Caught on camera; The tearing down of a chemical site to make way for the Riverside stadium...

Byline: By SAM BEATTIE

PLANS for a gleaming new football stadium sounded the death knell to Sonny Alder's working life back in 1994.

But it was just the beginning of the grandfather-of-four's amazing project that captured one of the biggest changes Middlesbrough has ever seen.

Using the camcorder his wife Margaret got him for their silver wedding anniversary, Sonny filmed his old workplace, chemical site Tees Storage, being torn down to make way for Boro FC's new riverside home.

And although he had no way of knowing it at the time, he preserved the dying days of one of Teesside's most industrial areas - and its rebirth for the 21st Century.

"I was disappointed when they said they were going to build a stadium because I knew I was going to lose my job," said the 72-year-old who worked as a weighbridge operator.

"It was very industrial. I couldn't visualise how it could be a football stadium."

Since the mid-1960s, 60-or-so soaring tanks, used to store hazardous chemicals, had stood on and around what is now Boro's pitch.

A few were painstakingly lifted whole and floated up the Tees to another storage site at Seal Sands. The rest were simply ripped down.

Other heavy-duty structures and a huge scrapyard were also scattered around the plot, as Sonny's never-before-seen video shows.

Footage shot while sailing along the Tees captures the old dock in its final throes as a working port, with ships moored and others passing through the old Middlehaven swing bridge.

"They were quite a sight to see coming past," recalled Sonny as he skipped through the two-plus hours of footage in the front room of his Acklam terrace.

He worked on the site for 11 years before being made redundant in 1994, which was the year it was sold for redevelopment.

"As the job was slowing down there was less traffic coming in and out and I was able to take my camera down and record the storage tanks being dismantled," he said.

"There's one shot where this tank comes down and it's just like tissue paper. It's absolutely amazing.

"They actually found a couple of Second World War bombs on the site when they were dismantling all these tanks.

"With me working shifts I had the opportunity of doing all this. I don't think anyone in Middlesbrough has got anything like this."

But Sonny did not hit the stop button when his former workplace bit the dust.

He carried on and documented a new giant taking shape with the creation of the landmark Riverside Stadium.

"When they were building the new stadium, the lad over the road worked for a fabrication company and he said 'bring your camera down at night time and we'll get the foreman to get you a tin hat and you can go round the site'," he remembered.

With the birth of the new came the inevitable death of the old and the club's historic ground, Ayresome Park was bulldozed, which the dad-of-two also recorded.

And Sonny, who held a season ticket for the first two or three years at the new stadium, has more footage that would make your average Boro fan greener than the Riverside's pitch.

He filmed the club's flamboyant welcome to Brazilian boy-wonder Juninho in December 1995.

And he caught legendary former Boro player and England captain George Hardwick's 80th birthday celebration held in one of the stadium's banqueting suites.

He went to the event, which featured a speech by Brian Clough, as a member of Teesside Veteran Footballers group.

Both Clough and Hardwick died four years later.

So does Sonny resent the building that cost him his job and brought an end to years of Ayresome Park tradition? Not in the least.

"I decided to call it a day and I never worked since," he said. "I got finished there in 1994 when I was 58 and we've never seen so much of the world, me and the wife.

"She bought me a video camera for our silver wedding in 1992. I've videoed all the holidays since.

"I think it's absolutely fantastic, the new stadium."

CAPTION(S):

GET READY: A workman slicing down one of the chemical tanks with gas torch, above; GOING, GOING, GONE: The fall of the chemical tank in stages, below, captured on camera by for former Tees Storage weighbridge operator Sonny Alder; BEHIND THE LENS: Sonny Alder with his video camera at the Riverside Stadium, above Picture PETER BENN; A WORK IN PROGRESS: Pictured from top is the stadium at different stages of construction