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A cluster of residential towers ranging in height from seven to 12 storeys was reduced to rubble last week in Wuhan following a spectacular controlled implosion, said to be the largest of its kind of China. The 19 towers were demolished in order to facilitate construction of a new business district, with a supertall at its epicentre expected to become the tallest building in the country.
Approximately 120,000 timed detonations and five tonnes of explosives obliterated the buildings in only ten seconds. If done by conventional methods, demolition would have taken about four months. The operation went off without a hitch, leaving no damage to the neighbouring railway viaduct, shopping mall, or electricity substation in its wake.
"For this kind of large-scale blasting demolition conducted in the downtown area, we not only need to guarantee the demolition result, but also strictly control the adverse effects of blasting," said Jia Yongsheng, general director of the demolition company, to China's CCTV. "The demolition effect was quite ideal. The explosion didn't affect the light rail and public facilities around the blasted buildings. There was no damage and adverse effects of blasting," he concluded. A video released by CCTV captured several angles of the awesome scene:
The CTF Finance Center will be a 648-metre megatall skyscraper that will eclipse China's current tallest building, the Shanghai Tower, and the soon-to-be tallest, the Wuhan Greenland Center. The 121-storey office tower features a flowering design by Ronald Lu & Partners. Completion is anticipated in 2022.
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