Daytona Beach, FL – An iconic part of the old Daytona International Speedway is no more.
Construction workers set off 33 pounds of copper-sheathed linear-shaped explosives at 10am Wednesday to the backstretch grandstands, sending the entire 140-foot-tall steel structure to the ground.
DIS Vice-President of Sales & Marketing Sean Belgrade says the explosion came off as expected and that an explosion was the safest way to bring the structure down instead of using bulldozers or dismantling it piece by piece.
“Safety’s always the most important thing for us here,” Belgrade added. “Really, the safest and most efficient way to bring it down.”
Video of the actual explosion is posted above.
Insulation debris from the explosion – which could be heard for miles around – landed on the east-west runway at Daytona Beach International Airport, causing it to shut down for around an hour until crews could clean it up, according to Volusia County spokesman Dave Byron.
DIS spokesman Andrew Booth said the Speedway coordinated with DBIA and the Federal Aviation Administration so that no flights would be coming into that DBIA runway at the time of the explosion.
A Delta flight did land at DBIA around the time of the explosion, but used the north-south runway to land, per Byron.
Speedway officials asked the media to embargo the explosion until a few minutes before it happened to ensure that no onlookers would enter the blast zone and potentially get hurt.
Residential areas around the Speedway were informed prior to the explosion, per Booth.
DIS decided to stop using the backstretch grandstands as part of Daytona Rising, the ongoing $400 million renovation of the historic motorsports facility.
Speedway officials say the focus for them moving forward was to bring a high quality of entertainment to the fans, something they felt wasn’t possible if they didn’t focus exclusively on the mile-long frontstretch grandstands.
DIS plans to use the area for parking once the debris is cleared away, leaving seating capacity at 101,500. The backstretch grandstands used to hold around 40,000 seats.
Daytona Rising is expected to be complete by the Rolex 24 race in January, roughly a month before the Daytona 500.
Photos below of the grandstands coming down are courtesy of DIS.
Copyright 2015 Southern Stone Communications.