Marsden Matting
A sand sheet is a tool for recovering stuck vehicles and construction of runways of the airports segment or short street pieces. Sand sheets are also called Airborne plates or flooring sheets. Sand sheets are roughly perforated plates from sheet metal (steel, aluminum) or aramid fiber reinforced resin in lengths up to 3 meters.
Use in the vehicle recovery
Sand sheets are when driving in rough terrain, especially sands or muddy areas is an important tool to rid sunken vehicles back or to drive over obstacles. Also, as a base for jack - by distributing the force over a larger area - the sheets are used.
For vehicle recovery, the drive wheels are free dug in the desired direction and the individual sand sheets rammed as horizontal as possible under the wheels. Color coding or connecting to a cable on the vehicle will facilitate a successful recovery and locate a safe site to locate the thrown backwards sand sheets.
Use as floor mounting
These sheets have a tooth on the long sides, with which they can be connected to each other positively and non- positively. Thus they can be placed on a flat surface with sand, earth or similar. This can be harnessed within a short time a large area for the use of aircraft and heavy equipment without the tires sink or equal to the mud pit is formed. These sheets are about 3 m × 60 cm tall and 3 to 5 mm thick.
To new uses as a tool for vehicle recovery, the sheets are shortened to one to two meters and the lateral hooks removed.
History
Originally sand sheets were developed in 1941 in Marston in North Carolina, USA, near the Camp Mackall, construction of runways for military aircraft. They had at first no holes or corrugations. They were produced and used in large numbers during WW2 by the Americans.