Response to article on Trump Connection to the Twin Towers Nov. 14

The article contains at least one major error – the exterior beams were not aluminum. They were steel as was the rest of the structural system. The structure was designed as a cantilever with the interior core carrying about 65% of the vertical dead load with the exterior window wall system carrying the balance as well as horizontal (wind load) load. The structure met all applicable building codes of the 1960s. There was no special treatment of floors and ceiling structural systems. This is not unusual for high-rise design. Also, the structural steel members did not melt they simply expanded causing structural failures at connections.

Other “interior beams” were not there because of the design of the buildings. Interior space taken up by structural members cannot be rented. That amount of area multiplied by several hundred floors results in a lot of money. The design was very rent efficient!

I doubt that the two pilots had any concept of the structural system. They were not structural engineers and they were hardly pilots. They did not even know how to land the planes. They just wanted to create as much damage and loss of life as possible.

The owner of the buildings was the Port of New York Authority and to my knowledge Trump had no involvement in the financing or ownership of the buildings. A private investor held the mortgage.

How the writer came to call the World Trade Centers as Trump Towers is nonsensical. Applying current impeachment politics to this tragedy is ridiculous.

I am a licensed architect and licensed structural engineer and I have held my licenses for about 50 years.

Harry Stitle