Olympic Park tower now in Zaun's orbit
A string of projects at home and abroad are keeping a Wolverhampton-based fencing company busy. Zaun, one of the region's big winners of work during the London 2012 Olympics with orders for its securit
y fencing, has now helped with the re-opening to the public of one of the event;s iconic symbols.
The flagship looping red steel tubular sculpture alongside the main Olympic Stadium, known as the ArcelorMittal Orbit, reopened to the public last month along with the south half of Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park.
The striking steel structure became a perfect symbol of the brilliance and originality of the London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games – and now visitors who book to make the ascent up the 114m tower will be rewarded with breath-taking views over the park, the city of London and 20 miles beyond.
The ArcelorMittal Orbit was created by sculptor Sir Anish Kapoor and designer Cecil Balmond and uses 2000 tonnes of steel, more than half of it recycled.
The idea was spawned from a chance conversation between London Mayor Boris Johnson and Lakshmi Mittal of steel giant ArcelorMittal: the Mayor mused about creating a landmark to commemorate the London Games and Mr Mittal immediately came on board and agreed to provide the steel.
The crowds are channelled by fencing, fittingly designed from steel mesh, manufactured and installed by Zaun, which provided the majority of the temporary high-security fencing for the London 2012 Games – including the perimeter of both the Olympic Stadium and the main park.
Zaun has provided 2km of 2.4m high fencing around the tower itself, a further 400m of 1.2m fencing around The Podium houses ticket shop, event space, café and toilets, with access provided through canopied pedestrian turnstiles, two sliding vehicular gates and a 40mm thick steel panel specially requested by main contractor Skanska.
South Park is the last piece in the jigsaw of the two-year transformation of the 560-acre Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park to open to the public.
Earlier this year Zaun clad the facade of the 1,200-space Olympic media complex car park, as part of the conversion of the Press and Broadcast Centre to prepare for iCITY, a digital hub comprising new tenants Loughborough University, data centre provider Infinity, Hackney Community College and BT Sport, who now broadcast 38 Barclays Premier League live games a season.
Meanwhile the company has won its first two pilot projects, worth almost £1.5 million, with Oman's premier oil company. Zaun is supplying the perimeter security for two prestigious booster stations in Oman for Petroleum Development Oman (PDO), the foremost exploration and production company in the Sultanate. It accounts for more than 70% of the country's crude oil production and nearly all of its natural gas supply.
Zaun is supplying almost 9km of HiSec 358 fencing and a large number of PAS 68 crash rated entry and exit gates, which will fill 24 40-foot containers, of which half have already left Zaun's UK manufacturing base.
Zaun said its premier British-made fencing, embedded operations in the region and superior customer service won it the pilot projects.
The fencing and gates will be integrated with razor wire, PIDs and CCTV to form inner and outer cordons around the Hubara oil booster station in the south of Oman and its sister Nahada booster station in the north, about 400km from Muscat towards the Saudi border.
The purpose of the booster stations is to pressurise the crude oil in pipes buried under the Omani desert as it is fed from the fields into the main oil line for export.
Work is proceeding apace at the Nahada site though they have had to overcome on-site challenges, such as the formation of wadis when rivers spring up in flash floods in the desert and violent sand storms that can shred the coatings on the fence panels.
Jeremy Knight, head of Middle East operations for Zaun, said: 'Even though these are only pilot projects, they constitute a sizable contract for our Middle East operation. PDO is an extremely important and influential client for Zaun as they are well known in the region for setting the benchmark for the industry.'
Closer to home Zaun has been working with contractor PM Harris on a project with Cannock Chase Council to refurbish four full size courts and four junior tennis courts as part of a 2019 Hednesford Park masterplan since the council stopped charging for use of the courts as part of its health agenda.
Zaun manufactured, supplied and installed its Duo8 Advantage Tennis fencing and powder coated the gates.
