I intend to use my blog to keep you informed of things happening with my car(s) and anything in life I find interesting, unusual or worthy of sharing! Please check back regularly to see what's been happening in the world of Simo 
Tim-berrrrrrrrrrrrrrr...
Posted 23rd October 2008 at 23:41 by Simo
I'm working in East Germany this week, close to Leipzig. I arrived at work this morning and got on with a meeting I had planned at 9am. At about quarter to 10, the meeting was put on hold and I was told there was something interesting to watch outside??
We walked across the site to an old semi-abandoned part, where an area had been barrier-taped, to restrict access. In the distance there was a team of guys cutting and torch-burning the base of a large chminey - I'd arrived at a demolition site!
The chimney in question was dis-used and was apparently costing a lot of money to maintain, so the decision was made to knock it down! The chimney itself was 60 metres tall, constructed of concrete and re-inforced with steel... in total it weighed 450 tonnes!
The demolition team had chopped a wedge shape out of the base, after tying a heavy duty steel cable to the top of the chminey. The idea was to weaken the bottom of the chimney by cutting the supporting steel, then use a large JCB to pull the chimney over using the steel cable!
At first, the chimney wouldn't budge, but after a little more cutting, chiseling and banging, the chimney started to wobble. The guys moved back a little and handed over to the (brave) guy in the JCB. The steel cable was tensioned and slowly the chimney began to lean. Once it started to move, it was only ever going to go one way... down!
A few seconds later (literally about 5 seconds), the whole structure had toppled over and embedded itself in the marsh land below. We had a walk over to the fallen chimney and even had a little walk on top of it. There was quite a lot of support steel in the structure - its no wonder it was a little tough to topple! I spoke to the engineer who had designed and built the chimney some 25 or so years earlier... he said he knew he'd designed it well! lmao.
With the chimney down and the dust settled, we all headed back to the meeting... it certainly made the morning a lot more interesting!
We walked across the site to an old semi-abandoned part, where an area had been barrier-taped, to restrict access. In the distance there was a team of guys cutting and torch-burning the base of a large chminey - I'd arrived at a demolition site!
The chimney in question was dis-used and was apparently costing a lot of money to maintain, so the decision was made to knock it down! The chimney itself was 60 metres tall, constructed of concrete and re-inforced with steel... in total it weighed 450 tonnes!
The demolition team had chopped a wedge shape out of the base, after tying a heavy duty steel cable to the top of the chminey. The idea was to weaken the bottom of the chimney by cutting the supporting steel, then use a large JCB to pull the chimney over using the steel cable!
At first, the chimney wouldn't budge, but after a little more cutting, chiseling and banging, the chimney started to wobble. The guys moved back a little and handed over to the (brave) guy in the JCB. The steel cable was tensioned and slowly the chimney began to lean. Once it started to move, it was only ever going to go one way... down!
A few seconds later (literally about 5 seconds), the whole structure had toppled over and embedded itself in the marsh land below. We had a walk over to the fallen chimney and even had a little walk on top of it. There was quite a lot of support steel in the structure - its no wonder it was a little tough to topple! I spoke to the engineer who had designed and built the chimney some 25 or so years earlier... he said he knew he'd designed it well! lmao.
With the chimney down and the dust settled, we all headed back to the meeting... it certainly made the morning a lot more interesting!
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Comments
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pretty cool
any photos of dodgy german mustaches?Posted 26th October 2008 at 22:46 by barrett 
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I didn't see any twirly mustaches... maybe that's a West Germany thing?
Got some other interesting trip pics to share - will try and blog later from hotel.Posted 2nd November 2008 at 02:17 by Simo
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