Surf Lakes Yeppoon Is Rising From The Ashes!

Do you remember last October, when we jumped the whole damn Pacific over a little wavepool rumor? 

Surf Lakes full-scale test site in Yeppoon, Australia was reportedly being filled with water for an investors-only reveal, but of course we weren’t gonna let that happen. So we boarded planes, trains, automobiles and made our way to the northern Queensland beach town, where we found a large, rusted, pressure pipe looming over the main highway. 

The plunger!

You probably know how things played out. Briefly:

Surf Lakes found out about our plan to raid their welcome party. We had a back-and-forth with upper management. They eventually let us in. The waves were small. They tried to make the waves bigger. The plunger broke. 

After the break occurred, Wayne Dart, media correspondent for Surf Lakes, told us, “It’s only a part. Parts can be replaced. What’s important is that we’ve shown our design works. We’ll be back soon enough.”

Rough estimates called for two months of reconstruction. Jump ahead nearly eight months, still no signs of life. Until today, when Surf Lakes sent the following message:

The buzz around Surf Lakes’ full-scale Research and Development facility in Yeppoon is building as the onsite engineers have completed the repairs and have now moved into preliminary testing. The repaired structure is much stronger than it was during Phase 1 testing, in October of 2018. On top of this, the team have been making many other improvements to allow for much more detailed monitoring of the machinery. This will enable the Surf Lakes crew to access information swiftly, relating to stress placed upon various components. It will also allow the team to better understand efficiencies.

In breaking news… earlier this week the tap was turned on, filling the lagoon partially, so initial systems testing can take place!

Dry commissioning has now begun and is due to be completed this weekend, after which the lagoon will be filled to the brim in preparation for full commissioning.

This is a major milestone for the team as we inch closer to Phase 2 surf testing.

Now the question becomes: can Surf Lakes solve their sequencing issue? If you recall from last October, the reason the plunger broke was related to the timing in which they raised and dropped the thousand-ton piece of machinery into the water. Essentially, if their timing isn’t exactly right (which it wasn’t), the machine will bash into a wall of rising water, thus causing severe damage to the equipment (which it did). 

We wish them all the best. Stay tubed.