implode

Just on the border of El Segundo and El Porto is a power plant whose neighboring smokestacks are the symbol of the neighborhood. They are dismantling part of the plant and preparing to build a new one in its place. This morning, they did an implosion of the remaining structure of the old plant. Even though I had only gotten about four hours sleep, I got up and wandered over to watch. I expected some earthquake-like experience anyway that would wake me up, so I might as well be up to watch instead of being woken up by something cool that I missed. Also adding to the suspense right beforehand was the conversation of the guys behind me about the town that exploded the dead whale that had washed ashore (if you haven't seen it, Google for the video.) I started to wonder if we shouldn't be so flippant about just standing there. Without any sort of warning or countdown, it suddenly fell. But it was a bit of a blip, not so much of a big boom. I guess that makes it successful, but certainly not so exciting.