Educational Media Reviews Online

Building on Ground Zero: Lessons from the World Trade Center Collapse explores the effects of the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, on the World Trade Center towers – and implications for the design of large-scale public buildings in years to come.

Through film footage, computer simulation, and interviews with survivors, rescue workers, engineers and architects, this NOVA program revisits the awful moments of impact – and later collapse – of each of the skyscrapers. The film documents investigations into exactly how the structural elements of the towers reacted to the extraordinary stresses to which they were subjected, and what can reasonably be done to make buildings safer. The American Society of Civil Engineers and the National Institute of Standards and Technology, which undertook the studies, subsequently recommended numerous changes to building codes in the US, based on their findings. As of 2006 none had been implemented; in other countries, however, many such changes were made almost immediately.

In a particularly compelling interview, Leslie Robertson, chief structural engineer of the World Trade Center towers, who spent nearly a decade involved in their design and construction in the 1960s, quietly describes his experience of the devastating events of 9/11. Convinced that his professional career had ended – given a rush to judgment that the towers collapsed because they were structurally unsound – he later felt vindicated when no engineering flaws were identified by investigators. Roberston subsequently worked with architects Kohn Pedersen Fox Associates on the now-completed Shanghai World Financial Center in China which is designed and engineered to be among the safest buildings in the world. The film concludes with a forward-looking analysis of this innovative building’s design and construction.

Building on Ground Zero: Lessons from the World Trade Center Collapse follows the earlier Emmy Award-winning NOVA program Why the Towers Fell, which aired in 2002. It is recommended for libraries and programs with collections in architecture and engineering, and will also be of interest to general audiences.