LAWTON \u2013 Dirtwork in preparation for construction of buildings at the Firehawk Aerospace site in northwest Lawton is complete and the project remains \u201con schedule,\u201d the Lawton Economic Development Authority was informed Thursday.<\/p>\n
More than 130,000 cubic yards of earth were excavated, moved, then limed and watered to stabilize the dirt on the 320-acre site directly north of the Goodyear tire manufacturing plant, according to Larry Adair, construction executive for Ryan Herring Construction on the Firehawk job.<\/p>\n
More than 15,000 linear feet of pipe \u2013 approximately three miles \u2013 will be installed for water lines and fire suppression, he added. Drainage is being installed, and construction has started on the first of 16 structures that the company says will \u201cserve a variety of functions.\u201d Some of those buildings will have walls 3 feet thick, Adair said.<\/p>\n
LEDA awarded the first contract on the Firehawk complex \u2013 for demolition, sitework and storm drainage \u2013 on April 16.<\/p>\n
The second contract, awarded in May, included site utility infrastructure and associated work, such as water and sanitary sewer lines, storm sewer, fire line and fire hydrants, natural gas systems, septic systems, utility connections, excavation, backfill, compaction, and related site utility improvements, records show.<\/p>\n
LEDA awarded 10 more contracts July 23. Those included building pad earthwork and concrete; structural steel, a pre-engineered metal building, general trades, roofing and pre-finished panels, flooring, framing, insulation and Sheetrock, fire protection, plumbing, electrical and data communication.<\/p>\n
Three other bid packages \u2013 for painting, specialty flooring, and HVAC \u2013 will be awarded later by Firehawk.<\/p>\n
To date, LEDA has paid $4.87 million on three construction invoices, Executive Director Richard Rogalski said.<\/p>\n
The dozen contracts LEDA awarded, along with $2.4 million in \u201cgeneral conditions\u201d and fees, consumed $21.3 million of the $22 million grant LEDA received from the Oklahoma Development Finance Authority for the Firehawk project.<\/p>\n
That leaves a balance of $668,776. However, \u201cI held back $500,000\u201d for reserves and \u201ccertain legal expenses,\u201d Rogalski said. \u201cWe can always put it back into the Firehawk project later, if we need to,\u201d he told Southwest Ledger.<\/p>\n
The \u201cbottom line\u201d is that LEDA has $168,776 in unspent, unencumbered funds from the $22 million ODFA grant. \u201cThat\u2019s what\u2019s left on the table,\u201d Rogalski told the LEDA board July 23. From now on, Firehawk will shoulder the costs, he reminded the board.<\/p>\n
The Firehawk complex is being built on 320 acres of undeveloped land that was owned by the Comanche County Industrial Authority and is situated between 112th Street and Goodyear Boulevard, north of the railroad tracks. The site is north of what would be Gore Boulevard if the street extended farther west.<\/p>\n
Adair said the land previously was owned by the late Marvin Bicket, a graduate of Oklahoma A&M (now Oklahoma State University) who began teaching agriculture at Indiahoma, established the Vocational Agriculture Department for Lawton Public Schools, and spent 37 years in education before retiring in 1980.<\/p>\n
Firehawk Aerospace manufactures solid rocket motors. \u201cIt makes sense for us to be in this neighborhood, because Fort Sill is the training base for the missile systems that Firehawk is developing design concepts for,\u201d George Liddell, Firehawk\u2019s senior director of operations, told City Council.<\/p>\n
The Addison, Texas-based company announced it intends to invest $45 million to build a state-of-the-art manufacturing facility in Lawton. And that\u2019s on top of the $22 million ODFA grant.<\/p>\n
Besides Adair, Stephanie Bolton is Ryan Herring Construction\u2019s project manager on the Firehawk project, Levi Griggs is the project superintendent, and Molly Frye is the project coordinator.<\/p>\n
___<\/p>\n
Mike W. Ray is a fifthgeneration, award-winning journalist who has more than 55 years\u2019 experience covering municipal, county, state and federal government in Oklahoma and Texas. He can be reached at mike.ray@swoknews.com.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"LAWTON \u2013 Dirtwork in preparation for construction of buildings at the Firehawk Aerospace site in northwest Lawton is…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":417689,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[15],"tags":[160,162,161],"class_list":["post-417688","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-plano","tag-plano","tag-plano-headlines","tag-plano-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/417688","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=417688"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/417688\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/417689"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=417688"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=417688"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=417688"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}