Noida Twin Tower Demolition: After years of delay, that day has finally come. The stage has been set for the safe demolition of Supertech’s twin towers on Sunday. The demolition will be a unique spectacle of engineering that will destroy two structures nearly 100 meters high born out of corruption.
Only last-minute inspection remains as the towers — taller than Delhi’s iconic Qutub Minar Waterfall will be brought down in less than 15 seconds by implosion technology.
Officials said they would be the tallest structures ever to be demolished in India. Noida Authority CEO Ritu Maheshwari told PTI, “All preparations have been made for the safe demolition of both the towers as per schedule at 2.30 pm tomorrow.”
Explosive set, residents evacuated and vehicles removed
More than 3,700 kg of explosives will be used to demolish structures in pursuance of a Supreme Court order that found their construction within the Emerald Court Society premises in violation of norms.
Around 5,000 residents of Emerald Court and the adjoining ATS Village Society in Sector 93A have to vacate their premises by 7 a.m. on Sunday, while removing around 3,000 vehicles and 150-200 pets, including cats and dogs, have to take it with you. Many of them left only on Saturdays, some were only visiting relatives or friends in Delhi NCR, while some had gone to Uttarakhand and Rajasthan on short holidays.
The nearest buildings are next to the twin towers Aster 2 and Aster 3 of Emerald Court Society which are just nine meters away, Officials said the demolition will be done in such a way that there is no structural damage to other buildings.
Roads to remain closed, city to become no-fly zone for drones
While the Noida-Greater Noida Expressway will remain closed from 2.15 pm to 2.45 pm, the city will remain a no-fly zone for drones. According to the Noida Authority, the airspace within a nautical mile above the blast will also be unavailable for some time for flights at the time of demolition.
All the work relating to the placement and attachment of explosives has already been completed. The only work left is to interconnect the twin towers and lay a 100 meter long cable from the structures to the explosion.R, from where the button will be pressed on Sunday, project officials said.
“Once the last minute checks are done and all the teams have descended from the buildings, the two buildings Apex and Cayenne should be interconnected. A 100 meter long cable will then be run from the towers to the Exploder. Demolish,” said Mayur Mehta, project manager, Edifice Engineering.
“Once we get clearance from the police department that the exclusion zone is 100 per cent clear, we will press the button at 2.30 pm on Sunday,” he said.
Mehta said only six people, including three foreign experts, Indian blaster Chetan Dutta, a police officer and himself, would remain in the exclusion zone to press the button for the blast.
Will the explosion be 100% successful?
Asked how confident he is about the safe demolition, Mehta told PTI: “100 per cent. I have no more words. We are 100 per cent sure.”
Mehta’s Mumbai-based Edifice Engineering has been tasked with pulling down the structures safely. Edifice has contracted South African experts Jet Demolition for the project. The entire exercise is being monitored by the local Noida Authority.
His brother and Edifice partner Utkarsh Mehta has assured residents of the surrounding societies that there will be no damage to their homes except the possibility of “cosmetic cracks” on the exterior paint and plaster of some structures.
Regarding the duration of the demolition, he said that first all the explosives would explode in a chain from the bottom floor to the top in eight to nine seconds, and then it would take four to five seconds for the buildings to come down – 15 under the entire incident. seconds.
“The buildings are planned to come down in the south-west direction, away from nearby buildings and towards the open area,” Mehta said.
On how many options he had for taking down the Twin Towers, Mehta said there are basically three techniques for safely demolishing any structure of such scale – diamond cutters, use of robots and implosion.
“The technology is selected on the basis of three parameters – cost, time and safety,” he said.
He said the ‘diamond cutter’ would have taken two years to completely safely demolish the twin towers, and would have cost five times more than the blast method.
About using robotics, he said that this technology would have created a lot of noise over a period of 1.5 years to two years and disturbed the residents of the nearby Emerald Court and ATS village.
“It would have cost less than diamond cutting technology, but more than the explosion,” he said.
The Edifice Boss said that since the Supreme Court also ordered that the project should be completed in the shortest possible time and the neighboring residents should not suffer, the transplant technology became the choice for the project.
Meanwhile, in an advisory issued to the public on Saturday evening, the Noida authority asked people, especially children, elderly and patients living in nearby areas to wear face masks as a precautionary measure.
The authority specifically asked the residents of the nearby In Sector 93, 93A, 93B, 92 Parsvnath Prestige, Parsvnath Srishti Society, Village Gejha and others to wear face masks after 2.30 pm,
The diversion will be imposed on roads leading to the Twin Towers in Noida Sector 93A from Sunday morning, while the Noida-Greater Noida Expressway, barely 200 meters from the demolition site, will be closed for vehicular movement from 2 pm to 3 pm. DCP (Traffic) Ganesh Saha said.
Google Maps to show the diversion
On Sunday, Google Maps will have updated feeds for diversion and real-time traffic conditions, Saha said, adding that arrangements have been made for movement of emergency vehicles.
DCP (Central Noida) Rajesh S said that around 400 police personnel would be deployed for law and order duty, while PAC and NDRF personnel will also be in the field for any emergency,
Chief Medical Officer Dr Sunil Sharma said that the health department would deploy six ambulances equipped with officers and medicines at the site. Beds have also been reserved in the district hospital and private medical facilities Realty, Felix and JP.
Demolition of the Twin Towers will be done using waterfall implosion technology, which will knock them down like a pack of cards in seconds. The eye-catching event would leave behind 55,000 tons of debris, with some estimates putting the figure at 80,000 tons. It will take an estimated three months to clean up and dispose of the debris.
Maheshwari said that all arrangements are being made to clear the dust from the area after the demolition. He said that apart from the cleaning personnel, mechanical sweeping machines, anti-smog guns and water sprinklers would also be installed at the site.
Residents of Emerald Court and ATS village, who spoke to PTI, said they were concerned about the demolition, even as they expressed relief over the illegal structures finally closing after more than a decade of legal battle .
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(with inputs from agencies)