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Maradu Flat Demolition: All 4 Luxury Apartment Complexes Razed To The Ground

The four complexes together housed a total of 343 flats. Golden Kayaloram is the last to be demolished.

Two 55-meter high apartment complex, built in violation of Coastal Regulation Zone norms in Kochi’s Maradu municipality, were demolished on Sunday as part of the Supreme Court’s order to raze four luxury complexes in the area.

Of four apartment complexes — Alfa Serene, H20 Holy Faith, Jains Coral Cove and Golden Kayaloram — the first two were demolished on Saturday.

Jain Coral Cove was demolished on Sunday morning using controlled implosion method.

The fourth and last building — Golden Kayaloram — was demolished at 2.30 pm, marking the completion of implementing the court’s order passed last year.

The four complexes together housed a total of 343 flats.

The demolition

A mock drill to condition the team of police, fire force, health officials and other experts for the Sunday’s exercise was carried out at Golden Kayaloram on Saturday evening and at Jains Coral Cove, the third building, on Friday.

Residents in the neighbourhood moved out and Section 144 of CrPC come into force at 8 am in the evacuation zone ahead of the demolition to ensure there was no untoward incident.

Ahead of the demolition, the area in a 200-metre radius of the building was kept out of bounds for people and all kinds of traffic.

In a precise sequence, over 350 kgs of explosives filled in the structures were blasted in a controlled manner at the end of the third warning siren and the concrete colossus came crumbling down in seconds, triggering mammoth ‘clouds’ of dust, PTI reported.

In a few seconds, the towering building, whose interior walls had been removed in pre-demolition work over the past weeks leaving it a concrete shell, became mounds of debris.

High-rise luxury apartment apartment Holy Faith H2O is brought to the ground by controlled implosion in Kochi,, Saturday, Jan. 11. 2020.
ASSOCIATED PRESS
High-rise luxury apartment apartment Holy Faith H2O is brought to the ground by controlled implosion in Kochi,, Saturday, Jan. 11. 2020.

The spectacle was witnessed by a large number of people who perched themselves on top of houses and other buildings in vantage points just outside the 200m radius evacuation zone even as police and district officials kept a vigil.

“It was a perfect implosion. Not a single debris has fallen in the lake,” Ernakulam District Collector S Suhas said after visiting the site along with city police commissioner Vijay Sakhare after the demolition. Sakhare said the operation was executed as planned. “It was an absolute success. No damage has happened to the building adjacent to the demolished one. And no harm to any human life or any animal life. No properties in adjoining area damaged,” the police officer said.

On Saturday, the two other complexes near the backwaters ― H2O Holy Faith and the twin towers of Alfa Serene ― were destroyed in a similar implosion, in which explosives filled within the structures of the building are blasted in a controlled manner.

Mumbai-based Edifices Engineering carried out the explosion with the assistance of experts from South Africa-based Jet Demolition.

The Ernakulam District Collector used his authority as District Magistrate on Saturday to declare a prohibitory order in the evacuation zone of the two residential complexes, officials told PTI.

They said the demolition had been carried out safely without causing any damage to buildings in the neighbourhood.

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This article exists as part of the online archive for HuffPost India, which closed in 2020. Some features are no longer enabled. If you have questions or concerns about this article, please contact indiasupport@huffpost.com.