Gas explosion in South Manchester raises spectre of service disconnection issue.

National Federation of Demolition Contractors president David Darsey has made the issue of service disconnections one of the cornerstones of his two-year presidency; and not a moment too soon. The disconnection of water, gas and electricity services prior to demolition is one that has plagued the industry for many years; and continues to be a major issue as this latest incident in South Manchester highlights all too vividly.

According to reports in the South Manchester Reporter, an explosion which blew apart a block of luxury flats was sparked when a workman cut through a live gas pipe which he thought had been disconnected, we can reveal today.

It is understood that urgent investigations are underway to find out why developers P.J. Livesey, who are refurbishing Didsbury Gate, wrongly believed there was no gas in the pipes.

The company said the building had been bought from the NHS ‘on the understanding it had been safely decommissioned with all previous services stopped’. None of the occupied flats had connected gas supplies.

But a spokesman for the National Grid said P.J. Livesey had not checked with them whether there were active pipes in the building – in breach of normal protocol. “We believe the incident was caused by damage to a live gas pipe on the site,” said the spokesman.

Click here for more details or see the video below.

Around 24 demolition contractors attend pre-bid meeting on Coca Cola bottling plant.

It is a story that will gladden the hearts of dentists across the land; the Coca Cola bottling plant in Muncie will be coming down early in the New Year and local demolition contractors are queuing to be the ones to pop the cap.

According to Indiana news source Starpress.com, nearly two dozen demolition contractors recently attended a pre-bid conference at the former Coca-Cola bottling plant, a burned-out, trash-filled brick eyesore. Demolition bids will be opened on 16 December with “deconstruction” of the building scheduled to begin 8 January and end within seven weeks.

Phil Huber, the owner of the two-story building, which stands near the BMH Open Door Health Center, the Liberty Bowl bowling alley and Indiana-American Water Co.’s water tower, has been ordered by the city’s unsafe building hearing authority to tear it down.

The authority has determined that the 1,950 square metre structure “has been ransacked in every way”, is unsafe, a fire hazard, a health hazard and a public nuisance.

Read more here.

The discussion over the suggested High Reach Register is continuing in the Forum.

Every once in a while, you wish you’d learned to keep your big, fat mouth shut. Late last week, I idly pondered the idea of the demolition industry adopting the basic concept of the UK’s Tower Crane Register to keep track of high reach excavators and to ensure they these highly specialised machines were inspected and maintained regularly and correctly.

The comments on the original article tell only part of the story, as the telephone at Demolition News Towers has barely stopped ringing with messages of support and cries of “are you out of your tiny mind” split roughly 50:50, while our email server is close to meltdown for much the same reason.

So, to allow everyone to have their say in an open and transparent way, we have moved the debate over to the new Demolition News Forum. You can see the discussion by clicking here although, if you haven’t been around for the past few days, you might want to read the original article here before you make your comment.

We look forward to hearing what you have to say.

High-profile, anti-demolition protests force Chinese officials to rethink forced demolition.

China’s State Council is moving to revise the “Regulation on Urban Housing Demolition” and the legislative research of the work has started, China Daily reports.

The decision follows two recent cases of forced demolitions that raised attention of the protection of citizens’ rights and conflict resolution in China. On 13 November, Chengdu local government’s forcible demolition of a private building led to the suicide of one of the owners, Tang Fuzhen, who poured gasoline and set fire on herself. The house stands in the way of a district government’s project to link two roads. Later in the month, a woman in the Minhang district of Shanghai threw self-made petrol bombs at a demolition crew preparing to destroy her house, which is the site of a transportation hub for the 2010 Shanghai Expo.

Read more here.

Demolition work has started on a $750 million residential project in Oklahoma.

Construction is under way on a massive lakefront redevelopment at Lake Texoma near Kingston, Oklahoma. Demolition of the old lodge and several nearby buildings began on Friday and is expected to take between four and six months.

Pointe Vista at Lake Texoma will be a master-planned residential lake community featuring a variety of small to large lakefront properties and luxury resort amenities, including a conference center, hotel, golf courses, and a marina.

Read more here.

Recycling levels at London 2012 Olympic site below NFDC national average?

It was heralded as an opportunity to highlight all that is good about UK construction and demolition. But while work remains on schedule, a comment in a new report from Waste Resources Action Programme (WRAP) suggests that the level of demolition waste recycling on London’s 2012 Olympic site is, in fact, below the average set by the members of the UK’s National Federation of Demolition Contractors (NFDC).

NFDC members, who are responsible for more than 80% of all the UK’s demolition, regularly achieve recycling levels of more than 95%. However, according to the pithily-titled Time for a New Age: Halving Waste to Landfill – Seize the Opportunity from WRAP, the UK’s flagship project – under the full glare of the media spotlight – is achieving levels that are closer to the 90% mark.

Keith Clarke, chief executive of Atkins, says: “We’ve already demonstrated – at the Olympic park enabling works for example – that it is possible to reclaim or recycle more than 90% of materials from demolition works. This is universally achievable, but we can do even better if we can get the effort and commitment from clients, contractors and designers collectively to work this out so we’re designing out waste right from the start of every project.”

Admittedly, these figures are well beyond those that remain little more than an item on a wish-list in the US, it is nevertheless surprising that the showcase project of the moment should fall short of what is being achieved on more run-of-the-mill works.

Read the full report here.

Volvo Construction Equipment offers remote monitoring on demolition machines.

Volvo Construction Equipment has announced it will fit as standard its remote monitoring (telematics) system on all larger machines – along with a no charge 36 month CareTrack service subscription.

Under the plan, all newly produced larger machines (including the standard demolition EC210CLD and EC700CLD and high reach demolition EC360C-HR and EC700B-HR models) ordered for markets with CareTrack availability, will be standard equipped with telematics and will be delivered with a no charge, 3-year CareTrack customer subscription that enables owners to enlist the full range of benefits available with remote monitoring.

“Volvo Construction Equipment feels that remote machine monitoring is a feature with high business value for the customer and we want to accelerate its adoption throughout our various market segments.” says Tomas Kuta, President of Customer Support for Volvo Construction Equipment. “Every segment we participate in is being driven toward increasingly sophisticated business approaches by the combined influences of environmental and safety concerns, globalized economies and ever more demanding end customers. Higher adoption levels of telematics and the services that can be delivered using the technology will enable our dealers to more effectively tailor and deliver solutions for our customers.”

Read the full story here.

Nuclear decommissioning company fined over safety breaches led to radiation exposure.

UK trade magazine reports that the company that runs the Sellafield decommissioning has been fined £75,000 and ordered to pay £26,100 in costs after two workers were exposed to radiation.

The contractors were drilling through a concrete floor contaminated with plutonium in a waste facility that Sellafield was converting into offices when the July 2007 incident occurred.

Carlisle Crown Court was told that the men were exposed to higher than anticipated levels of radiation, though neither workers suffered any immediate illness or injury.

Read the full story here.

Demolition commences at Eastern Washington’s vast nuclear weapons complex.

Work is under way at Hanford to prepare the first huge processing canyon in the Department of Energy’s nationwide nuclear weapons complex for demolition. The DOE approved a plan for demolishing U Plant in central Hanford in 2005, but then decided to focus its budget on environmental cleanup closest to the Columbia River first.

But with $1.96 billion in federal economic stimulus money allocated to Hanford, DOE has been able to begin preparing U Plant to be torn down.

It’s one of five processing plants at the Hanford nuclear reservation built to chemically separate plutonium from fuel rods irradiated in Hanford reactors for the nation’s nuclear weapons program.

Read more here.

Intense secrecy marks the impending implosion of the Texas Stadium.

Irving’s hope that the pending destruction of Texas Stadium becomes an American spectacle – complete with a corporate sponsor and national contest – rests on Maura Gast. But the Irving Convention and Visitor Bureau’s executive director has a fine line to walk, a secret to guard and an unforgiving timeline.

A major food company wants to sponsor the event and turn the right to push the detonator into a nationwide contest. But the company doesn’t want the world to know who it is unless a deal is struck.

City Council members want a pact to bring the city the biggest financial and advertising bang possible. But while the city owns the structure, the Dallas Cowboys retain near-total control of the use of Texas Stadium’s name. That leaves Gast with the task of selling her bosses and America’s Team on plans without spilling the beans on who is behind them.

Read more here.