Walls come tumbling down Armed Forces Retirement Home demolition clears way for new facility construction Published Oct. 23, 2007 By Susan Griggs 81st Training Wing Public Affairs KEESLER AIR FORCE BASE, Miss. -- A big boom at 10 a.m. Oct. 25, marks the implosion of the 11-story Armed Forces Retirement Home in Gulfport, a casualty of Hurricane Katrina 26 months ago. The $7.5 million demolition job wipes the slate clean for construction of a new $188 million facility. Once work to clear the site of the main tower and surrounding buildings is finished in late January, construction of the new structure can begin. July 2010 is the target date for completion. Capt. Carmen Andrews, 81st Communications Squadron, sings the national anthem and a joint service color guard presents and retires the flag at the 9:30 a.m. demolition ceremony. Traffic on U.S. Highway 90 and its frontage road is halted from Cowan to Debuys road 15 minutes before the explosives are detonated. The public is invited to watch the implosion from along the fence on the south side of the property. The Gulfport center opened its doors 31 years ago as the U.S. Naval Home. As its mission broadened to embrace veterans from other services, the home was redesignated as the Armed Forces Retirement Home in 2001. More than 400 of the home's 600 residents were in the building as the first floor of the home, just north of the Mississippi Sound, was engulfed by Katrina's storm surge. The structure also provided refuge to a Weather Channel crew trapped by the rising waters. Days after the hurricane passed, the home was closed and residents evacuated. About 322 of the residents were transferred to Washington, D.C., where the only other AFRH is located, until a new structure can be built.