Awakeri School

Astro Turf

2008

The teachers played the BOT and PTA at hockey on 21 July 2008, to sort of open the new turf. Here's Kerry Looney trying to get the better of Mr Fitz.	The teachers have the yellow sticks. Vicky Coulter shows off her hockey skills for the BOT. Fiona and Jasmine were the refs.
Here is the sand being spread along the turf by the hopper (also know as a spreader)	And here is the hopper being filled up with fresh sand

At last the Astro Turf is being finished. The ground is ready, the metal and sand under the turf is all compacted and level. Here's the turf being laid, on June 19....

The men are hard at work rolling out the 'soon to be' Astro turf. I hope they are good at jigsaw puzzles!	Lots of the junior rooms come to watch as it was being laid. Everyone is excited about it and everyone is looking forward to using it!

2007

Click here for a link to the data and excel spread sheet on our progress of sinking the astro turf. We update it twice a week.

Our school has been saving for about 5 years now for a new astro turf.
We have finally raised enough money to build it. The turf will have room for 2 netball courts and 2 tennis courts. It will hopefully be completed by February or March 2008, which is sad for all of the year 8's that don't have a chance to play on it because they are leaving! We should have a day that only year 8's can play on the turf next year when it's all completed.
If you are now thinking why is there so much dirt for just an astro turf, don't worry! I was pondering about that too but only until I got chosen to measure the drop of the dirt I found out why: the constructors are trying to sink the pumice underneath the dirt. Because we are on the Rangitaiki plains, the dirt about 2m under ground is just mush for about 5m. If they just put the astro turf on the ground, it will sink quite a way down, crack and buckle. So they are trying to sink the pumice first by putting extra dirt on top to sink it faster and that's where I come in. Sam Schuler, Zara Fowell, Shaun Musgrave and I (Kelsi Parker) have been chosen to measure the height of the astro turf with a Theolodite every Tuesday and Friday. We are going to keep on measuring it until the holidays, hopefully it will drop.

Here are some photos of the measurers.

Sam, Zara, Kelsi and Mr Fitz getting the measurement for the benchmark.	Shaun and Sam with the measuring pole, measuring stake number 8.