Demolition News brings you exclusive details of three exciting UK job vacancies.

It is surely a sign of the times that the demolition recruitment business, which has been largely stagnant for the past year or more, has at last startled to spring back to life. And we’re delighted to be a part of it.

In this, our first job bulletin, we exclusively bring you details of three exciting job opportunities in the UK demolition business:

Managing Director – Heading up 7 divisions within the group company, this role will have a total of 8 people reporting directly, the Business Development Director, and the Divisional Directors of each business unit. We are looking for an excellent business manager that can forecast, write business plans and get the absolute best out of people. We ideally want someone that has fulfilled a similar role in either Demolition Business or from a Main Building Contractor. To apply for this position, please email Nicky@grassgreener.co.uk marking your message Managing Director Role via Demolition News.

Business Development Director – Working alongside the Managing Director and the Divisional Directors, this role will focus on the continued growth of the business. Must have experience in tendering at Senior Management level, securing multi million pound deals. This role will be split between the UK and Europe. Each Divisional Director will have a target to achieve and the Business Development Director will be responsible for working with each Divisional Director to achieve this target. To apply for this position, please email Nicky@grassgreener.co.uk marking your message Business Development Director Role via Demolition News.

Contracts Director – Our Client is making an appointment to the board, the Contracts Director is the main point of contact for all major clients. This person will have a team of contracts managers that will be responsible for running the jobs, the Contracts Director will be responsible for these people and ultimately be the person that pulls the whole operation together. Strong client and relationship management skill are essential as this person will be responsible for the retention of business. To apply for this position, please email Nicky@grassgreener.co.uk marking your message Contract Director Role via Demolition News.

All of these jobs are UK-based; however, we are currently in negotiation with several specialist recruitment companies that will see us widen our brief to include Europe and the US in the coming weeks and months.

Low-key dismantling will mark end for Vegas’ Queen of Hearts hotel.

Demolition in Las Vegas is normally accompanied by pyrotechnics and razzamatazz. But when the – admittedly small by comparison – Queen of Hearts hotel falls later this week, it will do so quietly and without fanfare.

The event won’t involve an implosion or a wrecking ball but an excavator with a claw, said Amy Maier, a spokesperson for Forest City Enterprises, the developer.

The demolition will make way for a new City Hall and office complex, beginning the process of bringing new development and thousands of jobs to the city’s downtown.

Las Vegas Mayor Oscar Goodman and other city officials will be on hand to make remarks and watch the demolition begin at 10 a.m. Tuesday at the site, 19 E. Lewis Ave., which is at the corner of First Street and Lewis Avenue.

Read more here.

Movie shoot leads to long, slow death of Lafayette building.

Detroit’s Downtown Development Authority voted last June 25 to demolish the vacant office building. Seven months later, the building was still only half down this week, with a lot more work to go.

Waymon Guillebeaux, vice president of project management for the Detroit Economic Growth Corp., which oversees the demolition, said two major delays cropped up since the DDA’s vote.

First, nearby filming of the movie “Red Dawn” stopped demolition work, and then a sinkhole on nearby Shelby necessitated a water main replacement that also stopped demolition work.

Rick Cuppetilli, project manager for Adamo Demolition, said his crews lost 14 working days to the movie shoot and 45 working days to the water main replacement, or more than two months in all.

Read more here.

It’s been a long time coming but the vast K-25 building is finally down.

Federal contractors have completed demolition of the west wing of the World War II-era K-25 uranium-enrichment facility, marking a major milestone on one of the largest nuclear cleanup projects in history.

The work has been delayed on multiple occasions because of safety issues or technical concerns, and some aspects of the project were complicated by the deteriorated condition of the 65-year-old building.

In a statement, Department of Energy Manager Gerald Boyd said, “We are extremely pleased to have gotten this portion of the project done. The work force has done a remarkable job, and we thank them for their hard work.”

At the time of its construction during the wartime Manhattan Project, K-25 was the largest building in the world under one roof, covering about 40 acres and containing miles and miles of equipment that processed uranium in a gaseous form.

Demolition of the U-shaped, milelong building began in December 2008 under the direction of Bechtel Jacobs Co., DOE’s environmental manager in Oak Ridge.

Read more here.

Five power plant buildings scheduled for demolition in Canada.

Epcor plans to start demolishing five of the 10 former Rossdale power plant buildings this summer as it continues to look at what else can be done with the area.

Work will start inside the 1960s-era structures before they’re torn down in 2011, creating a nearly one-hectare public green space along the North Saskatchewan River, says Geoff Wagner, Epcor’s director of Rossdale decommissioning.

“They have really reached the end of their useful life,” he said Friday.

“We have committed to our community that we’re not going to bring power generation back to this site, so the buildings have no use.”

The project, which will employ up to 30 people, is scheduled to wrap up with grading in the summer of 2012.

An archeologist will be on hand during excavations in an area used for centuries by aboriginal groups and Europeans.

Read the full story here.

Police investigate after house demolition in South Carolina reveals human remains.

Police in Florence, South Carolina are investigating human remains found in a vacant home. Florence Police Chief Anson Shells says demolition workers were getting ready to demolish the house at 520 Charles St. when they knocked over a tub and found the remains. The remains were found around 11 a.m. Friday.

Florence Police believe the remains have been in the home for a while.

Shells said investigators have been speaking with neighbors, who say the property was rundown and seemed to be involved in unsavory activity.

The home was scheduled to be torn down as part of the city’s abandoned house cleanup efforts.

Read the full story here.

Water tower falls as demolition begins on former naval intelligence base.

The demolition of approximately 150 buildings began Wednesday on Skaggs Island, which served as an intelligence-gathering site and communications base for the US Navy for more than half a century.

The 1,339 hectare (3,310-acre site), located 25 miles northeast of San Francisco in Sonoma County, will be transferred from the Navy to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service when demolition is complete and will eventually become part of the San Pablo Bay National Wildlife Refuge.

The Navy demolished a 12-story, 38 metre (125-foot) steel water tower on property it occupied from 1941 to 1993.

Click here to read the full story and to view the War of the Worlds-esque video.

Armoury Group announces appointment of new business development director.

Construction-specialist and architect, Jim McEwan has joined Armoury as the company prepares to launch its new Northern office in Sheffield.

With over 20 years of experience across a number of construction disciplines in both the public and private sector, McEwan boasts an extensive knowledge of the industry which will bolster the business development arm of the existing team.

Formerly of Keltbray and Controlled Demolition, where he worked with a number of major blue-chip companies including Westfield, Balfour Beatty and Bovis Lend Lease, Jim has many years proven skills at fostering new client relationships and identifying business opportunities to secure greater market visibility.
Within this new role, Jim will predominantly be responsible for the strategic development of new business opportunities and clients and maximising service provisions across the UK.

Tony McLean, managing director of Armoury Group comments, “Jim’s appointment is a significant move for Armoury as it clearly highlights our intention to strengthen our position within the industry and initiate new business growth throughout the coming year and beyond.

“Jim joins us with an excellent pedigree and impressive cross-sector experience which will provide us with increased flexibility to gain an enviable market advantage. With his remarkable credentials, he will make an outstanding addition to the team.”

Engineering company says demolish Buckingham Palace to make the Queen green.

A nefarious plot to destroy Buckingham Palace has been exposed, but it’s not the work of terrorists, anarchists or extremist property developers. No, this one comes from an engineering consultancy. Before the capital goes on high alert, Atkins, a design and engineering group, weren’t actually intending to carry out this plan. In a none-too-serious assessment of the building’s green credentials, rather, they dropped the hint – or was it a gauntlet? – that the Queen might be better off with a new London eco-crib.

Atkins’s proposal was part of a fanciful survey by Construction Manager magazine into how much it might cost to rebuild British landmarks. It concluded that you could build a new energy-efficient replica of the palace for a knock-down £320m (Stonehenge would be £815m, but it’s hard to see how you could make a collection of stones any greener). Among other improvements, the report suggested replacing the palace’s 760 sash windows with double-glazed replicas, and installing photovoltaic panels, ground-source heat pumps and masses of insulation. With such changes, the royal carbon footprint would be 400 tonnes of CO² lighter every year, it estimates, and the palace’s £2.2m utilities bill would be slashed by 90%.

Read the full story here.

New video from Stephen SetteDucati pits wrecking ball against high reach excavator.

Demolition News regulars will know that we’re huge fans of the work of Stephen SetteDucati at ssdphoto and his video work with the likes of Testa Corp. But his latest really is one to admire, as it pits an “old school” crawler crane and wrecking ball against the young pretender in the shape of a high reach excavator.

The two machines were filmed side-by-side on a Testa Corp contract in Lowell, Massachusets where the company was charged with taking down a pair of cold storage warehouses.

The wrecking ball footage really is one for the purists and is a great display of power, while the precision on the high reach excavator allows it to match the wrecking ball productivity-wise.

Which is best? You decide, and let us know: