The much anticipated crane date has finally been set for Wednesday, March 19th between 7am and noon. Please tune in to see the cranes lift up the frame and roof that the we have been assembling for the last week and a half.
Rumor has it there may be a small gathering of people Wednesday morning to watch. If you are unable to be with us in person, please tune in and watch on the blog.
Point Pleasant - Live Job Site Camera
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It's 9:00am. Having fun from my "perch" at work in Folsom watching the progress today. Wish I was THERE!
It was great to watch right from the church lawn. It's amazing to see how quickly everything moves along.
From your on-the-spot reporter:
The crane arrived at 6:58am, and immediately started setting up. The first roof section was lifted in one huge piece and bolted in place on the northeastern end. This took about 40 minutes. The crane moved to the south a bit and proceeded to hook up the second piece that was placed on the southeast end of the building. All this time, there was a crowd of over 30 people from the congregation standing on Schmidt Lane, watching, drinking coffee and enjoying the doughnuts David and Ginger so graciously brought out. We were all like little kids, talking excitedly, oohing and aahing, we experienced history being built. The second section was bolted down and the crane moved to the western side of the building at 9am. The third and fourth roof sections were also assembled on the ground but were complete with layers of webbing to hold the insulation in, the insulation, green corrugated metal roof material and a large dormer on each section. Those dormers were the "pretty silver metal doll-house looking things" I saw being assembled last week. (Sure wish I knew they were dormers then, would have used a lot fewer key strokes!)The last roof section has just been lifted into place, and the bolts are being put in right now. To bolt the sections together, 3 men in two different man-lifts go up to the roofline and insert very long bolts between the roof and the frame. They moved from one support to the next on each side of the roof until the roof was stable. It's a little hard to picture, but the roof looks like it would have 6 total sections to it. But instead, it has the four outside sections and the inside sections are beams being placed between the east and west sections, since the supports are already in place. Lifts are being used to raise the remaining beams into place, and men are walking along the roof bolting them into place. There's a rope running along the edge of the roof that the men hang onto as they walk up and down the roofline. There were lots of cameras and video cameras taking footage today, even the Jobsite Superintendent, Chad, was snapping shots of one of the dormered roof sections getting raised into place. Such excitement! (I sure hope Rusty has access to a laptop in his hospital room so he can watch.) Just like clockwork, the crane was unhooked from the 4th roof section before noon.
Chad mentioned that crews will be by my house tomorrow morning at 7am to relocate the "relocatable classrooms". They'll be put on their foundations tomorrow! This is huge news, they were scheduled to be moved sometime in April! I have a feeling we'll have a crowd here tomorrow morning, too, to watch as a crane lifts the four portables into place.
My thanks to the Building Committee for their dedication, Applegate-Johnston for their safe thoroughness, and I especially praise God for the ability to witness the construction of this project. Like I said before, this is history in the making. I was standing in the road and looked from the Buscher House to the multi-purpose building...what a difference a hundred years makes.
Here's a portable update. They're going to be brought over to the Buscher Campus around noon tomorrow. If you were planning on coming out to see them set on the foundations, now you can sleep in until 11 or so!
Have a great Easter at Point Pleasant UMC!
Thanks for the extra effort, John, and everyone else working on our project. It was a glorious Easter gift to see the frame work and portables in place. We appreciate all of you.
And WHOO-HOO to Rusty for being unable to stay away from us for too long. Chad stopped by to say that Rusty was onsite, getting back into his work. AMAZING! One word of advice though, Rusty, don't push the healing process too hard, we want you well and healthy.
Looking out my window at work, I've seen people working on our project every day since the project began. Antonio and I took a "getaway" trip (my final 50th BD celebration) to the Peppermill in Reno this past Monday and Tuesday. The Peppermill is just finishing up a multi-year expansion and renovation project that we've been checking out several times a year on our visits. The final phase is the outdoor grille, a huge steakhouse complete with outside waterfall, spa and two pools.
So what did I do on my vacation? I stood on the other side of the plate glass windows, about 5 feet from the action, overlooking the building project!!! I watched a GINORMOUS crane lift giant metal beams to the top of the building being erected, I watched a man in one of the motorized lifts, moving up and down, in and out, moving the machine near the edge of the pool hole then back again...I never saw him do any work though. I watched one man with a garden hose, spray a little water here, then walk around, talking with other guys standing around, and spray a little water over there...and then he handed the hose off to another guy while he climbed into a small trencher and started jerkily moving the trencher back and forth over the same area. THEN, the entire group took turns in a tiny Bobcat moving what seemed to be the same mound of dirt back and forth!!! Antonio and I spent a great deal of time watching from one hallway, then another, we went up a few floors to see the action from yet another perspective, all the time watching for some productive work from this crew. Others were welding and loading the crane, but the majority were like little kids playing in a sand box.
I realized at that time how truly fortunate PPUMC is to have the caring, diligent general contractor that we have. Our project is on time, (if not early)and I have yet to see a guy walking around talking to his buddies while spraying a hose around. Thank you Applegate-Johnston for your honest, can-do work ethic. Everyone I've seen has been polite and hard-working. Now that I've seen what we could have had, I appreciate you even more!
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