Local painting company shortens runway at O'Hare

ADAMS CENTER — A local road and runway painting company shortened one of the busiest runways in the world last week in just eight hours.

Hi-Lite Markings Inc. removed the paint and repainted the central 10-28 runway at Chicago's O'Hare International Airport. The job, which shortened the runway by 4,000 feet, was done in one night shift.

"Honestly, I don't think there is another striper in the country that can perform this job with the specifications they have put on this job and the time frame," Richard Calvin McNeely III, Hi-Lite vice president, said in a statement. "We have the most experience, the best equipment and the best team."

O'Hare is well-known as one of the busiest airports in the world. But passengers also face many delays from unpredictable weather and a bad layout. All but one of the seven runways at the 7,300-acre airport intersect, limiting the number of planes that can land at once.

O'Hare airport is undergoing a $6.6 billion modernization project, including reconfiguring the runways to limit intersections. Walsh Construction, Chicago, is responsible for the two-year, $140 million contract for the new runway configuration.

About 24 employees, mostly from Jefferson County, used specialized equipment to shorten the central 10-28 runway from 13,000 feet to 9,000 feet. The job involved paint removal and application of new paint.

"It required a big commitment of manpower and equipment to make sure it got done in the time period for the FAA requirements," Walsh Construction's project manager, Dan Siede, said in a statement. "Hi-Lite was selected for their ability to perform this job."

Hi-Lite developed its own equipment — machines that blast water or steel pellets to remove paint. Hydro Blasters use pressurized water at 40,000 pounds per square inch. Blastrac 4800 Shot Blasters use small steel pellets, which are then picked up by a magnet and reused.

For the O'Hare job, Hi-Lite used two Shot Blasters and four Hydro Blasters, followed by three vacuum recovery sweepers to pick up paint chips and debris, and two paint trucks for repainting.

Pilots look for countdown numbers on the runway and lights along the runway to see how much space they have left during landing. All of the distance markings had to be blasted off and repainted with the new numbers as part of the runway shortening.

"It was a joint effort," said Brian P. Becker, director of sales and marketing at Hi-Lite. "We did the paint and pavement removal and an electrical company was changing the lights."

He said Hi-Lite will be involved in three more runway jobs in this phase of the O'Hare project.

Hi-Lite also has offices in Buda, Texas, Columbia, S.C., and Kingston, Ontario. While it completes some road contracts in New York and Ontario, 70 percent to 80 percent of the company's contracts are on airport runways.

"Most of our employees from Jefferson County are working at these airports all around the country and the world," Mr. Becker said.