Promptly at 11 a.m. Monday, a 7,000-pound wrecking ball slammed into the 15-story Statesman Towers east building, and soon, pieces of concrete and windows came crashing down.
Demolition of Statesman Towers on the north side of the Indiana State University campus, which has been under discussion for more than 10 years, has finally become reality.
As pieces of the massive structure came tumbling down, media captured the moments on video and camera, while others watched in awe and curiosity as they took pictures with cell phones.
"Everything is going as planned," said Andy Licht, superintendent with Renascent, the company hired to demolish Terre Haute's iconic twin towers between Eighth and Ninth streets and between Sycamore and Spruce streets. Statesman Towers opened in 1968 as dorms and later were converted into academic buildings to house the colleges of Business and Education.
Renascent is using a 200-ton crane with a 250-foot boom to tear down the towers, which are about 160 feet tall. Work began at the top of the east tower on the northeast side.
Each building could take about two months to bring down, Licht said, with demolition of the west tower expected to begin by mid-June. The entire job should be completed by mid-October, which includes putting in sidewalks and greenspace.
North Ninth Street from Chestnut to Spruce streets is closed for two weeks (open to local traffic to get to the recycling center and ISU's parking lot R). Renascent hopes to have the building about half-way demolished by then, and one lane of that portion of North Ninth Street would then re-open.
The demolition contract cost $1.9 million, and mechanical demolition using a crane and wrecking ball is less expensive than implosion, officials have said. The entire project cost is estimated to be around $3.1 million — less than initial figures.
The project has involved much recycling, which will continue. "We've recycled all the metal," Licht said. Also, as demolition continues, piping — as well as rebar and cable in the precast slabs — will be recycled as well.
All of the concrete from the buildings will be crushed on site and put back into the basement area of the towers.
The two Statesman towers have about 20,000 cubic yards of concrete, Bryan Duncan, ISU capital planning and improvements director, said last week. "It's a major undertaking,” Duncan said.
Late this afternoon, Duncan indicated that demolition was proceeding as anticipated. "They've made more progress than I thought they would," he said.
The project has involved much detailed planning and much attention given to safety issues, Licht said. "There is quite a bit of safety concern here. As long as we keep people out of the 200-foot radius from the building, everything should go pretty well."
Renascent has a large staging area set up north of the towers; equipment includes a large crane and wrecking ball, several excavators and a machine to crush the concrete. Safety fencing is located around the entire perimeter. The north staging area will be used to handle all of the materials from the buildings; Renascent has completed interior salvage work.
While the project appears to be a massive undertaking, "this is pretty routine for us," Licht said late Monday morning. "We do a lot of demolition.This is one of the taller ones that I've been in charge of. ... It's going pretty well."
Among those watching demolition get under way was Frank Mann, who was on his lunch break. The towers "are going to be missed in Terre Haute, that's for sure. I wish they would have kept them." He didn't know any details as far as how much it would have cost to maintain them; he knew they were built during the Vietnam War era.
"A good solid building, it looked like," Mann said. He works for the city and was in the area inspecting a sewer project.
Other people, including ISU employees, took a few minutes from their busy schedules to watch from afar and take some cell phone photos.