And the wall came tumbling down

Crews from Clauss Construction of San Diego, Calif., on Monday began demolishing four buildings at Technical Area 41 in Los Alamos Canyon. The project is being managed by the Facilities and Waste Operations (FWO) Division through the Cerro Grande Rehabilitation Project Office. Because the buildings are located in a major flood plain, they would have been in danger of catastrophe in the event of a 100-year storm event, which would submerge the bottom floors of the buildings. Clauss crews plan to recycle approximately 80 percent of the demolished buildings as part of the nearly $1.5-million demolition project. Concrete will be used as base course for roads, all metal will be recycled into other products and electrical equipment will be re-used or melted down for use in other applications. Major historic structures at TA-41 will be spared from the wrecking crew.

To quickly and efficiently bring down all 47,000 square feet of structures, Clauss is using a Hitachi 450 excavator -- a machine with interchangeable tools that can snip through building I-beams as if they were made of tin and can chew concrete up into baseball-sized chunks. The buildings are constructed of an estimated 25,000 tons of concrete, 100 tons of steel and about 10 tons of miscellaneous scrap metal. Clauss crews completed an asbestos abatement on the structures prior to demolition. Demolition of the outside structure of Omega West reactor begins later this week. Photos by James E. Rickman, Public Affairs

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