Please let me be clear: I've no doubt that an ANFO bomb is suitable for leveling most structures. Furthermore, I believe McVeigh's bomb could easily be responsible for knocking out the the walls and tearing out the floors in the Murrah Building. What interests me is the reinforced concrete columns.

In fact, Partin says: "Structures that have large areas for blast loading and low mass can be destroyed at considerable range from a large blast....Five pounds of blast pressure will flatten most frame houses."

The point of Partin's analysis is that a 4,800 lb ANFO bomb could not have possibly done that damage to the columns. At the time he wrote, the information about the nitromethane was not public. Since he wrote, the size of the bomb has been revised upwards to 5,600 lbs. I hope to eventually plug in these newer numbers myself, and see what the results are.

I've also learnd that there was a documentary shown on The Learning Channel a few years ago which argued that the Murrah Building was extensively damaged not because the columns failed but because there was a design flaw in the building. Does anyone know something about that?