Late last month, crews from Oregon City lifted 250,000 pounds of drilling equipment out of the Willamette River.
The device? A drill The Clock-A-Mole is being called by Clackamas County Water Environment Services.
The drill was used to bore a nine-foot-diameter, half-mile tunnel from the Tri-City Water Resource Recovery Facility in Oregon City to the Willamette, just north of the Abernethy Bridge on Interstate 205. In order to discharge treated wastewater into the river, the route will function as an outfall pipeline.
According to a press release sent by Clackamas County spokesperson Scott Anderson on Tuesday, crews lifted the drill out of the ocean on January 28 using a boat equipped with a big crane, capping a seven-month excavation.
According to officials, the current outfall pipe, which was constructed in 1984, is unable to filter water quickly enough during strong storms and will not be able to keep up with the county’s population growth. According to officials, the resource recovery facility cleans 10 million gallons of wastewater per day.
According to a statement from Clackamas County Commissioner Martha Schrader, without this kind of infrastructure, we can’t build so that people have a place to live or give homeowners the services they need.
As pipe segments were added along the way, the Clack-A-Mole drill—named by locals after a county survey—burrowed from the Oregon City plant out to the river. An educational film released by the county showed a cutting wheel tearing through rock and soil while a press pushed the drill and pipe sections forward.
Find out more about the drill’s operation.
According to Anderson, the renovation began in July and would ultimately cost the county more than $58 million. One of the final stages of the outfall project is the half-mile tunnel. It is a component of a broader county-wide effort to upgrade environmental and water treatment infrastructure.
Austin De Dios reports on programs, politics, and other topics in Multnomah County. You can reach him at @AustinDeDios, [email protected], or 503-319-9744.
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