The Leaning Tower - of - ???

[P95Carry]

OK - you are the boss of a demolition company - you and your team have spent two weeks of intensive work prep'ing a building. Jack hammers, weakening critical elements - placing charges at strategic points, some shaped even - the intention being to blow out the footing area and let the whole deal collapse on itself. Easy eh? regular stuff! What folks always do.

WRONG!! How they got to finish the job I am not sure - and I have some explosives training too. Dangerous would be one word


http://www.break.com/articles/stillstanding.html?t=4409

[DefensiveCarry.com]

[Bruces45]

Looks like the crew who built it knew what they were doing, seems quite strong.

[Bud White]

opps can you imagine how dumbfounded they must have felt when nothing happened... Also how dangerous it will be now to try to take it rest of the way down

[Wayne]

I just want to know the name of the construction company that built that thing so they could build my house.

I wouldn't even be afraid of a nuclear blast in that thing :D.

Wayne

[QKShooter]

Hey...I don't wanna joke about somebody else's misfortune but, why do they hafta be so doggone scientific about it?

The exact amount of explosive in just the right key places & the building will gently topple inward on itself....without so much as raising nary a dust cloud.
Just the right amount & Not A Bit More.

Damn!! ~ I wish I was in the demolition business.

500 pounds of explosive calculated...I'd use 1,500 pounds....maybe more. Maybe a lot more.

All those rubber~necking spectator type people standing around waiting for a building to explode...sorry "implode"~~~~I'd blow the dad~blamed thing up & give them a show they wouldn't forget for years.

They would be ducking burning debris "raining out of the sky" 5 miles away.

Somebody is paying me good money to blow something up???...I'm blowing it up!

Just my opinion.

[P95Carry]

Thing is QK - the ''art'' is to use the smallest amount of explosive, to do the job. Flying debris is bad news from a liability angle and so they try to minimize that - often hanging huge curtains around base.

To quote a parallel with quarrying - the best jobs were with ''just the right amount'' - which usually means little more than a low rumble - no ''boom''. Then all the energy has gone into doing work instead of generating sound (and fly rock). Good stemming too helps here and occasionally nets over top of shot holes.

Back to the building - I suspect some structural aspects were overlooked (framing, steel maybe) and also just perhaps, the timing of the det's was out. For this job I would expect a simultaneous blast at all points (unless delay charges added at higher level) - so the theory then is once that huge mass is comin down - gravity will do the rest of the work - and it should all collapse in a nice (dusty) heap, without falling over. The ''falling over'' trick is a cinch to do but - not usually desirable.

If here they by mistake used delay det's - 5 msec even, on the far corner, then the right front started down earlier - mind you tho even if symmetrical charge detonating - the structure might still have ''stalled''.

It suggests mainly inadequate prep'ing - sometimes with steel it has to be cut thru to pre-weaken - so that once a tumble starts - everything breaks and it all goes smooth. I can see immense probs getting back in there (safely) to place fresh charges.

[QKShooter]

Yeah,...I "get it"...Chris...
Leave it to a Dang Engineer to take all the fun out of blowing something up.

[firefighter4884]

LOL QK....

us engineers are horrible for that...

[HotGuns]

Look to me that the intermediate charges that collapse the building in on itself didnt fire.

Its easy to cut the electrical cord with the primary charge if its not routed just exactly right.

[kastiron]

Yeah,...I "get it"...Chris...
Leave it to a Dang Engineer to take all the fun out of blowing something up.

We just call it "research" now, still fun to blow stuff up! I love it when I get to "test" things, especially when it involves explosions, or ballistic resistance. Once in a while, I get to put ammunition down on my expense reports! I love my job sometimes.