So you know that parking lot in Salmiya I’ve posted about that’s filled with graffiti and is now getting demolished? Well whoever is demolishing the building messed up, not just once, not twice, but three times!
As you can see from the photos, the demolition has damaged the still brand new unopened mall in three different places.
What probably is worse is the fact that the demolition area isn’t cordoned off which means kids from the neighborhood could just walk into the demolition site or just go up the easily accessible stairs of the partly demolished lot. Sadly it’s not a big deal because most of us here have grown accustomed to the lack of professionalism involved in demolition. On a similar topic, a reader the other day left the following comment under the Family Bookshop post:
Speaking of demolishing. An Indian that works for our company became paralyzed from the waste down just this past month because the building next door was being demolished. The side wall of the building fell into their building knocking down the wall to his room.
That’s messed up.
26 replies on “Demolition Blunder”
Very common here, unfortunately. It happened on my property when the neighbor behind my house was having his place demolished. The 1st floor collapsed into my walkway behind my house with bricks falling right through the metal shed. Somebody could have been killed.
well the mall is ugly anyway. I guess the grafitti parking structure hates it also.
That’s because he probably had no experience handling this equipment and was hired because he was Indian or Pakistani or from where ever and Kuwait thought he is qualified to do his job when in reality has never operated the equipment before. STOP HIRING BY RACE! In addition, Kuwait has a hard time hiring qualified personel across the board throughout the country because of its countries poicies.
At the risk of sounding like a jerk, this is what happens when you employ untrained, unqualified third-world labor. I am aware that mishaps of this nature can, and do, happen everywhere, but with this frequency?
I guess this can be taken both ways! but you do have a point – even with the nanny situation – it has recently come to my attention that Kuwaits are apparently NOT allowed to hire au pairs or nannies from europe … even though it is a job with some distinction and plenty of experienced individuals exist that would be excellent. for some reason – kuwait as a rich country – hires by race and looks for the cheapest deal rather than the best quality. this occurs across the board. Hire underqualified westerners for the ‘visible’ roles but get the experienced and professional asians to do most of the grunt work including accountancy and IT for pocket change… but also get asians and arabs who have no idea what they are doing in menial tasks.
It can stay non racist if you include the uselessness across the board. But then youd have to mention kuwaitis and mmediately – it would be GTFO!
That’s probably because they probably don’t want hot Eastern European nannies coming to kuwait.
well they could always hire from england š
Who was responsible for demolishing the Family Bookshop building? Hope they compensated the worker heavily.
Considering the distance between the demolished building & the New mall in the photos, It is surprising that only such minor damaged occurred. Usually when a demolition is done where there are neighboring buildings close by , the recommended method is to use charges to bring the building down on itself (Implosion) … Looks like here they tried the more cheaper method of using the excavators and paid the price …. I would blame the cheapskate \ Illiterate Owner or the miserly contractor and not the third world fellows trying to make a buck ..
To all ignorant morons. The owner and the contractor should be held responsible. Not the labor who get severely underpaid!
As a matter of fact, there is no construction in Kuwait which meet EU or US Standards. The contractors break most of the building construction ethics.
The newer residential building have no quality and no proper maintenance.
The rents in Kuwait are second to Dubai, but the quality of housing or services are inferior/ third grade.
I think the posts you cite were blaming the imbeciles who hired the idiots, not the idiots themselves. I take it reading comprehension is not your strong suit?
I fail to understand why you term the operators as idiots. Imbeciles, fine, but just because someone is not qualified enough does not make him or her an idiot. Idiot is the person that knows what work is to be done, but refuses to hire the proper person for it.
If a person has just qualified to operate an equipment or has been operating a lower class of equipment but has now decided to go one level up, is he/ she an idiot? The contractor should have found the right personnel and if it’s a trainee (or a person learning to operate a higher classed equipment) the contractor should have kept a senior or qualified person until such trainee is qualified enough!
Idiots working for imbeciles. Happy?
So says the under qualified, overpaid westerner.
Now this isn’t salam
In riggai behind muzzaine exchange the top floor side of a new building jus fell off ….thank gid no 1 was hurt …..hmmmm
In riggai behind muzzaine exchange the top floor side of a new building jus fell off ….thank god no 1 was hurt …..hmmmm
In Riggae, they are bigger stingier landlords and harris’s. They are a lot of buildings which were 2 bedrooms and then they are converted to two flats with same ac. Also for old buildings with one lift, they built extra rooms on the single stair landings. They utilize all spaces between the buildings to make mulhaqs.
I cannot believe the baladiya is allowing this.
Also, the harris’s are demanding 150kd as key for anyone moving in, not including the monthly 5kd he demands for the trash picking or cleaning which he never does.
There is always a poor bengali who will pick up trash of trash of whole building for 20-25kd a month.
Shit is bad in Kuwait. Government turns a blind eye to these problems instead builds roads and offices which doesn’t solve any problem.
Haha I was there today filming and watched one sling shot a bunch of debris at himself with the heavy equipment
Why only blame the poor labourer when all of us know full well that (the probably) Western qualified senior management of whatever entity responsible for the demolition is wholly responsible for this fiasco owing to their abject lack of common sense which led to hiring of this third world national to execute their simply brilliant idea of knocking down the parking lot after the mall was fully built.
Foolishness and stupidity knows no borders or nationality as is amply evident from the tone of some of your commentators.
If only there was a more able and trained workforce in the Middle East they wouldn’t have to go looking elsewhere!
And besides it is your average Indian or Pakistani blue collared joe that has toiled in the Emaarati sun to give you the supertalls and Burj Khalifa in Dubai, and with all due respect- not some pub crawling Irish or English fella.
+1
+1
You know this country is messed up when you see a bulldozer on the roof of a 10 storey building demolishing it bit by bit…
My wife and I were driving down the street next to this site while they were demolishing it. All of a sudden, I see a concrete pillar fall down right onto the street in the right most lane, and I was planning on driving there. Thank goodness no one was in the right lane when it collapsed. My wife and I were both shocked that it happened and we couldn’t believe such bad safety measures are being taken.
And its horrible what happened to that Indian man. I would sue the company so hard and for every fil if anything like that happened to any of my family members.
This is the price we pay for the type of labor practices we have here in the Middle East (hire non-high school graduates from rural areas of third world countries, promise them high salary or good positions then give them hard labor jobs when they arrive with very little pay and only every couple of months they get pay, house up 10 workers in a 1 person bedroom, take their passport away, etc., and yeah this shit happens in Kuwait too)
+1
Planners of this mall are seriously ridiculous! If the abandoned parking lot is not in the original blueprint of the project and they plan to demolish it, why would they let it undemolished until the project is almost done? The most logical thing to do is to start from ground zero.