Big Bertha remains idle after hitting mystery object under city of Seattle

[Emily]

http://www.komonews.com/news/local/Bertha-is-stuck-thanks-to-mystery-object-235150841.html

Big Bertha remains idle after hitting mystery object

"Bertha," the massive tunnel boring machine, is expected to spend the next 14 months drilling a two-mile tunnel to replace the 60-year-old Alaskan Way Viaduct.
By Luke Duecy Published: Dec 9, 2013 at 4:21 PM PST Last Updated: Dec 10, 2013 at 7:06 AM PST
...
WSDOT says the trouble started Friday when Bertha's five-story tall cutter head felt some resistance, then stopped. WSDOT says engineers with Seattle Tunnel Partners, the company in charge of building the viaduct replacement tunnel, have been consulting with other experts to identify the obstruction - whether it's natural or manmade...

 

[Emily]

Re: Big Bertha remains idle after hitting mystery object under city of Seattle

http://seattletimes.com/html/localnews/2022593902_berthametalxml.html

Originally published January 3, 2014 at 9:37 PM | Page modified January 3, 2014 at 10:32 PM
Bertha?s nemesis: 119-foot steel pipe

Highway 99 contractors revealed Friday what?s been blocking Bertha, the giant tunnel machine: The obstruction is steel pipe, left buried by a state groundwater study in 2002.

By Mike Lindblom

Seattle Times transportation reporter

A fragment of steel pipe pokes between spokes of Bertha's cutting face, in this photo from Thursday's inspection. It's part of a 119-foot deep well, left in the soil after a 2002 groundwater test.

State officials revealed Friday that the mystery object blocking tunnel machine Bertha is a long steel pipe, left buried in 2002 by one of the Highway 99 project?s own research crews...

 

[Emily]

Re: Big Bertha remains idle after hitting mystery object under city of Seattle

http://www.kirotv.com/news/news/ground-sinking-unevenly-downtown-seattle/njNWj/

Updated: 6:33 a.m. Monday, Dec. 8, 2014 | Posted: 12:40 a.m. Monday, Dec. 8, 2014
Shifting ground near 'Bertha' settling unevenly
...
This weekend marked one year since the Bertha got stuck under Seattle. On Sunday, KIRO 7 learned the work to get it unstuck has created a new problem: it?s making the ground uneven.
...
Officials have also decided to stop pumping out groundwater, which has been part of the process of digging the pit...

 

[BestlaStormcrow]

Re: Big Bertha remains idle after hitting mystery object under city of Seattle

On Seattle news radio this morning they were calling the stuck tunnel project the world's biggest time capsule. What a mess!

 

[Emily]

Re: Big Bertha remains idle after hitting mystery object under city of Seattle

Maybe it's best they do just bury the old girl, BestlaStormcrow.

Bertha got stuck on the evening of Dec. 6, 2013. There was an unusual earthquake swarm in Dabob Bay that started that day, (though the nearby 3.5 actually hit Thursday just before midnight.

List Sun Dec 1, 2013 to Tue Dec 31, 2013 UTC

Map of those Dabob Bay area earthquakes

Dabob Bay associated with a?yahos stories

Saddle Mountain and Seattle fault may be kinematically linked.

Why we don't want to jostle that area.

 

[Emily]

http://www.king5.com/story/news/loc...ha-pit-catastrophic-failure-warning/21671747/

[h=1]WSDOT, city square off over Bertha pit 'catastrophic failure' report[/h]
Gary Chittim and Liza Javier, KING 5 News 8:18 p.m. PST January 12, 2015
SEATTLE -- Seattle and state leaders square off Monday over the stalled Seattle tunnel project and the discovery of an engineering report that had some alarming language. It said continuing to dig the pit to reach Bertha, the stuck tunnel boring machine, could result in a "catastrophic failure."...

http://www.bizjournals.com/seattle/news/2015/01/12/wsdot-calls-memo-warning-bertha-pit-could-be.html

[h=1]WSDOT calls memo warning Bertha pit could be 'catastrophic failure' a miscommunication[/h] Steve Wilhelm
Staff Writer- Puget Sound Business Journal Both sides said they were "disappointed" in the other. And while City Council members were pressing for more information, state officials said they needed to be more discriminating about who has access to draft materials...

 

[Emily]

Posted: 6:05 p.m. Thursday, Jan. 29, 2015


[h=1]Bertha contractors theorized tectonics contributed to ground settling[/h] By Graham Johnson
Contractors working to fix the tunnel machine Bertha floated the theory that tectonics somehow contributed to ground settling under Seattle.
In an early December letter to the Washington State Department of Transportation obtained by KIRO 7 through a records request, Seattle Tunnel Partners suggested "slide activity/tectonic event" as a possible cause...

http://www.kirotv.com/news/news/bertha-contractors-theorized-tectonics-contributed/njzdc/

Is Texas Brine in the tunnel digging business now? Yes, there was that unusual swarm in Dabob Bay the day Bertha got stuck and the faults could be kinematically linked, but I suspect that Bertha's activities set things in motion, rather than the other way around.