Shawn Goodsell, Director of Operations
Town of Oliver

There is one section of pipe that has shifted and pulled away from other pipe by 6”, one section that has collapsed by approximately 24” and some noticeable cracks and damages from the force of the landslide which reveal some of steel meshing in the pipe and crumbling.

Staff, our Engineering Consultant and a Geotechnical Engineer from Golder & Associates were on site Tuesday looking at the potential of this happening again, what needs to be done before we can do any work and when we could do any work. It sounds like there is always potential for rock to fall at this location because of freeze/thaw cycles and to be less hazardous, we need a period of time where the weather has to be over 0 Celsius with no rain. We are waiting for a brief report on this and he estimated as much as a 100 cubic meters of rock fell. We also are currently sourcing pipe to replace the broken section which could be between 20 to 30m. This isn’t easy to replace because of the size of the reinforced concrete pipe which is 1950mm (76+”) large and not standard. The last company we used in 1997 to make the pipe is getting back to us. We also need to source; a contractor to install pipe, rock scalers and still want to camera the siphon from the other end.

We have a short window before irrigation season starts in early April but weather will have to cooperate with us, getting all approvals/ go aheads and having the pipe made in time because it generally needs weeks of curing time. We will provide another update in the coming weeks because we are already working on a list of we need to get done.

I provided some pictures of the broken parts in the pipe, on top of the rock fall area with the Geotech and looking down at the lake where more rock as entered the lake.

Shawn Goodsell | Director of Operations
Town of Oliver

 

Info sent to Oliver Chronicle and Oliver Daily News based on inquiries made by both.