Delaware School District Breaks World Record for Tallest LEGO Tower Ever Constructed
Wilmington, Delaware (PRWEB) August 20, 2013 -- Hundreds of community members attended "TowerFest" at John Dickinson High School Monday evening to watch as District Superintendent Merv Daugherty placed the final piece on a tower constructed of LEGO bricks and entered into the Guinness World Book of Records.
An official from Guinness declared the tower at 112 feet, 11 and 3/4 inches high, breaking the record of 106 feet, 7 inches, held by Prague in the Czech Republic.
The five-story tower was made up of more than 500,000 LEGO pieces, weighing in at about 1 ton. The temporary structure was based on student ideas but fortified by local architects and engineers, who donated their time to the district.
With the help of a crane, Superintendent Merv Daugherty placed the final piece, a little red schoolhouse that is the district's logo, onto the top of the tower just before 7 p.m.
Students have been building sections at the district’s 32 schools for several months and have attended numerous “Build Days” with their families throughout the summer to continue construction.
Sections include school names, mascots and characters. Other sections display names of local corporations and families, whose donations are paying for the bricks. With the help of engineers from Pennoni Associates and construction experts from Whiting Turner, Red Clay has designed a tower that will take an estimated 15 hours to build, and another 15 hours to take apart.
The tower has been both a community project and learning experience for students, said Ted Ammann, the assistant superintendent in charge of the project.
Pati Nash, Red Clay Consolidated School District, http://www.redclay.k12.de.us, 302-552-3716, [email protected]
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