The night before last, I was sent a link to a newspaper article about a demolition gone awry. The headline read: “Norton demolition temporarily halted after digger toppled onto side among rubble”. As if that headline was not self-explanatory enough, they showed several photos of a New Holland excavator lying on its side.
For all I know, that machine might still be there, lying among the demolition debris like a wounded animal. Quite how it came to be in this predicament is hard to say. Perhaps the operator tracked the machine over an unseen void and it partially collapsed into a basement. Maybe the operator had built himself a platform from which to operate, and then toppled off it. Maybe it was something else.
But there is a clue. A clue into how this unfortunate turn of events came into being. And that clue is in the name on the hoarding around the site, which apparently reads: “Budget Property Maintenance and Rubbish Removal”. That name might also go some way to explain why the fallen machine appeared to have no demolition guarding on it.
It would be easy, at this juncture, to point to the rubbish removal company and say they had over-reached themselves; that they had portrayed themselves as a demolition contractor which – according to their name at least – they are not; that their confidence was writing cheques that their experience was incapable of cashing.
But Budget Property Maintenance and Rubbish Removal didn’t just pitch up and start demolishing. Demolition contractors – like vampires – must be invited in.
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