Week 10 – Pontiac – Clay Kurkechian

The average commute to work this morning took an unexpected turn! As I exited I-75 at Great Lakes Crossing, I noticed a helicopter hovering over the mall parking lot. As I was driving by, I saw the helicopter lift an air handling unit on to the top of the mall buildings. I figured this was a more than reasonable excuse to be late to work, so I pulled off into the parking lot and watched the helicopter make many lifts over the course of 20 minutes. It looks like they were replacing the old AHU’s with new ones. I took some pictures that you’ll see below.

It was amazing to actually see this happen in person. The timeliness of the lifts was super impressive. I timed it out, the helicopter made the lift, placed the AHU on the building and came back with the old one in about 5 minutes.  The skill needed to maneuver the helicopter with a load dangling below and place it with the precision that they do is unmatched. A couple years ago, Ideal hired out a company to do something similar here in Pontiac. The helicopter came all the way from Oregon to place a couple of cooling towers on GPS building C. There aren’t many companies out there that perform these types of tasks, so sometimes you have to do some searching to find the right fit for the project. Altogether, this was the highlight of my week so far!
Below are some of the pictures from the heli lift that we did in Pontiac a while ago.