Combined use of explosives and cutting machines in urban demolition

The method described in this paper involves vertically slicing a building in order to obtain a set of tower-like elements that have to be separately blasted down. Its advantageous features, as well as its drawbacks, have been underlined, referring to different structural characteristics of both the building and of the surrounding environment. Criteria have been given to defi ne the slicing programme, cutting methods, machinery and performances together with simple predictive calculations and examples of successful operations. The analysed and discussed cases have been taken from literature and from directly studied operations.