Faces of the Diversion: Tyler Cole

Tyler Cole: [00:00:13] I’m Tyler Cole, work for Ames Construction, I’m a pile driving foreman. I grew up in Anoka, Minnesota, about three and a half hours east of here. Graduated in 2010, wanted to get into construction so got in with my dad where he works at in the cities. Then we decided I should probably try to do something different, so we decided to go to commercial diving school. Me and a couple buddies left and did that in Seattle for a year, came back and I’ve been with Ames ever since.

[00:00:43] I’ve been with Ames for 10 years, this will be year number 10, and I’ve only worked for Ames. Basically we do foundation work. We drive steel in the ground and it supports the structure. So my crane operator, he holds the D19 or D30 pile hammer and that’s what we use to put the steel in the ground, or we’ll have a vibratory hammer and that also shakes it into the ground instead of hammering it.

[00:01:11] It’s pretty crazy to think that we’re building something… the vertical river, like I’ve never heard of that before. I guess when it needs to be used it’s going to be huge.

[00:01:21] The weather up here is wild. It can be March here will be sunny, but then next week it’ll be snowing. It’s happened before. It’s different up here that’s for sure. The weather’s crazy.

[00:01:34] I just want to see it done. It’s kind of cool to say you built something like… you’ve literally built America. I think that’s kind of cool.