
Kyle Naber
Member
If the popular theory that the first funnel collapsed due to the water pressure on the outside of the structure, would it be probable that the cylindrical figures would pancake in on themselves as they fell?
Regardless of how egg-shaped their cross-sections became due to impact when falling over, once the stacks got in the ocean and started gaining speed downward, water friction on their surfaces would have a large effect. The effect would be to turn the stack vertically, which would make it have the least friction and therefore the least unbalanced forces on it. That is, any unbalanced force at first would push the stack, and not until the alignment resulted in the fewest unbalanced forces would it stop realigning. That's how a falling object gets aligned into its most efficient, least unbalanced orientation as it falls. In this case, each stack would soon become oriented straight up and down (either right-side up or upside down), and would then gain speed like a bullet. Due to asymmetry in construction or due to deformation during the mayhem topside, the path of each 'bullet' might vary slightly, causing a tight spiral path down. The speed would be high for so much weight presenting such a small cross-section of metal in the direction of travel. I imagine that each funnel would have buried itself in the ocean bottom when it impacted, cutting in like a cookie cutter through dough. I'd bet that for a time after impact, each stack left a ring-, donut-, or disc-shaped color change or pattern in the sediment. It's extremely likely that currents have obliterated such evidence, so it would take metal detectors to find the stacks--which by now are huge cylinders of iron oxide (rust) instead of steel--but that's still magnetic.
"I think the funnels would have been crushed inwards like a soda can on their way down. If it’s true that water pressure and simple turbulence compromised the integrity of the structure and caused it to collapse, I don’t think it would have had much strength on the way down."