to see
if I could organize an independent study of the World Trade Center dust to
find out if thermitic materials could be found. Not being a chemist, I
couldn't make a truly independent analysis of the data found in the Bentham
paper alleging the discovery of unignited thematic material by Niels Harrit,
Steven Jones, Kevin Ryan and others: “Active Thermitic Material Discovered in
Dust from the 9/11 World Trade Center Catastrophe, The Open Chemical Physics
Journal, Vol 2, 2009,”
http://www.benthamscience.com/open/t...001/7TOCPJ.SGM
While I am very skeptical of claims of controlled demolition on 9/11, I’m no
scientist, and I can’t independently judge the merits of this Bentham article.
What if they did find thermitic materials? I wanted to see if their evidence
could stand up to scientific testing. So I began to ask, what would it take to
do an independent test of the dust? Some people said that for a few hundred
dollars, a lab could easily test the dust. Kevin Ryan told me it would not be
so easy, and he turned out to be right. He seemed to indicate he would be
reluctant to provide samples of his own dust, so eventually I decided to look
for a lab which:
1) Knew a protocol for searching for unignited thermitic materials in dust
2) Did not put down the idea as ridiculous or a waste of time
3) Had access to WTC dust
4) Would not just run whatever test their lab could do just to make a few
hundred dollars
(they had to know what they were doing and have the equipment to do it)
Finally, for my part I decided not to tell the researcher how to do his/her
job. I would simply ask if they could look for unignited thermitic materials
in the dust, and if so, what protocol would they suggest and how much would it
cost?
The search was not easy. I contacted 24 or 25 forensic experts, laboratories,
universities, fire safety experts, etc. I broadcast out a general request to
refer me to someone who could do this.
Eventually, I was recommended to Dr. James Millette of MVA Scientific
Consultants near Atlanta. He had all the qualifications: 1.) He had a lab that
could do multiple tests. 2.) He had access to WTC dust (Kevin Ryan would not
be likely to release any of his own samples) 3.) He was genuinely openminded.
I asked him if he believed there was thermitic material in the dust and he
said he wouldn’t know until he did the tests. He openly acknowledged that no
one in the traditional scientific community has seriously investigated this
question. I asked him point blank what would happen if he found thermitic
materials in the dust and he said he was used to giving forensic evidence that
contradicted the expectations of the people who had hired him. He is an
independent scientist. “If I find it I’ll publish it.” Many 9/11 Truth
activists have told me, “at last, someone is taking the Bentham study
seriously! At last, a real independent investigation!”
Dr. Millette is a member of the American Academy of Forensic Sciences and
works with internationally known microscopy experts. An ad hoc international
team of these experts, as well as architects, engineers, and other
specialists, contributed their expertise to this study. Dr. Millette had
already glanced at the red-gray chips in WTC dust but never did a thorough
study of them. He decided to do this study for only $1000, although the value
of all his research was much more.
I thought he just might be my guy. In case things didn’t work out, I called
him “Lab Guy” for a month or so on the JREF blog and other correspondences. I
checked him out, and got recommendations from a top arson expert and fire
safety expert.
Why did he do such a thorough study at such a low cost? He is doing a lot more
with this study than just doing a job and reporting his findings. It was the
centerpiece of three major presentations by his lab at the American
Association of Forensic Scientists 2012 convention:
http://www.mvainc.com/2012/01/13/feb...nnual-meeting/
In addition, the results will soon be published in a peer-reviewed scientific
journal.
Some people on the 9/11 Truth side were suspicious of him. I’ve summarized
those suspicions on my Richard Gage debate thread starting near the bottom of
this page:
http://forums.randi.org/showthread.php?t=212725&page=86
On that thread I am willing, on a limited basis, to answer sincere questions
about my decision to choose Dr. Millette for this study. I am not interested
in endless rounds of attacks and will not participate in such an exercise on
that thread or anywhere.
However, this thread here is about summarizing and discussing the scientific
findings of this report. If you have questions about Jim Millette’s
credibility, those are being dealt with on the other thread (link above). This
is a moderated thread, so any questions about anyone’s honesty or integrity
etc. will be referred to the other thread. Here is Dr. James Millette’s
promise to us:
“Chris, I can assure you that we will proceed in an objective, scientific
manner and report what we find. At present, I have no opinion as to whether we
will find any active thermitic material. All I can say is that to this point
in time we have not found any during the general particle characterizations we
have done. Because we have not focused on this particular question in the past
analyses, we are proceeding with a careful, forensic scientific study focused
on the red-gray chips in a number of WTC dust samples. When I present the
data, it will be in front of critical members of the forensic science
community and when I publish, it will be in a peer-reviewed scientific
journal. I am an independent researcher without an interest in how the
research results come out. Our laboratory is certified under ISO 17025 which
includes audits of our accuracy, reliability and integrity. I am a member of
the American Academy of Forensic Scientists and have sworn to uphold the high
ethical standards of the organization. I do not see anything in our article
that he linked… to suggest that we were publishing misleading data.” Jim
Millette
I submit to you that Dr. Millette has kept his promise.
The next several posts contain the results of Dr. James Millette’s study.
Onward!