Bauer handles compaction on Panama's Ocean Reef island

Bauer Fundaciones Panamá is carrying out vibrocompaction work on the Ocean Reef artificial Island project in Panama City, Panama. The project involves the creation of two artificial islands -the first man-made islands in Latin America - which will accommodate 138 luxury apartments and a marina when complete. The islands will be linked to the mainland with two 160 m long bridges.

The first island is currently under construction and covers an area of 100,000 m². Bauer's subcontract involves carrying out vibrocompaction to an average depth of 15 m at some 12,800 points around the development. The timescale for this work is four months, and having started in June, Bauer expects to reach completion in June. During peaks of activity it is using four deep vibrators simultaneously.

Parent company Bauer Spezialtiefbau has prior experience in vibrocompaction work on an artificial islands, including on the Palm Jumeirah in Dubai, UAE which was officially opened in 2008. On that scheme, some 7 million m² of reclaimed sand was compacted by as many as 17 Bauer deep vibrators.