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77 °F Forecast | Road Cams Thursday, September 16, 2004 Today's News | Classifieds | Autos | Homes | Jobs | Tempo | Health | Community | Home Delivery SECTIONS Home Page Local News Sports Business Obituaries Life Opinion - Politics Tempo AP News Weather Classified Archives Site Map SPECIAL SECTIONS Since We Asked Outdoor Journal How To Guide Wellness Connection Readers' Choice Real Estate Showcase Joy Magazine Homelife Magazine Wedding Guide Rogue Valley's Finest EXTRA Newspaper in Education Personals Movie Times TV Times E The People MARKETPLACE Find a Car Find a Home Find a Job Classifieds Place an ad eSouthernOregon Automotive Communities Entertainment Publications Recreation Calendar CUSTOMER SERVICE Frequent Questions Advertising Information Home Delivery Employment Contact Us Media Kit Network Affiliate Oregon Road Conditions & Cams Email Story to a Friend August 22, 2004 Ironworkers begin dismantling the large crane that has aided in construction of Rogue Valley Medical Center�s new bed tower since January. A second, larger crane, at right, was brought in Saturday for the job. Mail Tribune / Roy Musitelli Heat, height, hornets fail to faze workers RVMC addition goes up — and up — with aid of an experienced crew By GREG STILES Mail Tribune Behind a row of fir trees, locked gates and cluster of portable offices, Rogue Valley Medical Center’s future looms above southeast Medford. Way up there, underneath the wispy clouds floating through a smoke-filled sky, are a half-dozen high-wire performers who happen to carry union cards from Ironworkers Local 86 out of Seattle. The only thing missing Saturday morning as the massive tower crane is broken apart are bleachers full of spectators and popcorn vendors. Strutting their stuff nearly 170 feet above the crushed rock and dust piles in the heart of the campus, the itinerant artists dismantle the 246-foot horizontal jib. Scampering over the 50-foot- plus sections like spiders over a web, ironworkers remove 5-inch steel pegs with sledge hammers, rig cables through strategic locations, then hook them onto a second crane. The so-called stick crane gently lowers the mustard-colored section back to earth for a trip up Interstate 5. Axis Crane LLC of Clackamas arrived in town and assembled its crane Friday. The new crane is far less flashy than Morrow Crane Co.’s apparatus that has hovered above the RVMC campus for eight months. But it serves a more pedestrian role. Advertisement As his crew rattles around the machinery overhead and others await on terra firma, superintendent Randy Glaze of Owen Glaze Crane & Hoist Services Inc. says one character trait stands out — aggressiveness. "We want guys who are aggressive," Glaze says. "We want guys up there who are experienced tower climbers. The one thing we don’t want is laziness, or people who drop things." The crane was installed in January and construction of a six-story addition to the hospital began in March. The 1,600 tons of structural steel comprising the crane were planted in what will become a basement food court. The 24 primary support columns were milled in England and shipped to Portland for fabrication. Every column foot weighs 500 pounds, every four feet a ton, and each 23-plus-foot section 11,800 pounds. From beginning to end, the ironworkers experienced extremes — icy steel to summer heat, punctuated by 100-degree toasters. "I think they’d rather work in the heat than with frozen metal," says Glaze, who previously worked on the 390-foot-high Snohomish County Jail north of Seattle. Weather hasn’t been the only scourge the 225 construction workers have endured. Yellow jackets have been ever present, says Steve Sheahan, a project engineer with DPR Construction Inc., general contractor for the $100 million, three-year expansion. "They’ve been buzzing around the crane and at the top of the bed tower," Sheahan says. "There have been a lot of stings and when you’re working up there, that’s not the place you want to get stung." DPR’s senior project manager Bill Maibusch confesses he had no interest in scaling the heights Saturday, but he is in good spirits as the erector-set portion of the expansion nears completion. "This is clearly the most challenging hospital project I’ve worked on, just because of logistic phasing, sequence and working with clients to maintain operations," Maibusch said. The new bed tower stands in the middle of what was a parking lot north of the emergency room. For that reason, the contractor completed last November a four-story parking garage and new heliport, the first of six expansion phases. Mail Tribune Home Local News | Sports | Business | Obituaries | Life Opinion - Politics | AP News | Archives | Site Map E Southern Oregon | Classified Copyright © 1997-2004 Mail Tribune. 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