Langley Air Force Base Hospital Honored with Project Award

LANGLEY, Va. Doctors and medical staff have recently moved into the renovated Langley Air Force Base hospital. The $62 million expansion project was named best project in a public sector building over $15 million by the Design Build Institute of America Southeast Region during a ceremony last month.

The expansion for the hospital increased the number of beds from 35 to 65. The hospital has the busiest urgent care center in the Air Force based on the number of visits per day. The medical complex provides inpatient and outpatient services, intensive care, emergency room services, a dental clinic and health support services. Roughly 1,000 health care professionals serve a patient population of more than 60,000 active duty members, dependents and retirees.

Over a two-year process, Atlanta-based Heery International provided a team of integrated architects, engineers, interior designers and construction managers to wrap up the expansion project. The 160,000-square-foot renovation reconfigured and modernized the USAF 1st Medical Group facilities to support new technologies and equipment. The majority of the renovations occurred in the main hospital building, but also included two other ancillary buildings on the base. The project also included the design and construction of a 3,492-square-foot veterinary clinic to serve the military working dogs as well as the pets of base personnel. This could mean a boost in the number of vet jobs at the facility, as more vets and nurses will be required to run the clinic.

Key elements of the project included modernizing the life safety and mechanical systems throughout the buildings while replacing and upgrading exterior items including brick faades, windows and roofing.

All the work was completed through a phasing plan that allowed all departments to remain fully operational throughout construction, without the use of modular or temporary buildings. Building systems from security to HVAC and IT, as well as patient and staff access were maintained throughout the project.

Several clinics relocated to the hospitals main building, including the flight medicine, mental health and public health clinics. Virginia Air National Guard medical personnel have moved from the nearby Aerospace Medicine building into the newly renovated area of the main hospital. The migration project provided modernized work centers for the clinics.
All the work was completed through a detailed phasing plan that allowed all departments to remain fully operational throughout construction, without the use of modular or temporary buildings. Building systems, such as security, HVAC and IT, as well as patient and staff access were maintained throughout the project.

The new addition is a three-story steel frame structure, and the exterior was constructed of brick veneer with cast stone details over metal studs. Constructions such as this will require careful planning in which details such as the steel channel sizes will be decided on. The existing building has been refaced with a brick veneer and new window frames. The project also included a renovation of the central utility plant. The renovation replaced a 167-ton chiller, steam boilers and associated equipment.

Langley has experienced a lot of growth over the past few years and now has specialty clinics that were not available in a military treatment facility on the Peninsula, U.S. Air Force Maj. Jeffrey Chaperon told The Peninsula Warrior. Military patients living west of the tunnels now have a convenient location to receive care for those services.