ACE Plant has introduced the new Dust Fighter dust suppression system.

A new generation of equipment from dust suppression specialist, ACE Plant, offers greater versatility and overall efficiency than traditional methods – and it’s more economical, too.

Based on a powerful 3-phase electric fan with hose water feed to produce a fog like mist, Dust Fighter has a range of up to 60m in windless conditions, and is available in four sizes and two versions: a plug-in electric model mounted on a 3–wheeled trolley, or fully self-contained with on-board generator mounted on a rugged 4-wheeled chassis and integral 2000 litre stainless steel water reservoir.

ACE Plant is taking the concept even further and is working on the design of a hydraulically driven model that can be mounted on any of its standard mobile dust suppression tankers and which will have the capability of carrying enough water for a whole day’s operation.

All models are fitted with a water filter and have full 360º manual swivel allowing accurate all round targeting. Options include remote control for water ‘on’ and ‘off’, while oscillation and raise / lower functions are available in either automatic or remote control mode.

Dust Fighter is available for sale only through ACE Plant, with machines also available for hire (in England and Wales).

“Dust Fighter is a genuine problem solver when it comes to tackling high level airborne dust,” says ACE Plant managing director Frank Cundell. “It fits perfectly into our established range of mobile dust suppression tankers which can be equipped with raingun, basic spray bar or our top selling hydraulic spinning disc water applicator.”

Michigan demolition contractors to face tougher rules.

The Michigan city of Buchanan has adopted an ordinance to govern future building demolition to coincide with its more aggressive stand toward dilapidated structures.

The Buchanan City Commissioners at their meeting this week voted unanimously in favor of the policy and fee for a demolition permit. Under the new policy, the permit requires the removal of both the building and foundation or slab. The site must also be restored with clean fill and graded. And, within the next 30 days, the property once filled and graded must be seeded with grass.

Read more here.

Tampa city council awards lumberyard wrecking contract.

Plant City has awarded a contract to D.H. Griffin Wrecking Co. to tear down the remaining buildings and other structures at the former Stock Building Supply. Griffin Wrecking will pay the city $500, in exchange for the right to salvage materials from the site. A lumberyard had operated at that location since 1935.

The city’s Community Redevelopment Agency bought the 2.38 acres in 2008 as part of its efforts to revive midtown, an area south of historic downtown. The city allowed Stock to continue its operations in exchange for lease payments, but the lumberyard closed a few months ago amid a Chapter 11 bankruptcy filing by Stock Building Supply Holdings. The company, which bought the business from a Plant City family in 2000, cited slumping sales.

Read more here.

Implosion video captures final moments for Dutch coal bunker.

A new video showing the implosion of the Maascentrale coal bunker by explosives specialists Uittenboogaard is oddly reminiscent of the now infamous Turkish rolling building.

Inspections of flood-damaged bridges could herald bridge demolition gold rush.

Across the UK county of Cumbria, structural engineers are racing against time to inspect the areas 1,800+ bridges for signs of wear and potential collapse following last week’s catastrophic flooding. With several of the county’s bridges swept away in the torrent and several more already earmarked for demolition due to flood damage, local demolition companies are bracing themselves for what could be a much-needed gold rush.

The area has been one of the worst hit by the recession that has gripped the UK demolition industry for the past 12 months or more. And while the events of last week, in which a local policeman died, are hardly cause for celebration, any resulting demolition work will be music to the ears of local demolition workers who have been all but idle for the past year.

Northside Road Bridge at Workington was the first to be swept away in the early hours of Saturday 21 November resulting in the death of PC Bill Barker. By the end of Saturday five more bridges − Northside Footbridge in Workington, Lorton bridge near Cockermouth, Newlands Beck Bridge near Keswick, Camerton Footbridge linking Great Clifton with Camerton and the suspension footbridge over River Eamont near Dalemain − had collapsed.

“Capita Symonds is organising bridge checks and has redeployed some staff [from around the country],” said Cumbria County Council highways network manager John Robinson. “Preliminary checks assess which bridges are affected and which ones aren’t.”

Read more here.

Demolition firms given second chance to bid after concerns over tendering process.

Councillor Brian Ward, Stoke-on-Trent City Council deputy leader, has asked officers to re-tender the contract to demolish Westcliffe Hospital, Chell.

London-based contractor Brown & Mason had previously been identified as the preferred bidder out of seven short-listed firms, despite quoting a price three times higher than that of a rival.

But, following allegations local companies were effectively excluded from the process, because of the council’s electronic tendering system, Mr Ward has asked for the contract to be re-tendered. He has also called for a full review of the council’s tendering and procurement procedures and for audit officers to look into the Westcliffe case.

Read more here.

There’s probably a story to this; but we have no idea what it is!

Every once in a while, we receive a photograph that is entirely self-explanatory, requiring no words from us. That’s not the case here. We have absolutely no idea quite why there’s an old lady at the controls of a John F. Hunt excavator or what part she’s about to play in this London demolition project.

So if readers are able to shed any light on the subject (or offer a suitably humorous caption) we’d love to hear from you.

Recent spate of failed implosions raises uncomfortable questions.

To the general public, implosions are the public face of the demolition industry. Although they account for an increasingly small and specialized part of the global demolition workload, the glitz, glamour and razzmatazz that a high-profile blow-down can deliver is unmatched anywhere else in the demolition sector. And if you’re questioning the public fascination with all things explosive, try searching for the term implosion on YouTube!

And here at Demolition News we’re just as guilty – Implosions are a subject that we find equally fascinating. In fact, we have covered literally dozens in the past six months or so in locations from the UK to Brazil, Germany to Canada, Turkey to the US.

But looking back, there has been an alarming number of recent examples of the blaster’s worse nightmare; the stand-up (a name coined because the structure stays vertical, not because it is in any way comedic).
Taken in isolation, most appear to have their own perfectly plausible excuse for failing to fall under the blaster’s spell. However, taken as a representative sample of the blasting sector as a whole, this spate of stand-ups represents a worrying trend; one that could so easily undermine public and client confidence in explosive demolition methods.

Now there is absolutely no suggestion that these recent stand-ups are in any way related; they have occurred on three different continents and no single company – supplier or contractor – has (to the best of our knowledge) been implicated in more than one such incident.

It would be easy, therefore, to lump all these contracts together and file them away in a drawer marked “coincidence” and then keep our collective industry fingers crossed when the next high-profile implosion rolls around.

But is there something more sinister going on here? Could it be that the current credit crunch is having an unseen yet damaging effect upon the credibility of the blasting sector? At a time when all demolition professionals are working on margins narrow enough to pass through the eye of a needle, are some blasters cutting back on expensive explosives and detonation cord to squeeze a few more bucks out of each job?
Faced with a tower block of, say, 20 storeys in height, a professional and security-minded blaster will typically rig several floors and use a primary and a secondary (failsafe) circuit to ensure that each detonator is hit at least once to ensure a complete and thorough blast.

Removing a few floors’ worth of charges in the hope of gravitational intervention and replacing the det’ cord that makes up the secondary circuit with crossed fingers might save the blasting company tens of thousands of dollars.

Demolition contractors have risked asbestos and waste disposal-related prosecutions for less over the years. Unlike a stand-up show with Peter Kay, the situation is no laughing matter.

Calculating the height of a building has always been notoriously difficult. Until now.

Short of reaching for an extremely long tape measure, it’s always been incredibly difficult to calculate the true height of a building. But not any longer.

The Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat (CTBUH) has developed a tall building height calculator to assist in determining tall building heights when only the storey count is known. The calculator is divided into three categories representing the three major functions represented in tall buildings;

(i) Office
(ii) Residential/Hotel
(iii) Mixed-use or when the function unknown

The calculator will provide an approximate height for a single tall building, but as tall building characteristics vary significantly with location, structural material, form, profile, etc, in some instances estimates will vary considerably with actual building height. As such, the calculator is best utilised to determine heights in multiple building / statistical studies, where there are many unknown building heights. In these instances the greater number of buildings examined will reduce any overall variations.

Click here for more details.

Implosion of faulty Ocean Tower structure presents CDI with unique challenges.

The specific date in December for the implosion of the faulty, 114 metre tall condominium tower on South Padre Island in Texas has not been set. But the demolition contractor says it has solved almost all the quandaries of one of its most challenging explosive demolitions.

The preexisting structural damage means loads are not being transferred through the remaining structure in a “fully predictable, much less programmable fashion,” says J. Mark Loizeaux, president of Phoenix, Md.-based CDI. That means more caution during prep work.

CDI has never encountered such a heavily reinforced building. “We have never had to preblast openings in walls of a building we were going to implode,” says Loizeaux.

Read more here.