USA: Wilmington Harbor Annual Dredging Kicks Off

The Wilmington Harbor Annual Dredging Program on the Christina River in Delaware started August 3, 2015 and will last until September 20, 2015.

Involved in this dredging project will be the dredge ESSEX along with support equipment, including tender boats DUKE, NORFOLK, and PUSHER 10.

All mariners are requested to stay clear of the dredger, booster, floating pipe, pontoon pipes, submerged pipelines, barges, derricks and operation wires around the dredger.

Operators of vessels of all types should be aware that the dredger and floating pipelines are held in place by cables, attached to anchors, some distance away from the equipment.

Buoys are attached to the anchors so that the anchors may be moved as the dredger advances and the location of the submerged pipelines are marked by buoys on either side of the channel.

USA: DNREC Announces Plans To Dredge Little River

DNREC’s Divisions of Watershed Stewardship and Fish & Wildlife announced plans for a cooperative dredging project on the Little River near Dover, from the Route 9/Bayside Drive bridge in Little Creek east into the Delaware Bay.

Dredging is scheduled to begin in the second week of August. Southwind Construction of Evansville, Ind., was awarded the contract for the project.

The channel is approximately 12,400 feet long and will be dredged to widths of 40 feet in the river portion and 60 feet in the Delaware Bay portion, and to a depth of 5 feet at average low tide. The Little River was last dredged by the state in 1981-1982.

The $1.01 million state-funded project includes dredging 79,000 cubic yards of material from the channel, and the removal of 30 derelict pilings and a derelict vessel from the waterway near Little Creek.

Project completion is anticipated by Oct. 1, before peak waterfowl season.

 

New Suez Canal Ready For Operation

New Suez Canal is completed ahead of time and ready to receive its first ships on August 6.

Mohab Mameesh, chairman of the Suez Canal Authority said, “We have finished work on time and even before the specified time… We call on all the international maritime carriers to use the current and the new Suez canal. Your navigation is safe.”

The new canal is connected to the existing canal by four small channels. The canal will reduce navigation times for the vessels from 22 hours to 11 hours, which means that the New Suez Canal will be the fastest waterway in the world.

The existing canal earns Egypt $5 billion a year and the new canal, which will allow for two-way traffic of larger ships, will boost revenue to $15 billion by 2023. If the hub projects are also fully realized then Egypt could earn an extra $100 billion a year.

 

USA: Dredging for the New Tappan Zee Bridge Restarts Next Month

Posted 7/30/2015

Dredging of the Hudson River for the new Tappan Zee Bridge will resume next month near Westchester.

The dredging project, costing $3.9 billion, will remove nearly 200,000 cubic yards of sand and silt south of the existing bridge to create a flotation channel for the largest crane on the bridge replacement project beginning on or about Aug. 6 and end no later than Oct. 31. Once the construction started, the work will last 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

Aimed at protecting environment and avoiding the main season for spawning and fish migration, specifically for endangered Atlantic and shortnose sturgeon in the river, the U.S. Coast Guard warned boaters that two dredgers, barges and a plant will be working near Westchester. Meanwhile, water quality monitoring, using closed clam-shell dredge buckets and having federally-approved sturgeon observers on site around the clock will strengthen.

All of the dredged material will be solidified, stabilized and disposed of at various sites in New Jersey.

The first of the new two spans is scheduled to open to traffic in December 2016, with the second following the next year.

Photo: Nrbelex

USA: Army Corps Approves To Dredge Cos Cob Harbor

Posted 7/29/2015

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has approved to the dredging of the clogged Mianus River and Cos Cob Harbor and the work to clear the harbor and river will commence in October of next year.

The channel has not been dredged since 1985 and is only two to three feet deep in parts at low tide.

60,000 cubic yards of clay and silt will be dredged up and loaded onto scows. The barges will dump the silt about six miles away to the west off Noroton in Long Island Sound.

The expected time frame for the dredging of the Mianus will be from October 2016 through January of the following year.

A contractor for the work has not yet been selected.

The Army Corps will accept comments and input on the dredging scheme through August 23.

USACE Proposes Maintenance Dredging of the Mianus River Federal Navigation Project

Posted 7/28/2015

Aerial view of Mianus River The Mianus River originates in southeastern New York, flowing southerly for about 20 miles before emptying into Cos Cob Harbor in Greenwich, CT. Photo taken Oct. 1967

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, New England District is proposing maintenance dredging of the Mianus River Federal Navigation Project in Greenwich, Conn.

The project consists of a 6-foot channel, 100 feet wide, running from Cos Cob Harbor up the Mianus River to a point about 400 feet downstream of the Boston Post Road Bridge, then, 75 feet wide to the bridge.

The proposed work consists of the maintenance dredging of about 60,000 cubic yards of primarily fine-grain clay and silt in order to return the Federal project to its authorized dimensions.

“The upper portion of the channel has shoaled into depths as shallow as – 4 feet Mean Lower Low Water across the entire width of the channel,” said Project Manager Jack Karalius, of the Corps’ New England District, Programs and Project Management Division in Concord, Mass. “The shoals are hindering navigational access and compromising vessel safety.”

The work will be performed by a private contractor, using a mechanical dredge and scows, under contract to the government. The dredge will remove the material from the bottom of the river and place it in scows which will be towed by tug to the Western Long Island Sound Disposal Site, about 6 miles away, where the material will be released.

Dredging is anticipated to take approximately 2 – 4 months between Oct. 1 and Jan. 31 of the year or years in which funding becomes available.

The town of Greenwich has requested maintenance dredging of the Federal navigation project. The river and harbor are used predominantly by recreational boats, and also several commercial fishing boats.

The last time the Mianus River was maintained was in 1985 when approximately 53,000 cubic yards of sediment was dredged and placed at the Western Long Island Disposal Site.

Source: Corps proposes maintenance dredging of Mianus River Federal navigation project in Greenwich