Six months after a pair of barges crashed in the dam at the East Bank of the Columbus Lock & Dam, Corps of Engineers Operations Manager Rick Saucer has an idea of the extent of the damage down the one of the dam’s five massive gates.
“We had a structural engineer up from Mobile take a look at it last week,” Saucer said. “We got a pretty good look at it and it’s about what we thought it would be, maybe a little worse.”
On Dec. 26, a pair of barges — one loaded with soybeans, the other with salt, both owned by Tom Soya Grain Company — broke free from the Raymond D. Lucas Memorial Port in Clay County after heavy rains and came to rest against the Columbus dam at approximately 8 a.m. Two days later, the barge loaded with soybeans sank, sliding beneath the other barge.
Salvage crews removed the barges on Jan. 13, but Corps officials said an evaluation of the damage done to the gate where the barges crashed would not be done until May or June when the flow through Tombigbee River was at a seasonal low.
“Now that we have had a look, we’ll be coming up with a repair plan,” Saucer said. “Hopefully, we’ll have that plan in a few weeks and can proceed with whatever repairs are needed.”
Saucer said it is likely the massive gate — 60-feet wide and 26-feet tall — would have to be removed and set away for repairs.
“In the meantime, we’ve stop logs in place and the other four gates are not affected,” Saucer said. “This really shouldn’t have much of an impact at all on our operations out there.”
Stop logs are used as a temporary dam device, Saucer said.
He said he has no cost estimates at the present, but hopes the Corps will be reimbursed through the barge company’s insurance.
“We will certainly try to get our money back,” Saucer said. “But the focus right now is on putting a plan together and making the repairs.”
Slim Smith is a columnist and feature writer for The Dispatch. His email address is [email protected].
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