ajvol01
GBO!
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I'll answer it this way. Its been quoted somewhere and I can't find the link at the moment, but I believe, like the article states....it's simple physics.
If you have 10 compacted squares of snow, one on top of the other....if you take a torch and heat the 7th or 8th cube, will the top 1 or 2 squares of snow compress the remaining 7 or 8? I don't see how unless the bottom 7 or 8 are compromised in some fashion. The force pushing up is equal to the one pushing down. I could see a semi collapse of 8 or 10 stories with the top finally choosing the path of least resistance(which would be falling off to the side) but for the top 10 stories to compact the resistence of 90 stories in close to freefall speed.....no! It's not physically possible..
Your analogy is not apples to apples.
Snow is uniform in weight. Snow has no component parts that can fail.
The article explains the angle clips used to support the floor joists were not able to support the weight of the floors above after the columns failed.
Take a look at the image below (figure 5 from the article)