Hospital panels removed to stop 'risk of death'

About a third of the tower's external cladding panels have been removed

Damaged concrete cladding panels have been removed from an NHS hospital’s crumbling tower to stop them falling on people.

An investigation into the safety of Wycombe Hospital concluded that removing the panels would “eliminate the risk of injury or death”, said Buckinghamshire Healthcare NHS Trust.

The eight-storey 1960s structure, which has been covered in scaffolding and green netting for years, houses cardiac and intensive care units and operating theatres.

The trust said the tower would not be fit for use within the next five years and it had started removing services from the building, according to the Local Democracy Reporting Service.

It has asked Buckinghamshire Council to approve work on the tower in a new planning application, and has also requested £200m of funding from the government to construct a new purpose-built care centre for High Wycombe.

The building has a "critical maintenance" backlog of £80m and costs the Trust £2m a year in monitoring and repairs.

The trust said 114 of the tower’s 316 panels had been stripped off "as a precautionary measure for health and safety".

The remaining 202 panels are expected to remain on the tower, with some being refixed.

Wycombe Hospital has been covered in scaffolding and netting since 2022

The tower contains small, narrow wards, theatres on different floors and is poorly ventilated.

In its planning application, the trust said that a "significant number of defects" were discovered in many of the panels following inspections.

A planning report by consultancy firm ADAS noted the "exterior envelope" was in "very poor condition".

Ongoing issues include water leaking from failed guttering and blocked downpipes, which in some cases has "severely corroded" metal pins fixing the panels to the tower.

The report added that the concrete supporting the panels "was generally of very low strength".

A report concluded that in the long term the hospital tower should be demolished and redeveloped

The tower also contains several cracked columns, according to inspection documents produced by Simpson TWS.

The structural and civil engineering firm said cladding was removed so the building could be assessed and because "excessive movement" of panels had been detected.

The ACAS report also said: "In the long-term, it is proposed that the building will be demolished and redeveloped as part of the wider redevelopment of the hospital."