Although its demolition would not occur for another twenty months, the first time I took note of the giant Reading Grain facility situated along Interstate-95 in Philadelphia was shortly after June 29, 1997. That was the day that demolition crews took 13 hours to blast down the head house at the Jack Frost Sugar Refinery located a few miles south along the same stretch of highway. I took note of the Reading Grain head house because it reminded me of the one at the sugar refinery. Not knowing its name, my sister Vyvyan and I dubbed it "Jack Frost's Cousin". We pondered over how cool it would be to see it imploded and how difficult it would be to perform. Yeah, like that was going to happen any time soon . . .

To our surprise, it was only a short a year later, in September of 1998, when things started to happen there. Vyvyan and I were driving to the Jersey shore to celebrate her birthday, and decided to stop by the old Jack Frost site for some pictures of the vacant lot after the cleanup had been completed. As we were leaving the city for the shore, we were excited to see a wrecking ball pounding away at the grain elevator's silos, and the walls at the base of the head house were being stripped in preparation for an implosion.

At that time, information on explosive demolition was hard for us to come by. We had only attended three of them, and those had been discovered by dumb luck. In November of 1998, we established our own "implosion" website, and the Reading Grain Elevator became the first entry on our Upcoming Implosions page. We had little information on it, and hoped in our wildest dreams that someone out there would know something, and help us out.

We didn't have to wait long. In February of 1999, a representative from the project's vibration consulting firm happened across our site, and before we knew it we were getting a tour of the head house while blast preparations were underway.

A British company was in charge of the blast. It was our first (and so far only) chance to see their work in our area. The vibration consultant arranged for us to meet the blaster, and to watch the very first hole for dynamite drilled into a concrete column. The blaster described to us the very unusual way in which the head house would be demolished. Due to the close proximity of nearby buildings, only the top half would be removed, leaving the base to be demolished conventionally. Furthermore, the top half had been split into two separate halves, each of which would fall to a different side of the structure. Nothing like this had ever been attempted before.

Our excitement continued to mount over the next week and a half leading up to the morning of the implosion. We spent the hour-long drive to Philadelphia speculating on just how the project would go. As we pulled onto Delaware Avenue, the excitement became almost unbearable as we noticed the police cars and television news vans surrounding the site. There was no mistaking the fact that something big was about to happen.

We parked the car, and immediately began the search for "that perfect spot." The morning of February 28th was cloudy and misty so we didn't want to wander too far away. The view of the building was blocked to the north by the elevated section of Interstate-95, so we began our search on the south side. A gravel access road ran between the grain elevator and a sprawling oil-tank farm. Many people were already lining this road, and the clock was ticking down to 8:00.

With tripod and camera in tow, we began scouring the road for a good spot. Most good spots had been claimed, but we found one open area near the safety perimeter. We set up our tripods, and made some last minute adjustments in our position to minimize the interference of a nearby telephone pole and road sign. And then we waited, and waited, and waited . . .

When your adrenaline is pumping and you're waiting for an implosion, minutes can feel like hours. We listened in on some of the nearby conversations. The big question seemed to be "would it fall". It was the foremost concern on everyone's mind considering the problems another blaster had faced with the head house at the Jack Frost Sugar Refinery. It also became obvious that we knew something the others didn't - that only the top half of the head house would be removed by the blast.

After what felt like an eternity, the one-minute warning siren sounded. The cacophony of hundreds of people talking quickly faded to a tense silence. All eyes were on the building. I tried not to even blink as I steadied my hand on the trigger for the camera.

Despite the anticipation, my heart still skipped a beat as the unmistakable crackle of the detonating cord broke the silence. The next few seconds played out in slow motion in my head. One by one, bright flashes from the cord triggered the blasting caps attached to the dynamite. And then all at once, the dynamite exploded, sending a shower of debris down each side of the doomed head house. The two halves hinged apart and for a few seconds - huge masses of the building were now airborne. They crashed to the ground in a thundering roar, the concrete instantly pulverized into clouds of dust. Although we didn't feel much, shock waves traveling through the ground would nudge our video camera ever so slightly.

Following the blast, crowds of people were quick to hurry away in a stampede, but Vyv and I stuck around for a few minutes longer to watch the dust settle. It was the most spectacular implosion we had seen yet, and it went exactly according to plan. What made it even more exciting was that we knew of the unusual plan ahead of time.

Although I enjoyed the first three implosions we had witnessed, it was after this fourth one that I knew I was hopelessly hooked on attending them. No words can fully describe the adrenaline rush until you've been there first hand. And although we have seen over 16 others since the grain elevator, the excitement has never faded. Each implosion has its own unique challenges, and memories of being there. I doubt, though, that we will ever again see a demolition as unusual as the head house of the Reading Grain Elevator.