Work underway on demolition of famous Rolls Royce Plc factory in Bristol.

Buckingham Group Contracting has started work on a significant demolition contract for Rolls Royce Plc to clear the 27 hectare East Works Site at Filton in Bristol. The contract is being undertaken as part of a property consolidation exercise for Rolls Royce Plc and the project valued at in-excess of £1m includes extensive asbestos removal, decommissioning, dismantling and demolition works which are programmed to be completed by the end of the Summer.

The works are being undertaken by Buckingham Group’s in-house Demolition and Regeneration Division. This factor, together with Rolls Royce’s preference to work with an established Main Contractor underpinned Buckingham’s success on being awarded this contract.

Buckingham’s in-house Land Regeneration Division offers a complete brownfield land development solution encompassing demolition, remediation, services decommissioning, civils infrastructure and new build. By offering this Complete Construction Solution on an all-risk, lump sum basis, Buckingham Group has built up an extensive portfolio of successfully completed projects for a range of Blue Chip Clients.

“Following further significant investment in specialist plant and equipment, we are delighted to have secured this demolition project based on the price and quality of our service,” says director Tim Brown commented. “Buckingham Group Contracting have an experienced Land Regeneration Team and provide a high quality service which together enable us to make a major impact in the remediation, demolition, clearance and asbestos removal sector.’’

Irish demolition man Joe O’Connell and his wife Ann have been killed in the US.

There are times when fancy words just aren’t appropriate and this, tragically, is one of those times. We have just heard that Joe O’Connell – a familiar face at National Federation of Demolition Contractors and Institute of Demolition Engineers events – and his wife Ann have been killed in an horrific car crash in the US.

Further details can be found here.

Our thoughts are with their family at this tragic time.

Demolition workers are racing to clean up a Spokane site contaminated with PCBs.

In a move welcomed by Washington’s Department of Ecolocy, a former city parcels building is being demolished to allow the ground upon which it stands to be thoroughly remediated before PCBs from the site contaminate groundwater.

Click here for the full story.

And for more information on PCB contamination, please listen to our exclusive audio podcast.

A new video shows how a 70 metre chimney is being “munched” to the ground.

In certain parts of Europe, the challenge of bringing down a 70 metre high concrete chimney wold have been met with a call for a high reach excavator. But in the US, where such machines are still onsidered somewhat “new-fangled” by some demolition contractors, they take a very different approach as this excellent video shows.

Demolition News’ photo competition winner Alan Jones gets his prize.

Brown & Mason’s Alan Jones, winner of our recent photo competition, has stepped in front of the camera for once to pose proudly with his prize; a scale model of a high reach Komatsu excavator.

Architects offered counseling after seeing their work demolished.

Thanks to an unhealthy consumption of daytime television, online conspiracy theories and tabloid newspaper “editorials” I though I’d heard everything. And then I read this.

It seems that our friends in the architectural world find the whole business of demolition so troubling to their sensitive and creative minds that they’re now taking counseling after watching their handiwork turned to so much rubble.

Of course, they could have designed their buildings to be a little more future-proof, ensuring that their sad demise didn’t happen until long after the architect had been called to that great drawing office in the sky. Or, rather than designing atria made from Dodo egg membrane and Narwhal spit, they could have designed the building in a more modular fashion, allowing it to be carefully dismantled and possibly reassembled in another form or location.

But no.

In today’s increasingly touchy-feely world, the only possible answer to having seen your building hit repeatedly with a hydraulic hammer is a period of prolonged, over-expensive and often pointless therapy.

I wonder if architects will appreciate the irony?