December 2013
CONSTRUCTION WORLD
48
WINNER
Project information
• Name of project: Munitoria Implosion
• Company entering: Draco Demolition
• Project start date: February 2013
• Project end date: December 2013
• Client: City of Tshwane
• Main contractor: Draco Demolition
• Prinicipal agent: Group Five
• Project value: R18-million
Munitoria Implosion
T
he remnants ofTshwane’s historicMunitoria Building, a 44-year-old
building was imploded to make way for new government head-
quarters, to be known as Tshwane House. The implosion was the
city’s first in 14 years and one of the biggest in the city in terms of mass.
The 14-floor building, which included two lower basements,
was over 160 meters long. Preparation for the implosion took
approximately four and a half months from February 2013, when the
contractor took over the site from the City of Tshwane.
The project required a labour complement of almost 120 people
a day in order to ensure that all carpets, ceilings, doors, tiles, lights,
wiring, façades and plumbing were completely stripped from the
building. The bridges over Madiba Street, which connected the
Munitoria building with the Sammy Marks Building, were removed
over four consecutive weekends prior to the implosion.
The entire blast lasted only 12 seconds with the three main
portions of the building collapsing onto their own footprints, one
after the other. The noise of the implosion was heard for many kilo-
metres and reached approximately 140 decibels for those 12 seconds.
The immense dust cloud created by the implosion took approximately
an hour to settle.
As this was a demolition project, no specific materials were used
to aid the demolition of the building however, a Brokk 260 robotic
hammer machine was used in all hard to reach areas of the building.
Certain structural parts of the building needed to be weakened prior
to implosion and the Brokk was used to gain access in difficult areas.
DracoDemolition salvaged variousmaterials and donated themto
the Pretoria Zoo. In addition, Draco Demolition assisted the Pretoria
Specialist Contractors or Suppliers
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