The week a sandbar showed up and wrecked my production numbers

Last July on the Mississippi near Baton Rouge, I hit a nasty sandbar that wasn't on any of the survey maps. It was about 80 feet long and it clogged my cutterhead for 3 straight days before I could break through. I had to baby the swing speed and keep flushing the suction line every hour just to keep the dredge moving. Has anyone else dealt with a surprise sandbar that just appeared out of nowhere?

2 comments

2 Comments

dakota_king8019d ago

Got a sandbar story from a few years back on the Ohio River. Was moving along fine then my cutterhead just locked up solid. Turns out a whole pile of old car tires and concrete blocks had washed down from upstream and settled right where I was digging. Took me a day and a half just to get the cutterhead clear and another two days to work through that mess. Surprised me how fast that stuff can pile up and mess with production.

nancy92919d ago

Damn, that sounds like a nightmare. I can't even imagine dealing with old tires and concrete chunks buried in a riverbed. People just dump anything anywhere, huh? One day and a half just to clear the cutterhead, that's brutal. Honestly, it makes me appreciate how careful dredging crews have to be. You never know what's hiding underneath the surface until it's too late. Hope that spot finally cleared out for you after all that work.