Jason likes all the cool stuff sitting in the driveway! This is April 12, 2003. The tower has been sitting there for several months, but the excavator was just dropped off earlier in the day.

K2SMD begins digging while N2MM watches. Fortunately, all the ruts did go away! You can just see my back-door neighbor's house. Once the leaves come out, the house will be completely hidden. It had rained almost non-stop for several days before this due to a Nor'easter, so we had expected to hit water within a foot or two.

The sand pile begins to form. It'll get a lot bigger before we're done. Jason had a great time playing on it.

K2SMD carefully defines the edges of the hole before digging too deeply.

Shawn, K2SMD, has done this before. Not a single mistake was made, or at least not that I was aware of.

W2MC and Jason build the frame inside the garage.

Shawn uses the 8' measuring stick to see how close we are to finishing. Looks like another 2' must be removed!

N2MM scooping out the loose soil from the bottom. Our tower gurus wanted no loose soil in the bottom and no soil contacting the rebar cage one we lowered it in.

Southern New Jersey is really flat, and our area was under the ocean a few million years ago, so there is a lot of sand, and anything taller than a few feet qualifies as a mountain. This pile was known locally as Mount Medford.

The whole gang! N2MM, K2SMD (back to camera), W2MC, me (K2UT) and my friend Ron (not a ham).

You get some idea of how deep the hole is!

Someone had to hand-dig out the loose soil in the bottom, and N2MM volunteered. After filling a bucket, the excavator hauled it out, we dumped it, and the bucket went back in.

W2MC letting Jason get a good look at the hole. N2MM relaxes a minute in the back. Notice the size of the sand pile.

Ron wanted to play with the excavator! He did a lot of shoveling, so he earned it!

W2MC getting the cage vertical. You can see the C3S beam sitting off to the left just waiting for a tower to go on. Jason is playing in the sand.

N2MM and W2MC adjust the straps so that K2SMD can lower it using the excavator. The cage weighed several hundred pounds.

W2MC is getting ready to lower the rebar cage into the hole. You can see how massive this thing is!

The entire cage is in the hole and ready for the building inspector. The two L beams hold the cage off the bottom of the hole.