Miracle prevents fatalities at collapsed Ilford City Gates church construction site

 The potentially unstable crane deemed serious hazard!

 Fire engines and other rescue services on standby to save potential casualties.

 The mangled infrastructure illustrates the lucky escape.

 Rescue teams awaiting directions- limited information from thermal imaging delayed active response.

The residual infrastructure looks ready for another cave in.

It's a miracle that no-one was seriously hurt!

A five storey church infrastructure build collapsed at 16:30pm today, and miraculously killed no-one.  Around 20 construction workers were still on site and yet none of them suffered major injury.

Firemen and other rescue crew where unable to scour the site for any casualties due to the perceived danger of the site.  Around 30 fire, police and ambulance vehicles still waited along Clements Road, and Winston Way, seeking the go-ahead for a survey of the wrecked construct at around 7pm.

The reason for the collapse has not yet been established but this near miss posed a real threat to local people. Police and fire crew worked together in partnership setting up a safety cordon of around 500m diameter around the site, concerned that the large lifting crane could be unstable.

The building site belongs to City Gates Church a large charismatic Christian group, who intend to build a 5 storey complex, including a large 1000 seater auditorium to serve their larger than normal congregation.   Other rooms would include various meeting rooms and community projects.  The construction project was headed up by Ashe Construction.

Images from the scene of the collapse indicate how close, workers and the public, were to a potentialy fatal incident.

Thick steel girders have been twisted and bent out shape, the concrete floors have been deemed to dangerous for inspection- even obscuring any tangible thermal observation via helicopter.  Fortunately an Evening Standard reporter informed Wilson, that by 8pm it had been established that no serious harm had befallen anyone.  A passing women is said to have exhibited serious symptoms of shock.  Wilson Chowdhry said;

"Being a Christian I am compelled to believe that God had a hand in preventing any loss of life, simply because with the complete collapse of the structure, at a normal operational time, a more inimical catastrophe should have occurred."  


Read an update here:


http://www.ilfordrecorder.co.uk/news/news/ilford_city_gates_building_collapse_19_year_old_s_lucky_escape_from_parked_car_1_1194324

New years resolution to promote peace almost terminated due to poor weather

 The Redbridge Carnival Mascots and other visitors joined the peace gathering at our peace monument

 Later in the evening a second trip to the monument allowed us to clean the plaques for images.

Hard rainfall that lasted for over 4 hours (from 14:30 -19:00) on New Years Day, almost cancelled our new year mission to bring peace to the borough.   Although many visitors could not make it on a later  minutes silence scheduled for 19:30 those who turned up heard words of hope provided by Father Ackroyd, from Vine United reform church - read out by Wilson Chowdhry.  A minutes silence for all victims of violent crime in the borough created a sombre very sobering atmosphere.  The silence was pierced by the dulcid tones of a bugler playing reveille at the completion of the memorial.  

Our painting competition for mosaic designs to is now open and we will be launching it through local papers, our local media and via local schools, groups and colleges.  

If you would like more information of the painting competition please do make contact.

Borough-wide Peace Art Competition!

Parents of Kashif Mahmood RIP and Wilson Chowdhry during construction of monument!

The EIBP has launched a boroughwide art competition that will see young peoples art designs incorporated into the Redbridge Peace Monument - installed to commemorate victims of knife crime and to highlight the futility of knife crime.

The competition  has been launched on BBC Asia Network, Premier Christian Radio, Sunrise Radio, Ilford Recorder and Yellow Advertiser. 

We will also provide a large trophy to every school participating,  that we hope will be used for internal annual art competitions on a similar theme. 

Judging the competition will be undertaken by Mayor of Ilford Cllr Cummins, Ann Oakes-Odger MBE (Knifecrimes.org), Parvin Mahmood (mother of slain teenager Kashif Mahmood) and Gray Drostle (monument Designer).

If you as an individual, group or school would like to participate please contact us for the rules and regulations and template for the design.

Further details and images of our monument can be found here:

(Click here)

(Click here)


Wilson Chowdhry said;

"The EIBP wanted to lead by example and promote peace in the borough by opening the year with a resolution to see through this challenge.  We hope that our art competition will inspire young people to think about the world around them and how to make it a better place."