www.pedestrians... Part 2. Demolition of the 16-story Marriott Residence Inn in Arlington, Virginia, by wrecking ball. 59:38 Produced by John Z Wetmore, producer of "Perils For Pedestrians".
I love wrecking ball demolitions. Our lift ripout crew could have been a help in separating them guide rails rather than fighting the joined mangled full lengths.
Thanks, John, for another great video. A nice variety of shots, and some very nice closeups, especially after the sun came out and the video quality improved. Nice job catching the whole top coming down about 59:50. Thanks for including some shots of the crane reacting to the process. Wrecking ball demo is fun to watch, but seems so haphazard. I really don't understand his technique, like around 2:29:30 where he keeps pounding on the edges of the walls, which is their strongest direction, instead of bashing the side of them were they are weaker. It looks like they plan to switch tools when it gets lower, as I saw a longfront excavator on the site in a couple of shots.
The top coming down was a total surprise to me, and probably to the operator as well. I was told that they would use the wrecking ball above the 7th floor, and the high reach excavator below the 7th floor.
It was confusing to why he would keep hitting where he gets in a bind or making little progress. All that rebar was cushioning most the blows and throwing it off course.
Perhaps he means that the operator has allowed rubble such as rebar to pile up. The mounds of rebar absorb the energy from the wrecking ball, reducing its impact on the concrete underneath it. I edited out minutes of ineffective blows where he hit the rebar and nothing happened. One of the challenges of using a wrecking ball is being careful not to let too much rubble pile up and act as a cushion.
UAP, UFO, or aircraft upper left at 2:19:11? Also, it gives me lots of faith in the building standards of the modern civilized countries; it takes some heavy balls to bring down a concrete and steel building! WOW!
It would be interesting to see a time-lapse of this demolition. Like 3 to 4 frames per second, played back at 24-frames per second. See the entire building come down in a couple of hours.
I wonder if it would be handy to weld some saw like teeth on the chain with points down to clear all the rebar and piping. lifting no grab sliding down the wall and pulling the cushion down. No specialist but i just wonder if it would work, maybe someone who knows?
