With a swing of the wrecking ball, the bricks of the former Humboldt District Hospital began to fall to the ground last week.
Demolition of the former hospital building began at about 2 p.m. on September 27, and a large crowd gathered along 12th Ave. to watch the large structure begin to fall.
It took more than a few hits of the wrecking ball on the top southern corner of the building to get anything to start falling to the ground. For about two hours, the crew chipped away at that corner of the building before stopping for the day.
The demolition got going again on Wednesday morning, and is currently continuing.
According to Kelvin Fisher of the Saskatoon Health Region (SHR), flyers were distributed to the neighborhood around the hospital twice in the past month - first when demolition was scheduled for the week of September 12, and again when they found out it had been postponed to late in the month.
The flyers went to homes in a four-block radius of the old hospital, Fisher said, and simply warned homeowners about potential dust from the demolition.
The flyers also included a phone number residents could call with concerns.
Just two calls were made. The first asked about the safety of her vegetables in the garden. That homeowner was assured that her vegetables would be safe, just perhaps a little dusty, Fisher indicated.
Another asked about the possibility of asbestos entering the air due to the demolition.
There is no asbestos in the demolition dust, Fisher indicated.
"All the asbestos was removed," he said.
Actually, he added, all the hazardous materials - including things like Freon - were removed from the building before demolition began.
"We got clearance to demolish," he said. "It was all (done) according to regulations."
The timeline for the demolition of the building is between two to three weeks. That's the timeline the SHR got from the contractor to have the building completely knocked down and the site cleaned up.
Though any difficulties on the site, like mechanical break-downs could extend that timeline, Fisher felt the maximum time frame would be three weeks.
The demolition company plans on crushing some material on site, he added, and they will not be selling bricks.
"They will be processing as much stuff as they can," he noted.
The actual knock-down of the building is taking longer than they were originally told it would, Fisher admitted.
"They originally said two to three days. I don't think that's the case," he said on the second day of demolition, when all but the top corner of the building remained standing.
Fisher admitted the demolition was going slowly, but he did not know why or if they were off schedule. The Journal was also unable to contact the contractor for comment.
But even if the demolition does fall behind schedule, Fisher wasn't worried.
"There isn't a requirement that it had to be down by a certain time," he said. "It's taken a little longer than anticipated, but the building will come down.... At this point, we want to make sure we're diligent and do (this) the safest way possible. If it takes a little longer, that's fine."
The old hospital building is a solid structure, he admitted, which may be why it's taking so long to knock down. Walls of poured concrete 10 to 12 inches thick ran down the main corridors of the building, carrying the load of the structure.
Those walls, while it kept the building standing solidly, also made the building very difficult to maintain, as they housed the infrastructure systems.
"There was no crawl space. Everything was in the walls... encased in concrete. It was a very difficult building, as it aged, to service," Fisher said.
For additional photos, see photo galleries.
