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Trench updates

Here is all the latest news on the trench updates:

•• Next work day is Tuesday 18 Sept. 3-5pm.  With not a huge amount of work we can finish this off in style.  We’ll need people to do very light work of tying faux barbs on the barbed wire (a bit messy work, but not heavy lifting at all) and we’ll pull up the duckboards on the floor and re lay them on 2×4 sleepers and tail them in place.  Should not take too long at all.

17 Sept. Trench Cams are live!

We now have tow trench cams monitoring the site that you can look at 24/7.  Point your browser to the Trench Cam page.

16 Sept. Small crew is getting it nearly done

We had a small crew of dedicated volunteers on Sunday to get things into the home stretch.  Even better, the heat held off until after 1pm when we wrapped up.

12 Sept. we are now 95% complete!

Another excellent day of work from about 15 students.  We’ll be getting a separate post together to acknowledge the hard work you all put in on the days of work.  So all in all about 3.5 hours of work today and we got it mostly all done!  The trench itself is fully sandbagged and parapeted, the speakers are in place for the audio installation, the barbed wire entanglement is mostly strung (still have to add the ‘barbs’), and the uphill safety fence (a far more aesthetic wooden one rather than the yellow tape) is in place.  Wow it looks great!  Amazing how fast this came together thanks to all the help.

Nearly finished state
Try attacking this!

More to come shorlty.

• Next work day is Wednesday 12 Sept. 2-5pm.  With a good turnout we can finish the sandbags on the front wall, get the barbed wire entanglement developed, and finish the parapet and it will be mostly ready to go.

8 Sept. Amazing work today!

With about a dozen volunteers throughout the day–THANK YOU!!–the trench is looking amazing.

The nearly finished west entrance
If only the trench designers in WWI had geotextile fabric!

 

The crew from day 1
The inside salient takes shape

 

The crew bringing bags down to line the firing step
The trench after a great day’s work

8 Sept. Local media coverage

Nice article in the Daily Mining Gazette today: “Modern technology used to dig a 100 year-old trench”

7 Sept. The Dig begins.

Great excitement today as the trench digging commences.  The backhoe arrived about 8:30 and by noon the trench was 2/3 done.  Looking great!  Come on out tomorrow at 10am to help sandbag it.

What’s behind that hoarding?
Trench work commenses

 

Geometrically designed
Inside the trench

Also, we got a bit of coverage at TV6 (“Digging begins on WWI trench, volunteers needed“) and TV10 (saw it, but not online). Thanks to them both for covering it.

A Marine at the Sandbags
A Marine at the Sandbags. Photo by Cpl. Michelle Reif (Marines photo 160420-M-DT430-003.JPG)

6 Sept. Volunteers needed Saturday 8 Sept. at 10am

The weather is going to be good and the trench should be dug on Friday, so at 10am Saturday, we would like anyone willing to move a couple sandbags in to place (OK, a LOT of sandbags) to come over to the site and we’ll get to work.  Eventually the floor of the trench will have wooden boards (known as ‘duck boards’ for some reason) put down as well, but that’s for another day.

Please wear appropriate clothing for heavy yard work, including closed-toe-shoes (for heaven’s sake, no flip-flops!)

5 Sept. The big dig begins

The contractor is goings to start work digging the trench at 8:30am on Friday 7 Sept.  Anyone is welcome to watch from a safe distance, though as it is a construction zone, we won’t need volunteers until Saturday.  The plan is for the contractor to dig the trench a bit wider than it will be in finalized dimension, but in full length.  Then we will stack the sandbags at an incline on the inside faces to make the walls stable and simulate a real firing trench.

Watch our progress at the Trench Cam page! (drat: not active until next week; see above for 17 Sept.)

10 Aug. Plans finalized and accepted.

the plan are finalized, and the football team has helped fill the sandbags that will stabilize the walls and lip of the trench.

25 June: Trench info panels installed!

25 June: Trench info panels installed.

Trench construction has begun!

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