Blast brings end to towers left empty for 20 years.

Around 100 pounds of explosives brought an end to a pair of nine-storey high former office blocks in the Pieve Emanuele district of Milan yesterday.

The two blocks had lain empty and abandoned for some 20 years. Their demolition – carried out by contractor General Smontaggi – is part of a 170 million regeneration programme for the area.

Read more here, or view the videos below:

Demolition workers injured as stairwell collapses at fire-hit apartment building.

Two demolition workers were injured yesterday afternoon when a stairwell collapsed at the site of an apartment building fire that left 250 residents homeless in July.

Tom McLain, first district battalion chief with the St. Louis Fire Department, said the two men were “conscious and talking” after being pulled by rescuers from the rubble at 3949 Lindell Boulevard shortly after 2 p.m.

The workers were trapped for about 20 minutes before being taken to a hospital. Their conditions were not available.

The men were working Sunday at the site where a fast-moving blaze damaged the four-story, 197-unit apartment structure on the evening of July 18.

Read more here.

Northeast Kansas bridge felled in implosion.

The Big Blue River Bridge on US 77 in Marshall County was closed for a short time last week as crews imploded the old bridge next to.

Cleanup work for the old bridge removal should be done in the next two weeks.

The newly completed $7.6 million Big Blue River Bridge replacement was unveiled at a ribbon cutting last month.

Read more here or view the video below:

Condemned Hotel Sterling caught up in legal battle, despite demolition permit.

Liability issues are holding up an agreement between Luzerne County and CityVest, owner of the condemned Hotel Sterling, to demolish the historic building.

Luzerne County Council and County Manager Robert Lawton agreed in September to spend up to $232,729 on demolition. But before the county releases any funds, the county wants CityVest and the city of Wilkes-Barre to agree to terms on title conveyance and limiting liability exposure.

Wilkes-Barre City Council was set to vote on a Sterling agreement Thursday but removed it from the agenda because the county and CityVest have not agreed to terms. The city has $260,000 from a state grant to spend on a demolition and would be in charge of the demolition, while the county would become owner of the 4-acre Sterling site afterward.

“I am concerned and disappointed the parties are not moving with expediency,” Luzerne County Councilman Rick Williams said, noting the city condemned the building as unsafe and diverted traffic away from it with a detour 14 months ago.

Read more here.

We are receiving reports that veteran blaster Bob Daphne has passed away.

Nine months after we announced the loss of blaster Phil Lowe, the explosive demolition business has lost another of its characters: Bob Daphne.

We received an email from Geraint Totty late last night to advise us that Daphne had succumbed to cancer earlier this week in his adopted home of South Africa.

Together with Mike Perkin, Daphne had been a part of the “all-Yorkshire” tag team that pushed Ogdens to prominence in the UK blasting sector during the 1970s and 80s. Indeed, Daphne was one of those featured in the now infamous “day trip to Birkenhead” video.

The pair subsequently relocated to South Africa to form Wreckers, a multi-disciplined demolition company that retained their reputation for blasting expertise.

“With no ear drums left and forearms the size of tree trunks from his days on the rock drill Bob will be missed by many,” concludes Geraint Totty. “I reckon his contribution to the demolition industry is well worth a mention.”

Exactly 24 months on and stack remains where it came to rest.

It is two years to the day since we reported on the Ohio smoke stack implosion that went awry, leaving thousands without electricity as the falling chimney tore down 12,500 volt overhead power lines.

At the time, explosives contractor AED laid the blame for the misdirected descent upon an unseen crack in the stack that had caused it to fall in the wrong direction.

But precisely two years on, the resulting pile of rubble still sits where the smokestack for the Ohio Edison Mad River Power Plant fell.

No one was hurt in the accident, but it left about 4,000 people without power for several hours and did an unknown amount of damage to the company’s property. A company investigation into the accident is still ongoing, said Mark Durbin, spokesman for Ohio Edison.

“It’s still in discussion, believe it or not,” Durbin said. “There has been no definite decision.” Durbin said that the two-year wait was a normal part of the company’s internal investigative process. There is the potential for legal action against the demolition company, he said.

Read more here or view again the video below:

Downsizing of aerospace giant throws up demolition opportunities.

Aerospace giant Boeing Co. plans to sell two buildings at its Seal Beach campus, including its iconic, eight-story office tower along Seal Beach Boulevard, as part of a nationwide downsizing, company officials said Thursday. In addition, Boeing plans to demolish two vacant buildings at its Huntington Beach facility early next year.

“In Southern California, we have excess office space,” said Boeing spokesman Todd Blecher. “We’re just consolidating our footprint.”

Boeing announced Wednesday that it plans to trim $1.6 billion in spending at its Defense, Space and Security unit. The cuts, made in response to the federal government’s shrinking defense budget, will come on top of $2.2 billion in spending cuts made over the past two years.

The company also is cutting executive positions by 30 percent from 2010 levels and is downsizing facilities space by more than 10 percent, the company also said.

Read more here.

DemolitionNews is celebrating its fourth birthday today.

The story of the site’s conception is one that I never tire of retelling. I was in a bar in Istanbul with current IDE President John Woodward discussing the fact that there was no single place that gathered together demolition news from across the globe. Sure, there are magazines and websites but – by and large – they are tied by geographic boundaries or have specific allegiances to trade associations.

After, perhaps, a Turkish beer too many, I boasted that I could create such a news hub and, on my return to the UK, set about doing just that. The website was built in a few hours and went live a day or two later. By the end of our first week, we had four subscribers and had received 81 views (and I think most of those were myself, John Woodward and, perhaps, my mother).

Today, exactly four years since the site was originally conceived, we’re averaging well over 80 views an hour. Our list of subscribers is more than 1,000 times our first week’s total together with another 3,700 on Twitter and 1,300 via LinkedIn. We have produced just under 4,000 articles and posts, and our video channel has enjoyed over 1.13 million views. And our iPhone/iPad app is now used daily by more than 1,000 demolition professionals around the world.

We are, of course, immensely proud of how our baby has grown. But that growth – which I don’t think any of us could have predicted – is entirely down to you, our loyal and constant readers. Without your input and engagement, your contributions, criticisms and support none of this would have been possible.

So if you’re reading this, have ever viewed one of our videos, added a comment to a story, shared one of our posts with a colleague, or hit the Like button on our Facebook page, please raise a glass to yourselves.

We are eternally grateful.

Sneak preview of exclusive video interview with outgoing IDE President John Woodward

It is just eight days now until the presidency of the Institute of Demolition Engineers passes from the incumbent John Woodward to his successor, Steve Jack.

As part of our commitment to bring you interviews with the top people in the demolition industry, we have recorded exclusive, feature-length video interviews with both the outgoing and incoming IDE presidents, both of which will air on Friday 16 November.

Before then, however, we have also produced a pair of brief “teaser trailer” films. The first (below) features outgoing IDE president Woodward; the second, featuring Jack, will air here on DemolitionNews tomorrow.