This Excavator Was Toppling An Old Smokestack When Suddenly The Unthinkable Happened

What do you do when your work puts you in a fix? Go by your instinct and trust your experience to pull you out of it. This is exactly what Tim Phifer did. His work of an excavator has made him take on a few odd projects that yielded quite a few odd results, but nothing as compared to what happened with the 158-foot smoke stacker. The smoke stacker was standing there for almost 115 years and it belongs to the Avondale Mills. This mill was among the chain of textile mills located in Alabama that ran successfully before closing the doors for good in 2006. Now when everything has been demolished, then there is no reason for leaving the smoke-stacker behind. Therefore, work began to demolish it and after two failed attempts, Phifer attempted explosives too. In order to get lucky for the third time, he tried something different. Everybody was curious to see what happens when the excavator takes on the huge smokestack so in no time a crowd gathered around the place. Phifer was operating the excavator and trying to bring it down, but nothing happened. Phifer kept on repeating the action until a crack appeared on the wall. Initially, it was at the bottom, but gradually the crack widened and reached quite a height. Phifer knew that in no time, the smokestack will come down any moment, so he stopped maneuvering and kept an eye on it. He soon realized that a blunder is going to happen, as the 158-foot smoke-stacker was coming crashing down. The smokestack was not falling in a safe direction; instead, it came charging down towards the excavator where Phifer was sitting. Luckily for him, he was sitting inside the excavator, so when the smoke stack crashed on the excavator, he remains unscathed. His daughter and other people present at the moment came rushing towards Phifer top know whether he was all right or not. Phifer was rescued with dust all over his face and some bruises on his body, but overall he wasn’t seriously injured. Reminiscing the incident Phifer says that when he saw the smoke stacker coming towards his excavator, then he decided that he would remain seated inside the excavator only. They are built in a way where it can survive these kinds of things. A drone was also placed to record the whole proceedings and while the incident was happening, the drone kept a close eye on Phifer to ensure his safety. After Phifer was rescued, the drone went back to check the place and it captured how close a call it was.