Week 2: Day 7

Site Visit to Four Villas

On Saturday morning, the two teams headed to the Four Villas in Dubai. It's a project contracted by DCC for Seddiqi & Sons. The two-story villas include an outdoor terrace, a swimming pool, and a perimeter wall. The building lies on a raft foundation and is supported by reinforced concrete columns and load-bearing block-work. The project has a duration of 10 months, and is set to be completed by November 2014.

Team 1 went earlier in the morning, followed by Team 2 a couple of hours later. We were briefed by Mr. Mazen Hallak about what procedures we'd be doing that day when creating the concrete roof slab. First, the teams performed a slump test to measure the workability of the concrete from the transit mixer. The concrete was supplied by Readymix Beton with C40/20. In addition, cube tests were prepared to gauge to strength of concrete after 7 and 28 days. Afterwards, each team was divided into groups that would rotate once we got to the roof: There was checking the reinforcements, concrete pouring, vibration, and troweling and leveling. Each person had a chance to do every task under supervision of the safety officers and site engineers.

Edgar and Mr. Hallak showing the slump test.

Sjaak pouring concrete.

Bushra performing the vibration procedure.

The team leveling the slab.

In the late morning, we returned to the office to study for our quiz. It was a stressful three hours as we anticipated the arrival of Mr. Yabroudi from his meeting so that we could take the quiz.

In the afternoon, the groups had basketball practice at Willington School. It was a lot of fun, and afterwards, Mr. Yabroudi took us out for a delicious meal at Operation Falafel by the beach.