It seems the Seatle Big Digger "Big Bertha" has been hung up on an 8" monitoring well pipe installed in 2002. That would have been geo-located in New Jersey and I do not know how many other states. Even a hand held GPS would have shown it close enough to the tunnel route to be a concern.
Though not strictly required in PA, every monitoring well I locate has been geo-located since I also use GPS for vertical datum.
Paul in PA
On the radio they said that STP had been provided materials detailing the well.
Although they have not updated since the obstruction has been identified I have been following the project here:
http://www.tunneltalk.com/Seattle-Alaskan-Way-10Dec2013-Obstruction-prompts-TBM-shutdown.php
The referenced articles go into more depth but can be a little boring.
Seems like that 50' cutting head should cut through that 8" pipe like a samurai sword through a watermelon. Wonder if there was evidence of the well on the surface?
> The referenced articles go into more depth but can be a little boring.
So to speak... 🙂
I think maybe they needed to dig into the records a little deeper.
but those records are quite boreing
While research sometimes requires tenacity, it can be quite rewarding when you see the light at the end of the tunnel.
for heavens sake just frack that thing!!!
They Knew bore site on line, but assumed.....
that the steel casing had as normally is case been removed when bore became redundant.
RADU
I drove the Seattle/Elliot Bay waterfront viaduct for many years. It was always an exciting and very scenic bit of city travel in the Emerald City. I am not sure if the tunnel project was actually the answer to the earthquake damage to the viaduct, which could have probably been shored up and re-constructed to withstand many more years of use. It was certainly a unique stretch of inner city highway. I am now (once again) a "dry-side" Washingtonian, and of course we here in Eastern WA are wondering why our tax dollars should pay for the tunnel project, which was fraught with peril to begin with and has apparently now turned into the fiasco that we knew it would be. The Tunnel project was a political grandstand move by some wet-side politicians. I hope it works out for them but prospects look dim at this point.
You bring up some good points, hopefully a journalist with come up with some muck to throw on this project.