Blue Mike

January 3rd, 2014 at 1:50 PM ^

It's really not that bad; at least not as bad as local TV wants you to believe.  A section of the suites along the right field side are gone, and the storage area below them.  It sounds like they are planning to open April 8 without hesitation.  As long as that section of the concourse is stable by then, I don't see what the problem would be.  It isn't like the field or even the stands are destroyed.  

WOOD TV has been running live feeds from their "traffic cam" for 3 hours while reporters repeat that they don't really know anything about anything.  How about we return to regularly scheduled programming already!

Blue Mike

January 3rd, 2014 at 3:28 PM ^

Not really, it just cracks me up how had "breaking news" for 4 hours that was just them repeating that they don't know anything, only to interject with the reporter's memories of the park, like the whole thing was destroyed, never to be rebuilt.  

I get that GR has a small-town attitude, but come on.  Report on it during the 12:00 news, then just think of all of the in-depth details they could come back with at 5:00!  Oh wait, that would take real jounalism...

LSAClassOf2000

January 3rd, 2014 at 2:47 PM ^

There was footage from an MDOT camera being posted all over Twitter which looked rather bad. Someone there also mentioned that there were employees in the stadium at the time but that everyone managed to get out safely thankfully. To possibly confirm what someone alluded to above, the statement which WOOD-TV apparently has does imply that Whitecaps management hopes to be ready for April 8th. 

Jayvandy23

January 3rd, 2014 at 2:48 PM ^

Just heard a press conference with the Whitecaps owner.  He said that 11 or 12 suites were damaged, but that they are going to do everything they can to rebuild by opening day.  They also have several events coming soon, and they plan on having them still. 

BlueCube

January 3rd, 2014 at 3:49 PM ^

was a MI brewers event. It sounded like a beer tasting event. It's held in the parking lot. The head of the organization said he would have to talk to the stadium ownership but they would still like to have it there. From the reports from the owners that have been mentioned, I would assume they will be happy to accomodate them. I believe the event was scheduled sometime early in February.

They also mentioned the Midwest League all star game is scheduled to be there in June. I'm sure they will do everything possible to finish by that date at the latest.

Blue Mike

January 3rd, 2014 at 3:31 PM ^

The biggest concern for them, I would guess, is that they get to host the Midwest League All-Star game on June 1.  Great timing for a fire.

As for the regular season, the founder said that pretty much all Class A ball players have had to deal with "interesting" clubhouse conditions at one point or another in the past 20 years, so that won't stop them from playing April 8.

I dumped the Dope

January 3rd, 2014 at 8:11 PM ^

In an unheated space typically a dry sprinkler system is used.  More or less its a force balance between water and air compressed in the dry side of the system.  The valve so to speak is located in a normal heated space.  My guess is their insurance costs will skyrocket (sadly) if they did something illogical like store propane tanks in a place where they had purposefully disabled the waterflow.  Dry systems are a pain as if there are any leaks...the air leaks out and it slowly goes wet and of course would freeze and burst in cold ambients.  If they need a facility engineer I'm available ;-)