Courtesy Photo | The runway restoration project at NATO Air Base Geilenkirchen, Germany, recently...... read more read more
By Leon Koolen
GEILENKIRCHEN, Germany - The E-3A Component members, dependents and visitors who occasionally observe the construction site activities on the runway probably noticed it was fairly quiet out there during the week of July 21, so we figured a small update might be useful.
As most of you probably know, the project is done in two week cycles: 11 days of construction work followed by three days of flying. These flying days are necessary to launch and recover aircraft in function of maintenance requirements. Construction phase 5 was completed July 21, which implies the project passed the half-way point in terms of number of construction phases (five out of nine), distance completed (1,900 meters out of 2,950 meters), time (two months out of four) and asphalt volume (more than 82,000 tons).
Obviously, no project manager would ever plan a project of this kind in this part of the world without a bad weather scenario, and that is exactly what was done here at GK. The heavy rain which hit the area during the week of July 7 made asphalt work impossible for several days. Since flying operations cannot be resumed until the section of the runway covered during that construction phase is completely ready, the flying activities after construction phase 5 were delayed until July 22. Construction phase 6 (scheduled for July 18-28) was “simply” cancelled and one construction phase will be added at the end of the project, as foreseen in the planning.
Due to the extended flying window caused by the cancellation of construction phase 6, Ops Wing and Log Wing generously offered the company one extra day for construction phase 7 which can start on July 31 instead of August 1.
In view of the operational importance of the project, two acceptance checks are conducted at the end of each construction phase: one on Friday morning to ensure that any adjustments required can still be timely completed by the company, and a final acceptance check on Monday to ensure everything is ready for safe aircraft operations. This “everything ready” is to be taken quite literally: obviously, the core construction work (runway, drainage system and shoulders) has to be completed, but the acceptance checks also include the runway lights, the navigational systems, the runway markings, the unpaved areas adjacent to the runway and the roads used by the emergency response vehicles.
During the acceptance check, the safety team also carefully checks for foreign objects which are collected and removed. By the time that is done, the special vehicles section is already busy with the runway sweepers. Last but not least, the entire team has a last coordination session during which the results of the acceptance check are shared, discussed if necessary and captured in a message which is sent out to all interested parties, to include Force Command and the FOBs/FOL.
If the weather permits, we can hopefully report by the end of August that the last 300 meters of runway to be restored are in sight with “only” 15,000 tons of asphalt remaining. According to the current planning, the runway markings will be in place by the end of September. However, that only completes the construction work on the actual runway. The work on the apron and taxiways are scheduled to continue until Fall 2015.
| Date Taken: | 07.30.2014 |
| Date Posted: | 07.30.2014 05:24 |
| Story ID: | 137694 |
| Location: | GEILENKIRCHEN, NW, DE |
| Web Views: | 78 |
| Downloads: | 0 |
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