Lifting the lid on project relieve administrative burden on demolition companies.

A Europe-wide research project is underway to analyse and hopefully alleviate some of the administrative burden placed upon demolition contractors by the European Union, national governments and a variety of other organisations and legislative bodies. DemolitionNews.com’s Mark Anthony met Martha Bird, one of the team behind the research and accompanied her on one of her many fact-finding missions.

In the pantheon of thankless tasks, the job facing EU Affairs consultant Martha Bird is right up there with that of the England football team manager and BP public relations officer. Employed by Danish management consultancy Ramboll, Bird has been handed the poison chalice of researching the administrative burdens facing a variety of industry sectors including demolition.

In this exclusive audio interview, Martha Bird explains the thinking behind the project, why she belies that smaller demolition companies are disproportionately hit with administrative burdens, and how she hopes that her initial work will ultimately benefit the industry in the coming years.

To listen to this exclusive audio interview, please just hit the play button below or visit iTunes and download the podcast.

Have Your Say: Which administrative burdens cause you the greatest headache? Share your thoughts here.

Chinese man takes to tree-house to protest demolition order.

A man who protested by nesting in a tree for three months straight due to compensation disputes over his demolished house was charged for assembling a crowd that disrupted traffic and tried in Chongqing Monday.

The man, Chen Maoguo, pleaded not guilty. His family said he has no other way to protect his legal rights.

The indictment states that 61-year-old Chen grew discontented with the local authorities and the compensation package. He then moved to a makeshift shelter in a tree using a speaker to instigate his fellow villagers to block passing vehicles.

The indictment said Chen’s behavior attracted a large crowd that severely disturbed traffic order.

The saga started in October 2008 when Chen’s 1,200-square-meter courtyard house was demolished to make way for a highway project. Authorities promised to pay him about 500,000 yuan ($73,556).

Since one of his houses was used as a grocery store and he also ran the wine-brewing business in the family, Chen demanded an additional compensation of 220,000 yuan for his business loss but failed to get it, the West China Metropolis Daily reported.

Chen then started petitioning the authorities, but achieved no results in almost a year.

A frustrated Chen climbed up to a 15-meter-high tree sitting next to his house debris to stage a protest. He had lived in a makeshift shelter on the tree since August 3, 2009.

Read more here.

Local TV cameras given unique insight on major station redevelopment.

Work on transforming Birmingham New Street Station is now well underway and Central Regional News cameras have been allowed in to see the story so far.

Unfortunately, the resulting video cannot be embedded here; but it is worth clicking this link to view it on their website.

Worker lost one side of his head and suffered brain damage after demolition work fall.

According to reports in the UK’s Daily Mail newspaper and the Construction Enquirer website, Alan Hind,28, has been left with life changing features following the accident which saw his former boss convicted in court last week

The Daily Mail reported that Hind suffered massive head injuries, including extensive skull fractures, a badly broken jaw, a severed optic nerve that left him blind in one eye and irreparable brain damage.

He also suffered kidney damage and was left deaf in one ear following the February 2008 accident.

Surgeons carried out three complex operations and six months after his fall used a titanium plate to replace a large section of shattered skull.

Parts of his brain were so damaged they had to be removed.

At Carlisle Crown Court, a jury convicted Mr Hind’s supervisor Eric Murray, 63, who allowed him to work on the roof of a building at Watt’s Yard, off London Road, Carlisle, without safety equipment or training.

Read more here.

Cyclist injured by lorry owned by firm involved in the death of a rider three months ago.

A woman has been taken to hospital with a suspected broken ankle after becoming trapped between the Keltbray lorry and a metal railing opposite Borough Tube station, at the junction of Borough High Street and Great Dover Street.

It is the latest serious crash involving construction lorries in the London Bridge area, where the 310-metre high Shard tower is being built within a new commercial development.

A Keltbray truck was involved in a crash that killed Muhammad “Haris” Ahmed, a 21-year-old King’s College medical student, in March.

Scotland Yard said the 26-year-old HGV driver is on bail while enquiries continue. Cyclists’ websites have been inundated with concerns about the number of HGVs in the area.

Read the full story here.

Demolition Company of the Year Safedem implodes two Scottish tower blocks.

There are times when it appears that William Sinclair, managing director of demolition contractor Safedem, is intent on single-handedly changing the Scottish skyline for ever. In recent years, Sinclair has personally overseen numerous tower block implosions across Glasgow and Edinburgh; and this weekend saw him add another notable double to his already bulging portfolio.

The two 16 storey tower blocks in Kincardine, Scotland were cleared for Fife Council in advance of a major regeneration of the area which involves the construction of new low rise properties.

The structures were of Bison Wall Frame Panel construction which had been overclad in the late 80’s due to insulation problems and water ingress. Safedem removed the overcladding utilising mastclimbers in advance of the explosive demolition. Advance works also included asbestos removal, soft strip, preweakening, drilling and installation of blast protection measures in advance of charging the structure with explosives. Each structure had over 8000 tonnes concrete and took just 28 kg of explosives per structure to initiate the controlled collapse.

The collapse mechanism and delay sequence had to take into account both overground and underground liabilities. A live substation and two major retaining walls located less than 5 metres from the west elevation of the structures required the buildings to be directed towards the east. Historical information however indicated the drop area to the east of the buildings was riddled with mine workings. The site investigation identified a series of mine workings approximately 10 metres from the east elevations of the structures which had to be avoided.

“We were effectively restricted within a long narrow strip where we had to land the structures,” says William Sinclair. “Given the proximity of the mine working we also had to reduce the ground vibration to absolute minimal levels.”

“At first these looked like straight forward blocks – the panel construction being the classic ‘pack of cards’’, however this type of structure has caused serious problems for others in the past,” Sinclair continues. “These structures were almost identical to the buildings in Niddrie, Edinburgh which failed to collapse back in 1991 following an explosive demolition attempt. The important factor with such structures is to effectively disrupt the external panels and break the rigidity and boxiness of the building.”

To see the implosion, please click here for the slick news video version or see the amateur bersion below.

Hundreds watch as implosion fells 30 metre smoke stack.

One last puff came out of the old smokestack at the Murray-Courtright demolition site. The smoke shot up as the structure was imploded Friday morning, bringing down the 30 metre (100-plus foot) high smokestack despite a last-minute effort to save it.

Local historians wanted to save the structure at the Murray Courtright demolition site, city attorney Tim Henry said, but it was too late. The contract had been awarded and the work had begun.

Mayor Tom Leighton pushed the lever to trigger the explosives notched into the smokestack, removing the final standing structure on the parcel that will soon become a tax-generating housing development.

“That couldn’t have gone better,” said Doug Loizeaux of Controlled Demolition, Inc., the company that sub-contracted with Stell Enterprises to take down the smokestack. “We thought it was going to fall to the west, but the way it went down was perfect.”

Read more here or watch the video below.

Department of Housing & Urban Development investigates “procedural violations”.

Newark officials soon will provide more information to the Columbus Field Office of the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development about bidding procedures used for the demolition of two buildings on South Third Street.

Earlier this year, resident Rhonda Loomis alleged the city failed to publicly bid the demolition of 37 and 41 S. Third St. by placing it in The Advocate. Instead, certain contractors were invited to bid on the project. Loomis said the procedure violated HUD regulations and the city charter.

City officials disagree and said they followed acceptable procedures. Law Director Doug Sassen has since said it did not violate the city charter because the charter allows bidding to be bypassed for “professional services.”

But Loomis forwarded her complaint to HUD, and May 10 it asked the city to send a response directly to Loomis.

Read more here.

Details of two big demolition events have just hit our desks…!

Here at Demolition News Towers, there are times when cobwebs have started to collect around the office letterbox and it’s possible to believe that the postal system has packed up entirely or that we’re the only humans left standing after a global yet silent apocalypse.

And yet today, our mailbag has revealed details of two exciting demolition events; and it’s our intentions to attend both.

The first is the European Demolition Association’s Autumn Conference which this year will be run in conjunction with the DemCon exhibition in Stockholm, Sweden from 8 to 10 September. We were already planning to attend the DemCon event but the opportunity to meet up with the new EDA president and vice-president and other EDA stalwarts will just make this one too good to miss.

Closer to home, 12 October 2010 will mark the first ever National Federation of Demolition Contractors’ Demolition Day conference/seminar here in the UK.

We have started a Facebook Events page for both of these events; you can’t book place via Facebook but if you ARE planning to attend, please sign up so we can keep an eye on who will be there.

EDA Autumn Conference Facebook event
NFDC Demolition Day Facebook event

Two workers from Waltham-based NASDI injured in accident.

Fire officials blamed the wind on the collapse of a wall that trapped two contractors during the demolition of a power plant Thursday afternoon.

The men, employees of the demolition company NASDI of Waltham, were attempting to secure a cable from an elevated basket some nine metres (30 feet) above the ground when a corrugated steel wall at the old TMLP West Water Street generating station folded in on them, said Taunton Deputy Fire Chief Mike Sylvia.

Taunton firefighters used a ladder track to pull the men from their basket, which was pinned next to a brick wall six metres (20 feet) in the air.

One of the men was taken to Morton Hospital and Medical Center with facial lacerations and a suspected broken arm. The second man declined medical treatment.

Read the full story here.