Date:  Friday, January 16, 2009

Contact: Jeff Adamson, North Central Region Communications Manager, Wenatchee, (509) 667-2815, (509) 669-8778 Cell. E-mail: adamsoj@wsdot.wa.gov
Mike Andreini, Project Engineer (509)667-2860 andreim@wsdot.wa.gov

WENATCHEE – The Washington State Department of Transportation reopened Blewett pass at 6 p.m. Friday, January 16th. US 97 between I-90 and US 2 has been closed since washouts and mudslides at four locations closed the highway ten days ago.

“These repairs are temporary,” said Acting Region Administrator Dan Sarles, “Drivers may find some shoulder closures and speed restrictions at times in the coming weeks as repair work continues. It’s going to be next spring before permanent repairs of all the damage can be completed. We didn’t want to subject drivers to flaggers and lane closures in winter conditions, so we didn’t reopen until driving lane repairs were adequate to hold us until spring.” As the roadway reopened, there were no travel restrictions on the bare and wet pavement.

Last Wednesday, an overflowing Peshastin Creek, three miles from the Big Y junction with US 2, washed away 225-feet of the northbound US 97 lane. Five miles further south where Ruby Creek joins Peshastin Creek, the flood scoured out a 40 foot hole around a 12-foot pipe arch, 35 feet below the roadway, undermining 20 feet of pavement. Near the Bonanza Creek Campground, another five miles further south, is where a 200-foot-wide by 6-foot-high slide of mud, rocks and trees came down, crushing culverts and washing out shoulders and nearly a thousand-feet of the northbound roadbed. 14 miles south of the summit near Liberty, Swauk Creek created a new channel under the snow, alongside 600 feet of the highway, washing out the shoulder and exposing buried utilities including a critical cross-state fiber optic cable.

“Our Wenatchee contractor, Pipkin Construction, worked around the clock and threw every resource they could find into the repairs,” said Project Engineer Andreini. “They blasted rock from their own quarry when our DOT rip rap stockpile was exhausted, then got a subcontractor to fire up an asphalt plant so we have pavement instead of gravel. They’ve been better than great!”

Photos of the damage and repair work are posted on the WSDOT flickr web page: www.flickr.com/photos/wsdot/sets/72157612297436920/

The repairs are being paid for under a disaster emergency maintenance contract. The costs are not yet determined, but are expected to be reimbursed under the Federal Emergency declaration for the December and January storms.

Tomorrow, Pipkin crews will begin emergency repair work on US 2, 12 miles west of Leavenworth where almost a mile and a half of shoulder was washed out between milepost 88.5 and 89.8. For the next several days, crews will work daily from 7:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. There are three lanes through the upper half mile, so while the outside westbound lane will be closed, two way traffic will be maintained. Single lane alternating flagger controlled traffic will be necessary when crews are repairing the lower section. The contractor will be working at night, hauling and stockpiling rock near the project site, with no traffic impact.

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