Watch out for that silt curtain anchor line on the Willamette

Last week, our cutterhead snagged a submerged poly line from a silt curtain that broke loose upstream, and it wrapped up tight enough to stall the swing motor. Has anyone else had a close call with debris from failed environmental controls?

3 comments

3 Comments

milesbailey10d ago

That silt curtain line is a real hazard, but the bigger problem is nobody tracks where these things fail. A curtain breaks upstream, the contractor might not even know, and that loose line becomes everyone else's problem downstream. There should be a way to report a lost curtain so other crews get a heads up. Right now it's just silent debris waiting to tangle in your gear.

-1

lopez.quinn10d ago

Add a public log to the permit system so when a curtain fails, @milesbailey, the report goes to everyone working that stretch of river. That turns a hidden problem into shared knowledge before it wrecks someone's prop. Right now we're all just guessing what's floating toward us.

reesel509d ago

Remember that sinkhole on Oak Street last year? City knew about the water main leak for weeks but the paving crew had no clue. They rolled in, ground gave way, truck nearly went in. It's the same thing. We build these little pockets of knowledge that don't talk to each other. My building super won't tell the trash company the compactor is busted, so the next guy just finds a mess. Info gets stuck in the wrong hands and the rest of us pay for it.