Runway Relevelled at Gimpo Airport

Aussie Uretek Team Re-levels South Korean Airport

The airport runway problem

Gimpo, the number two international airport in South Korea, had developed some low spots in the main runway and taxiway surfaces. These dished areas were quite shallow but were in danger of producing real problems because of the potential for ice patches to form, causing aircraft to skid.

The South Korean Uretek company was only recently established, so Uretek Australia was asked to provide a fully-experienced Operations team to direct the remedial work and teach the South Koreans the finer points of such an important and exacting project.

Led by Operations Manager, Russell Deller, the Australian crew brought their technical equipment and all the resin materials required to raise and re-level the sections of the runway and taxiways that had been ponding. This required great precision. (Previously traditional ‘mud-jacking’ had been trialled without success).

Exact levels were taken and the areas mapped and marked out. 16 mm diameter holes were drilled to beneath the slabs at the carefully calculated locations within each affected spot. Uretek multi-component structural resins were injected to expand under the slabs. The first injections filled voids and then soft substrate areas were compacted and strengthened.

With continuing injection, the dished areas started to rise a fraction of a millimetre at a time. The injections were carefully monitored by laser level and the process was continued until absolutely the exact levels were achieved, evenly across all the affected areas. 

Airport runway problem solved without interrupting any flight schedules

No flight schedules were interrupted during the several days of this operation, because one area was treated at a time and when required the Uretek crew could move their equipment out of the way quite easily in their fully self-contained mobile operations rigs. 

It was no problem to have planes run over the newly treated areas since the Uretek resins cure to almost full strength in less than a minute or two.

Also see Airport Slabs Relevelled

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