Didcot Power Station demolition tomorrow

The three towers at Didcot A Power Station will be reduced to rubble between 6am and 8am.

Specialist firm, Brown and Mason, has been appointed to carry out the demolition which will use controlled explosions to bring down the 325ft towers.

Energy company, RWE, who own the site, said there will be no road closures in place.

Thousands of people gathered at vantage points to see the first three of the six cooling towers blown up at 5am on Sunday, July 27, 2014.

Places to watch the towers explode this time round include the outskirts of Great Western Park Estate, Wittenham Clumps in Little Wittenham - which saw around 1,500 people gather last time - and Ladygrove Estate.

Other spots to the towers tumble are along the Reading Road towards Upton and at Hadden Hill.

RWE has said it is actively discouraging people from viewing the demolition from close quarters.

Brown and Mason carried out test blasts on the site last October and, along with RWE, submitted its method of demolition to Vale of White Horse District Council.

According to planning documents, the blasts will be carried out at the same time to reduce disruption.

A statement released by RWE said: “We are committed to reducing disruption caused by the demolition to the greatest degree possible and are working closely with our contractors, Brown and Mason, to ensure we can achieve this.

“Health and safety remains our absolutely number one priority, and we are liaising with the relevant authorities to safely manage the demolition process.

“Further details of the planned activity will be made available closer to the date.”

To ensure the cooling towers fall away from the Didcot B gas-fired power station - which is still in operation - they will be tilted towards the centre of the site.

Tomorrow, an exclusion zone of 300 to 400 metres will be set up around the cooling towers - and 500 to 600 metres around the chimney - with security guards employed to ensure it is not breached.

The chimney is thought to weigh around 30,000 tonnes so demolition in the conventional ‘toppling’ method is not considered practical.

Instead, Brown and Mason intend to blast it at two levels in a similar way to how the company brought down chimneys at other power stations including Kingsnorth in Kent and Pembroke in Wales.

The detonation will take place at the second floor level, followed by a further blast a second later at the base of the structure.

This will reduce the length of the fall, the spread of the debris and the amount of ground vibration.

Didcot Mayor, Bill Service, said he had mixed feelings about the end of the coal-fired power station and that the demolition would ‘mark the end of one era for the town and the beginning of something else’.