North Carolina Aquarium at Pine Knoll Shores
Director’s Update
September 13, 2004
Construction of the new Aquarium continues at a steady pace.
During the August monthly meeting of architects and contractors,
it was announced that the project was 20% complete.
The focus over the last several weeks has been the cast-in-place
concrete pours located around the project site. These include
tank walls, support columns, foundations and the like. The
largest of these is the Living Shipwreck ocean tank,
which, once completed, will contain 306,000 gallons of seawater
and be home to the Aquarium’s largest collection of
marine life. After the foundation and floor of this tank
were poured in July, the massive walls began to take shape.
Miles of epoxy-coated steel rebar were woven into a tight
mesh and surrounded by steel forms in preparation for another
large concrete pour. As the walls of the tank were formed
and poured, the impressive size and shape of the tank and
its three viewing windows became clear. Work will continue
on the tank over the next few months to prepare it for the
arrival of huge acrylic windows in January.
Other large concrete pours included the foundation
of the Queen Anne’s Revenge tank, the Smoky
Mountain Waterfall pool, and the concrete saltwater
recovery tanks. Elsewhere, long expanses of the building’s
perimeter foundation have been poured. These provide a true
sense of the overall size of the facility.
Electrical and mechanical contractors have been busy running
miles of electrical lines and fire-sprinkler lines throughout
the existing Aquarium facility. The new state-of-the-art
waste treatment plant is largely in place, consisting of
huge underground storage tanks, a processing equipment room,
and thousands of feet of plastic drip tubing laid throughout
an undeveloped portion of the maritime forest. The treatment
plant will efficiently process waste from the Aquarium’s
restroom and kitchen facilities, return up to 80% of the
used water to the toilets and urinals, and discharge the
remaining water into landscape plantings and surface drip
lines. The plant will serve as a model for private and public
facilities, and we anticipate offering educational tours
of its operation!
The Living Shipwreck ocean tank, which, once completed, will contain
306,000 gallons of seawater and be home to the Aquarium’s largest collection
of marine life.
the massive walls began to take shape
Truelove Fabrications, Inc. of Wilmington, N.C., is the contractor responsible
for building the fiberglass and concrete exhibit replicas for the new Aquarium.
These include scenes of rocky rivers and waterfalls, cypress swamps, oyster
rocks, and remnants of several shipwrecks—including the rusting hull
of the German U-boat 352. Construction of these components is well
under way, and scale models of each design have been produced. Most of the
replicas are meticulously molded of fiberglass resin and painted to look like
the real thing. Because live filter-feeding animals would not survive well
in a closed aquarium system, even attaching organisms, like barnacles, sponges
and corals, are made of fiberglass or rubber.
The Aquarium staff continues to operate from its off-site headquarters in
Atlantic Beach, where preparations are nearly complete on large holding tanks
for new specimens. Over the next 18 months, staff from all three Aquariums
will be busy fishing, diving, trapping, and otherwise collecting over 3,000
animals for display. Some will be acquired with the help of commercial fishermen,
some may come from sport divers, and others will be purchased from professional
collectors. Check back here for photos of some of the new specimens, and to
keep an eye on the progress at the new Aquarium.
