It was amazing to see the giant jig the contractor made so that all the anchor bolts were positioned in exactly the right spots. 18-inch holes were drilled into the bedrock and then 6 foot anchor bolts were inserted and epoxied in. Rebar cages were also drilled and epoxied into the bedrock before forms were constructed around them. Then, the concrete was mixed on-site and poured. Almost 80 bags of a special concrete mix were used, and an independent testing company was on hand to test the concrete and the placement of all the bolts and rebar. Additional testing will be done at 7 days on samples of that concrete, and, after that, we’ll need approval from the town code enforcement officer to start the assembly process.
We recently learned that our tower is the only fire tower in the United States that had been removed, stored for years, and then reassembled in the exact same spot, saving a piece of local history.
We are hoping construction will be complete and the tower will be open to the public by the end of October. It has been 7 years since that first conversation with Tom Clark and with the DEP, but we are excited that, soon, a new fire tower will stand in the Catskills, right in our backyard.
