Three Scottish tower blocks felled in early morning blast.

With predictable and customary Safedem efficiency, three high rise blocks that towered over Greenock for nearly 50 years came crashing down in seconds this morning as crowds looked on.

People defied freezing conditions as they took up various vantage points to watch the familiar Belville Street buildings blown up in the middle of the night by a spectacular series of controlled explosions.

The loud blasts, timed just seconds apart, boomed across town and saw Selkirk, Peebles and then Melrose courts crumble, marking the end of an era.

A huge plume of dust in the specially set-up floodlights signaled the fact that the blocks had gone, changing the town’s skyline forever.

A large exclusion zone had been set up in the east end earlier on Saturday ahead of the demolition.

Last look around as crews prepare for implosion tomorrow morning.

Belville Street in Greenock, Scotland is bracing for tomorrow’s explosive demolition of three high-rise blocks.

More than a dozen roads will be closed from noon today to allow for the controlled explosion of Selkirk, Melrose and Peebles courts early tomorrow.

Around 250 nearby properties will be evacuated today too.

Although xontractor Safedem no official implosion time has been released, the 18-storey high flats will come crashing down in the early hours of tomorrow and an exclusion zone has been put in place in and around the site.

Read more here.

Family of labourer killed in lift crash demand bosses are charged.

The family of a labourer who plunged five storeys to his death as he stood on the roof of a 2.5 tonne lift called today for his employers to be prosecuted.

Silviu Radulescu, 31, suffered severe head injuries in the accident at the Victoria building site where he was working on a demolition project.

His family made the call after a jury ruled he was unlawfully killed following a five-day inquest at Westminster coroner’s court. The Health & Safety Executive has launched an investigation, which could lead to criminal prosecution.

Radulescu, from Romania, had only been on the site for a week when he died in January 2011.

Time sheets showed Radulescu, of London Colney, Hertfordshire, was supplied by MGM Construction Ltd as a labourer for T E Scudder. The site was operated for Carey Group Plc for a Berkeley Homes development. He was part of a team stripping out the Prison Service HQ in John Islip Street.

T E Scudder was contracted to remove seven lifts. The jury heard that after a tea break Radulescu and colleague Viorel Serban went back to work on the lift. His colleagues described how he and Mr Serban were working on top of the lift to raise it manually from the fifth to the eighth floor. The carriage was supported by a two-tonne chain that had snapped, but Radulescu was unaware of this. He was fatally injured when, as he stood on the lift car, it crashed to the bottom of the shaft.

T E Scudder said: “The inquest has been traumatic for all parties involved. We take health and safety seriously and will be reviewing fully the implications of a disappointing decision.”

Read more here.

Elected officials raise health, safety and environmental concerns.

A group of elected leaders this week will send a letter to state environmental regulators asking that they delay demolition of the Asarco smokestacks because of environmental and safety concerns.

The trustee in charge of the project said his team has already addressed most of the concerns and the rest will be addressed in advance of the planned April 13 demolition.

U.S. Rep. Beto O’Rourke, state Sen. Jose Rodriguez and state Rep. Marisa Marquez, all El Paso Democrats, on Thursday confirmed that they planned to sign the letter to be sent to Bryan W. Shaw, chairman of the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality.

County Judge Veronica Escobar and city Rep. Susie Byrd also said they would sign the letter, which asks whether risks associated with dropping the stacks have been adequately addressed.

“It has now come to our attention that serious, additional questions regarding the long-term environmental and health consequences of the planned demolition and burial of the stacks are being raised,” a draft of the letter says.

Read more here.

Vieth Construction calls halt after releasing “obnoxious odour”

Demolition at the former Chamberlain Manufacturing Corp facility in Iowa has been halted after something raised a stink.

Vieth Construction Corp. of Cedar Falls was told to stop working at the contaminated former manufacturing site last month after crews unearthed something that spread an obnoxious odor through the neighborhood.

Waterloo City Council members this week approved spending up to $25,000 with HR Green Inc. of Cedar Rapids for environmental testing on the site at East Fourth and Esther streets. The firm is also putting a plan in place to deal with future surprises, including the use of air canisters to capture samples if another odor arises.

“The contractor was told to not remove any more footings or slabs for now,” said Chris Western, a city planner II overseeing the project. “We keep running across things we didn’t quite expect.”

Read more here.

Blue Group takes on Genesis attachments dealership.

The Blue Group has announced that it has been appointed as the new UK distributor for the Genesis range of demolition and material handling attachments.

“The Genesis range fits in perfectly to the existing range of equipment sold and serviced by Blue. We can now offer our existing and new clients a full package for the business whether it be demolition or recycling/re-handling,” says Blue Fuchs Terry Hughes.

The current Genesis line up consists of dedicated scrap shears ranging from the 2.5 tonne GXP200 right up to the 25 tonne GXP2500R suitable for a 160 tonne carrier. The GSG range of orange peel grabs up to 1.91m3 capacity will complement the range of Fuchs material handlers sold by the group. Mechanical concrete pulverisers and magnets make up the dedicated attachment range. Genesis also manufacture the LXP and Versi-Pro range of processors with interchangeable cutting equipment.

Avert your eyes now if you’re offended by naked flesh and bad dancing.

It’s the dance craze that has conquered the world. So it was only a matter of time before the Harlem Shake arrived on a UK site.

Before you hit the play button, we feel it’s only fair to warn you that there is some very unpleasant male flesh on display here…and the dancing’s not great either:

Masterton eyes opportunities south of the border with opening of new Yorkshire office.

Following a landmark year in 2012 that saw Masterton Decommissioning increase its turnover by 60 per cent to £16 million, the 33-year old Scottish-based company is expanding.

It has taken a suite of offices at Carwood Business Park, Leeds sto manage the increasing number of contracts it has won south of the Scottish border. The company has appointed 27 people from across the Yorkshire region to operate from its new northern base. Masterton has an additional 110 staff working from its headquarters in Grangemouth, Scotland.

“A significant proportion of the contracts we have won recently are in the North of England, so it made perfect sense to establish an operation in Yorkshire. This region of the country has a particularly strong demolition tradition and we knew we would be able to find the right kind of people with the right skills here. We have recruited 5 highly experienced contract, site and business development managers, estimators and planning engineers, and a further 22 multi-skilled operatives,” says managing director Steve Forster. “Our Yorkshire based project teams are already undertaking dismantling work at a number of sites across the north including Runcorn and Hebburn. At some point fairly soon we will be looking to open another operation further south too because we have some particularly big projects commencing in London and the South West.”

Work to start next week on removal of water tower eyesore.

A landmark on the Greenwood skyline will soon be just a memory.

Crews will tear down the unused Valle Vista water tower next week, Mayor Mark Myers said.

The 105-foot tower, located on the grounds of the Valle Vista Golf Club has stood since the mid-1970s and has long posed a hazard for pilots who use the Greenwood Municipal Airport.

Removing the structure will boost air safety and make the airport more attractive for recreational and corporate pilots, Myers said.

Demolition, which is scheduled to start March 13, will take about one day, he said.

Read more here.

Dick Henderson bridge implosion captured in high def’ slow motion.

Here at Demolition News Towers, we love a bridge implosion video. In fact, the only thing we love more than a bridge implosion video is one shot in super slow motion to allow us to enjoy the destructive beauty of the blast tearing asunder a structure that has withstood the ravages of generations.

Bridge Demo in Slow Motion from West Virginia DOT on Vimeo.