Implosions, set to the Old Spice ad theme? What’s not to love?

We are reliably informed that the following piece of music is called O’Fortuna and it is from Carmina Burana by Carl Orf (but since our musical tastes largely begin and end in the late 1970s and early 80s, we’lll have to take Wikipedeia’s answer for it). Either way, it is probably better know – to those of us of a certain age at least – as the Old Spice theme.

Whatever it’s called, it was crying out for someone to set it to some spectacular implosions, which is precisely what Gladiator Production has done. The result – Demolition – The Opera. Enjoy.

Presence of asbestos prolongs contract, drives up costs.

The cost to demolish the old YMCA building in Riverfront Park, Spokane, Washington is increasing after contractors found more asbestos in the building than they originally thought existed.

An asbestos abatement company sent demolition teams a letter last month informing them the cost of removal would be higher than anticipated. Parks Department administrators are in the process of amending the contract to pay for the overrun.

Contractors are asking the City for as much as $80,000 extra to remove additional asbestos. The City is also spending an extra $20,000 to tear down a nearby building. The total extras are expected to cost at least $100,000.

“We’re still within budget,” said park director Leroy Eadie. “We’re not worried about that. We’re going to watch the demolition costs carefully.”

Eadie said the City wanted to spend $800,000 on demolition and $500,000 to build several look-out points on the Spokane River while planting trees and shrubs in the area.

The City is approaching the $800,000 mark. Any more increases could force the City to alter their plans for the land restoration.

Read more here .

Failure to address asbestos lands demolition company in court.

An Alberta company was ordered to pay a $35,000 penalty Tuesday relating to its failure to address the hazard of asbestos exposure at an Edmonton demolition site.

Eco-Industrial Business Park Inc. was fined $5,000 after pleading guilty in provincial court to a charge under the Occupational Health and Safety Act.

As well, the company must make a $30,000 donation to the Alberta Workers Health Centre, a charitable group that educates workers about unsafe jobsite situations.

According to agreed facts, Eco-Industrial purchased the former Celanese Edmonton plant located at 1250 Hayter Rd. on Jan. 9, 2008, and was doing demolition work on various buildings on the site as part of a redevelopment.

Within the project, the company contracted with Canadian Consolidated Salvage Ltd. to do a salvage and demolition job at a former cigarette processing plant there, beginning in the summer of 2008.

On Aug. 22, 2008, Occupational Health and Safety investigators were onsite for an unrelated work injury and became concerned about materials containing asbestos after noting loose insulation and significant amounts of white powder surrounding some dismantled piping.

Read more here.

First it was asbestos fines, now its a lack of references.

Middleboro demolition company Costello Dismantling has missed out on a prestigious contract to take down the cupola on the local Town Hall, despite bidding roughly half as much as the company that won the job.

Selectmen awarded the contract to Murray Bros which bid $16,609 instead of the low bidder, Costello Dismantling Co., because it did not provide references. Costello bid just $8,800.

This latest disappointment follows just over a month after Costello was hit with a $45,000 fine for failing to notify the presence of asbestos on a separate contract.

Read more here

House said to have inspired F. Scott Fitzgerald faces wrecking ball.

“..This is a valley of ashes; a fantastic farm where ashes grow like wheat into ridges and hills and grotesque gardens; where ashes take the forms of houses and chimneys and rising smoke and, finally, with a transcendent effort, of men who move dimly and already crumbling through the powdery air…”

The dramatic but dilapidated Sands Point mansion that some F. Scott Fitzgerald scholars believe served as inspiration for portions of “The Great Gatsby” will soon be reduced to rubble.

The owners of Lands End, a 25-room colonial mansion that sits in grand isolation above Long Island Sound, plan to raze the structure to make way for a five-lot subdivision, each with a $10 million home, according to Sands Point Village Clerk Randy Bond. Some Fitzgerald enthusiasts point to the 1902 residence as the template for Daisy Buchanan’s home.

Read more here.

Demolition companies to be charged according to levels of waste produced.

Abu Dhabi’s Centre of Waste Management is to introduce from March 16 the ‘Waste Generation Tariff System’ for companies and establishments in the emirate, Khaleej Times has reported.

The new system is aimed at reducing by 80% waste production from commercial, industrial, construction, and demolition activities by 2018.

Businesses will be charged fees based on the rate of waste produced annually, according to the type of activity and the size of the facility, Hamad Al Amri, General Manager of the centre, said.

This latest crackdown comes almost exactly a year after the country set in place strict new rules governing demolition activity by creating an approved contractor database.

Our favourite videographer strikes again with a great demolition double.

Our old friend Stephen SetteDucati seems to have been pretty quiet just recently, and we have missed his video contributions here at DemolitionNews. But he’s back and he’s brought with him a pair of first-class demolition videos.

The first is a compilation of the demolition of the work of MCM Management; the second is a compilation from the demolition of Giants Stadium in the Meadowlands, New Jersey

Take a look:

Demolition work underway on casino damaged in Oklahoma snow storms.

Cleanup is underway at the Hard Rock Casino in Catoosa. Demolition crews are hard at work tearing down and cleaning up the old bingo facility damaged by historic snowfalls. Heavy snow was too much for the first gaming facility the Cherokees built on the site, causing a partial roof collapse.

With all of the construction at the Cherokee Gaming Complex in Catoosa over the years, it’s rare to see demolition work instead. “Very seldom have we had to tear anything down,” David Stewart, Cherokee Nation, said.

Read more here or view the video below.

Consultancy takes leads role in pair of dismantling contracts.

INEOS ChlorVinyls – Europe’s largest polyvinyl chloride (PVC) manufacturer – engaged sector-specific CDM coordinators and project managers RVA Group, to oversee the safe execution of these two major projects and ensure the maximisation of income from the resale of redundant plant and metallic arisings including high-value exotic alloys.

RVA commenced its role at INEOS ChlorVinyls’ Barry site after manufacturing ceased in March 2010 as part of a consolidation of activities. Having planned to decommission and clean the site before handing it back to the landlord with the plant intact, INEOS sought RVA’s isolation and decommissioning guidance. However acknowledging the financial implications of INEOS’ proposed site exit strategy, RVA conducted a series of in-depth feasibility and option studies to investigate more commercially attractive routes for the client.

Utilising its vast knowledge and experience of asset recovery, RVA recommended that INEOS hand the site back as flat slab, as plant demolition and dismantling could generate an income from the sale of the process equipment – some had potential for reuse whereas other items (as a result of their high-value metallurgy) would create a positive income stream.

To demonstrate their confidence in the proposed alternative site exit strategy, RVA agreed to work for six weeks – at risk – to test the feasibility of their solution. If the project plan had proven unachievable, RVA would have waived all costs for work undertaken during this investigatory period.

However, as RVA had anticipated, the team was able to demonstrate that the project could be delivered with significant cost savings thus reducing the financial burden for INEOS.

Now RVA is project managing the dismantling and demolition of INEOS ChlorVinyls’ production facilities including process vessels, aluminium and concrete storage silos, a boilerhouse and three steel 1,500 cubic metre storage spheres. With a 27-man team on site, and kit ranging from excavators with shears and grab buckets to an ultra long reach machine safety remains the number one priority.

Colin Hopwood, INEOS ChlorVinyls’ site services manager for Runcorn explains the reason for RVA’s extensive involvement in the Barry site project: “RVA’s role with INEOS in fact commenced with the team’s development of a detailed redundant asset management review for our Runcorn site.

“The Company drew upon its technical engineering experience to assess a number of plants, projected costs of removal, optimised sequencing and a potential rolling decommissioning programme for several areas of the 125-hectare top-tier COMAH site. The quality and integrity of this guidance not only led to us proceeding with the Runcorn works, but I also then recommended their services to a colleague heading up the Barry project.”

Since the sequential decommissioning and demolition of five redundant chemical processing plants began on the high-hazard Runcorn site in August 2010, the site has remained operational elsewhere. Meticulous planning and project coordination has therefore been essential to ensure minimal disruption and utmost safety for all parties.

Priority was given to the complex dismantling of INEOS’ four distillation columns, ranging from 40 to 60 metres in height, which had to be dismantled to a low height before the arrival of the year’s high winds. However due to their proximity to high-hazard pipelines, and given the inherently dangerous nature of hot-cutting techniques, an alternative dismantling process had to be devised. Instead RVA oversaw the more time-intensive, but far safer alternative, of using high pressure abrasive water jets that ran around the circumference of the columns’ cut lines to eliminate the flammable risks, before the top sections could be removed with a lifting nail attached to a 500t crane.

With six months of the programme still to complete, RVA is currently planning for the dismantling of INEOS’ anhydrous caustic soda plant – a procedure that will take place in May 2011. Although the asset is no longer needed by INEOS, the plant is in good condition and is being carefully dismantled for re-erection elsewhere.

Vertical drop ball preferable to “Aussies or Yanks” says New Zealand demolition man.

A demolition expert believes Christchurch’s tallest hotel, the Grand Chancellor, will probably have to be knocked down by dropping a wrecking ball through the roof above its 26 accommodation floors.

“It will have to be done straight away – it’s not the sort where you can actually deconstruct it, because it is leaning,” said Demolition and Asbestos Association president Diana Stil.

Stil is in Christchurch to join other industry experts in advising civil defence authorities on how to clear central Christchurch of earthquake debris.

“When I saw it last night it was very unstable. You can’t load it – it’s already leaning, collapsing on one side – so the scenario of a ball and crane is probably the safest as that means there is no human exposure. We believe it can’t be saved, but that’s up to construction engineers.”

Alec Burrell, of Auckland’s Burrell Demolition, said it was unlikely that controlled explosives could be used to bring down the building because that would involve long preparations requiring people to enter the building to lay them.

“But at this stage no decision can be made until things have stopped moving,” he said. “Maybe it will be possible to take off the damaged side floor-by-floor and then rebuild it on new piles. I have no idea, but it would be a lot cheaper than mowing the whole thing down and starting again. Until the engineers are allowed a proper look at it nothing can be done – it might look 10 times worse than it is.”

Mr Burrell said local contractors and structural engineers would be well up to the challenge of dealing with the building – a task which would be far more straightforward than the Newmarket motorway viaduct project.

“What concerns us is the Aussies or Yanks may say nobody around here can do it and they’ll bring in a bunch of people and God help us.”

Read the full story here.