Nightmarish ground conditions and a fast-tracked schedule are not stopping the design-build team for a 1.2-million-sq-ft airplane assembly plant in South Carolina from delivering the building in just 18 months and on budget. There was no time for a learning curve for the 1,037-ft x 616-ft Boeing Co. facility, which encloses the equivalent of 12 football fields, says the team.
“Speed was the [project's] overriding theme,” says Kenny Anderson, project executive for BE&K Building Group, Charlotte, N.C. “We signed a contract on Nov. 7, 2009, and within 10 days we were breaking ground.”