“Probably around May 27, they’ll start to demolish the stack itself,” Nestle said. “By the time students come back in the fall, the stack will be down.”

Nestle said workers will take apart the smokestack with jackhammers, starting at the top and pushing bricks out through the center of the structure. The bricks will be removed from inside the smokestack by a chute and taken away by dump trucks to be recycled.

Project manager Sean Hollister said although the demolition is straightforward, the height of the smokestack and ensuring that everything is done in a safe manner might present some difficulty for workers.

“Outside of that, taking down the stack is no different than any other demolition project,” Hollister said.

The 230-foot smokestack has been a part of the MSU skyline since 1948, when it was built as part of the Shaw Lane Power Plant. The historic “MSC” along the side stands for “Michigan State College,” the university’s name from 1925 to 1955, according to the school website. However, Nestle said the smokestack has not been operational since 1973 and has been deteriorating from weather abuse.

In February, the university announced the smokestack had become a safety hazard and a solution must be determined. The university then offered a one-month period where the public could provide input on plans for the smokestack’s future.

It was decided the smokestack should be dismantled, but an attempt should be made to preserve the white bricks that make up the lettered MSC. Nestle said there were no plans yet on what the university would do with the bricks, but he did say they would be used to commemorate the smokestack in the future.

Nestle said the final bid for the project will be $700,000, down from the initial estimated cost of $850,000, but it would cost an estimated $50,000 extra to salvage the bricks. He said workers would have to take extra precautions to save those bricks.

“Basically, they’ve got to tip those out carefully by hand,” Nestle said.

However, Nestle warned that existing cracks in the smokestack and inadvertent damage done to the bricks during removal would mean only about half of the bricks are salvageable.

Hollister shared Nestle’s concern.

“It’s an old brick and when we start touching it, it’s unpredictable what will happen,” he said.

The Shaw Lane Power Plant will not be included in the smokestack’s demolition, to the chagrin of history senior Andrew Custer.

“The building next to the smokestack is pretty ugly, but I think there is at least some historical significance in the stack,” Custer said.