Just receiving reports of fire at demolition site in Shrewsbury, UK.

A fire has this lunchtime broken out at the scene of the Shrewsbury explosion in January.

Smoke can be seen rising above Shrewsbury town centre from the site on the corner of Bridge Street and Smithfield Road. Shrewsbury police are asking motorists to avoid the town centre, whilst the fire is dealt with.

Further news updates can be found here.

We know many demolition professionals that would work here free of charge!

For many people, the word demolition conjures images of rubble, mud and dust. But not on Bantayan Island in the Philippines where a series of illegal beach structures are scheduled for imminent demolition.

It is our firm belief that a contract of this magnitude and complexity merits a visit by DemolitionNews.com for an in-depth report lasting, oooh three weeks at least. If anyone would like to sponsor our trip, please PLEASE drop us a line.

Read more here.

DemolitionNews Forum opens new discussion area.

The DemolitionNews Forum was designed with one purpose in mind; to encourage demolition professionals to discuss industry issues with like-minded individuals. But we’re also mindful of the fact that our readers are spread all over the world and may not actually know each other.

So we have created a new “All About You” area to allow readers to introduce themselves. Here you can tell people about yourself, your company, yuour hopes, fears and aspirations. And, as you’ll need to choose a username, you can do so largely anonymously.

So please hop over to the All About You area now and let’s get chatting.

Why have ethnic minorities failed to scale the global demolition corporate ladder?

OK, before I begin, I’d like to make two things very clear. 1. What I am about to say may not be viewed as politically correct; and 2. I would dearly love to be proven wrong.

Now, on with the question.

During the past two years, I have been lucky enough to travel to more than a dozen different countries on both sides of the Atlantic and it has slowly dawned on me that the upper echelons of the US and European demolition industries are almost exclusively Caucasian

Now I am not suggesting that the global demolition business is operating a covert apartheid policy; I realise that a large proportion of demolition companies are family concerns with a history and ethnicity that pre-dates racial integration and political correctness; and I also realise that so-called ethnic minorities are well represented at site level.

But how is it that virtually no black demolition professionals are present within the upper echelons of this industry?

Have Your Say. We’d love to get your take on this subject so we have set aside a discussion area over at the DemolitionNews Forum. Just click here and let us have your thoughts.

Police investigate following grisly discovery in Finnish chimney.

Workers at a factory being demolished in Vantaa, Finland have turned up a mummified body stuck inside a chimney. He was born 1953 according to information in his wallet. He had gone missing in 1991, and by the early 2000s he was pronounced dead.

Workers were tearing down the chimney Sunday when they made the gruesome discovery. According to Juha Juurinen, a criminal investigator, “The police are investigating whether the man was placed in the chimney or went there himself.”

Read more here.

Video captures Vancouver double collapse from a different angle.

The dust is barely settled and the investigation is only just underway. But a new video of the double near- miss in Vancouver last week shows just how lucky demolition workers and pedestrians were to remain uninjured in the unplanned collapses.

Excavator operator survives collapse after ordering other off collapsing bridge.

A worker injured when a Naugatuck bridge that was under construction collapsed Tuesday morning is being hailed a hero. A portion of the Salem Bridge, which carries Route 63 over the Naugatuck River, collapsed during demolition before 7 a.m., police said.

Preliminary investigations by Connecticut State Police determined that just prior to the collapse, the excavator operator had some concerns. Police said the operator, identified as Anthony Mariano, 55, of Middlebury, cleared the bridge of all co-workers and reported his concerns to his supervisor, Mariano was preparing to remove the machine when the bridge collapsed, according to police.

Mariano was taken to St. Mary’s Hospital, then was then moved to Yale New Haven Hospital. He remained in critical condition Tuesday evening.

Read more here.

Work begins on former 100-acre fertiliser production site near Bristol.

In November 2009, a highly complex programme of plant decommissioning, isolation, demolition and ground remediation drew to a close at GrowHow UK Limited’s Severnside site, under the guidance of project management consultants RVA Group.

Now, having successfully supervised more than 60,000 man-hours during the initial project, RVA has been engaged by both GrowHow and American assets company Sigma Investment Holdings, L.L.C to co-ordinate the safe and precise dismantling and packaging of two remaining LCA (leading concept ammonia) plants and a utilities area, bought by Sigma for resale outside of the UK.

Following two months of RVA planning, specialist dismantling contractor EDS has been appointed by Sigma to begin the meticulous process of coding, extracting and preserving every single vessel and associated pipework for exportation. With work on site due to complete in August, this exacting project will then result in the shipping of 4,500 tonnes of ammonia production plant, in no less than 120 containers, 60 enclosed crates, 80 open stillages plus 30 outsize items of deck cargo, all ready for reassembly and return to production once it reaches its overseas destination.

RVA Group managing director Richard Vann said: “We have been employed in two capacities at Severnside. GrowHow has engaged us as specialist project managers to ensure that the high standards adopted on site to date are maintained, with no cut corners and no safety compromises.

Once this intricate removal operation is complete, RVA will bring its three years at Severnside to a close by supervising the filling of a number of underground chambers and finally the demolition of a wooden cooling tower – the final remaining structure.

Beware wobbly buildings and drive like a bat out of hell!

Following the double demolition near-miss in Vancouver last Thursday, we have been scouring the Internet, calling upon contacts, and making phone calls to find out more about the twin incidents. Having drawn a blank with all our avenues of enquiry, we have decided to recreate a conversation that may (or may not) have taken place between a driver using an adjacent road and the traffic controller charged with limiting access to the “danger zone”.

Driver: Excuse me but why are we stopped?
Traffic Controller: Sorry ma’am but there’s a demolition taking place up the block
Driver: Will we be stopped long?
Traffic Controller: No. We’re just waiting for the building to stop wobbling and then you can be on your way.
Driver: Wobbling?
Traffic Controller: Standard demolition procedure ma’am. Nothing to be alarmed about.
Driver: But a wobbling building? Isn’t that dangerous?
Traffic Controller: Not for me. I’m stood well back.
Driver: So, just so I understand this fully, you’re expecting me to drive down this street past a building that is wobbling?
Traffic Controller: You’ll be fine so long as you follow the three basic rules
Driver: Which are…?
Traffic Controller: Keep your windows rolled up to keep the dust out; close your sunshine roof to keep falling debris out; and if that big building up there on the left starts to wobble, pin the accelerator pedal to the floor and drive like a bat out of hell.
Driver: I think I’ll find a shortcut
Traffic Controller: Just be careful which route you choose ma’am; there’s another wobbly bit just round the corner.

Work underway on demolition of Billybanks estate in Penarth.

It was recently voted the ugliest eyesore in Wales and yesterday work began on demolishing a prominent derelict housing estate.

The former Billybanks estate in Penarth has been empty for more than 10 years and is regarded by many as a depressing example of the failed social housing experiments of the 1960s and 1970s. The estate was voted Wales’ ugliest eyesore, and eighth most unsightly in Britain by Beautiful Britain magazine in March.

After lengthy delays resulting from the economic downturn and the crisis in the housing market, developers Crest Nicholson and demolition specialist Lawson Demolition began work on the Royal Close section of the estate yesterday.

The £100m project involves demolishing the existing 329 flats and building 377 new apartments.

Read more here or view the video below.