OK, that was funny

[freckles_and_doubt]

Does anyone remember the Peter Sellars movie The Party, which features him as a sweet but gormless Indian bit-part actor? The opening sequence involves him noticing his sandal has come undone and hopping across to a convenient spot on which to rest his foot, which turns out to be the T-piece plunger handle for the explosives which are about to completely destroy a huge Middle Eastern palace as a giant explosive set-piece in the film. They have, of course, one shot at it. He sets it off early, before the cameras are ready, and destroys the shot. High-jinks ensue.

So, Cape Town has just taken down the twin cooling towers for the Athlone power station, which have been a functionless landmark for as long as I can remember this city. There was a huge buzz about this. Everyone was planning picnics and parties and swopping good spots from which to go and watch the explosion. Rhodes Memorial and the UCT campus are undoubtedly crawling with people even as I speak. The zero-hour was 12 noon today, and the EL and I, in a vaguely interested but not particularly energetic sort of fashion, climbed up on the roof of the dining room, from which we can see the towers through the framework of a half-built parking garage (despite it being black with people, in retrospect it would have been the perfect vantage point), to watch. There was antici... pation as noon rolled around, despite the merry CT addition of a short, sharp shower of rain.

At about five to twelve there was a sort of minor distant rumble, and the towers, which I happened to be looking at at the time, quietly vanished, to be replaced with a cloud of dust. The EL happened to be looking elsewhere at that moment and missed it completely. It was absolutely the greatest anticlimax ever in the history of premature explosions: I swear, all over the city people must be cursing a blue streak because they didn't have their cameras running at the psychological moment. This is Cape Town, dammit. We're supposed to run late, not early.

Everyone now seems to be trooping sheepishly home. And I can't help feeling that somewhere there's a hapless minor functionary of the municipal explosives type who pressed the big red button in a frenzy of excitement five minutes early, and who is now chained upside-down in the scorpion pit while annoyed explosions rubberneckers pelt him with things.

I would imagine it'll be all over YouTube shortly, in much better views than I achieved. And probably accompanied by startled cursing. (Early one here, very shaky cam but up close, and a more professional one here, blindsided by the premature start so you only see the second tower coming down).

Comments

Pff

[first-fallen.livejournal.com]

I suspect that's a cover-up for some inept official. Since the demolition took a whole 8 seconds to happen I really don't see what difference 4 minutes made. It only started actually raining about half an hour after the towers came down.

Re: Pff

[extemporanea.livejournal.com]

Um, not as such. It was raining, off and on, at our place from about half an hour before the demolition; squalls kept on moving through. I think you're right, there wasn't one for a bit after noon, but they're incredibly difficult to predict.

I love the elephant bit in the The Party for the gentle rebuke offered by the Sellars character for precisely the reasons you state. Elephants have more dignity than that.

Re: Pff

[wolverine-nun.livejournal.com]

When the engineering company engineering man came and gave a talk on campus the Thursday before, the following exchanges were heard (by me):
Q "What is the ideal weather for the demolition?"
A "The best weather would be a light drizzle as that would help settle the dust."
Q "Could you remind us of when the demolition will happen?"
A *leans in to micropone slightly dramatically* "12 sharp!"

I think there was a mess up and now everyone concerned is staunchly Sticking with the Story.