Posted on December 2, 2024
This year, a unique opportunity with the Corps of Engineers Engineer Research and Development Center and the U.S. Navy arose
The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Detroit District and Engineer Research and Development Center in partnership with the U.S. Navy removed over 25,000 cubic yards of material from Little Lake Harbor in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan this fall.
Little Lake Harbor, designated as a harbor of refuge, requires annual maintenance dredging. The harbor had severe shoaling and emergency dredging was completed in 2023.
This year, a unique opportunity with the Corps of Engineers Engineer Research and Development Center (ERDC) and the U.S. Navy arose.
“We were working with ERDC on redesigning the federal structures at Little Lake Harbor and ERDC was working with the Navy on experimental training,” said Soo Project Office, St. Marys River Section Chief Justin Proulx. “ERDC brought the two of us together to train the Navy on opening harbors and dredging the Detroit District’s shoaled in Little Lake Harbor.”
The St. Marys River Section (SMRS), coordinated equipment rentals, stagged and operated equipment to include an in-house floating plant and tug, and trained the Navy on the dredging and construction equipment.
“The Detroit and ERDC folks have been really nice to work with, they have been taking the time to train the Seabees to be more proficient at some of this equipment”, said U.S. Naval Mobil Construction Battalion 4 Chief Petty Officer Daniel Sullivan. “So, at the end of the day, it’s been great. It’s been win-win for all of us.”
Since the end of World War II, the Naval Construction Force has been focusing on mostly contingency construction supporting the Marine Expeditionary Force.
“We are really good at doing horizontal and vertical construction but looking ahead, the fleet needs waterfront support or port damage repairs in potential future operations to come,” said Sullivan. “The Naval Construction Force is looking at waterfront construction as a very high priority and all this experimental training that we are doing or opportunities like working with ERDC doing dredging is going to help speed along the capabilities that our higher headquarters needs from us.”
“We were working with the Navy on experimental dredging, they no longer had the knowledge set or the equipment,” said ERDC Research Physicist Thad Pratt. “We had a big need to train the Seabees and provide a new cost-effective way to dredge the smaller harbors within the Corps of Engineers. This project brought the two of them together. It is not very cost effective to mobilize a large dredging contractor to dredge a small harbor and remove less than 50,000 cubic yards of material. The Detroit District had most of the equipment needed to dredge the harbor. We researched and designed a six-inch pump with a rotating head in place of the bucket on their Crane Barge Harvey to complete most of the dredging. The project was a big success.”
Little Lake Harbor still requires annual maintenance dredging. Coastal Engineers with the Detroit District plan to survey and collect data from Little Lake Harbor to determine the effect of waves and how the federal structures in the harbor should be designed for shoaling impacts.
“We will set up an Integrated Radar Monitoring System (IRaMS) at the harbor,” said Coastal Engineer Jesse McNinch. “The system will be made up of a X-band radar and a solar-powered computer system connected to a cellular network that allows for remote data collection. The data will inform us how waves interact with the harbor structures during storm events and will be used to validate numerical wave model simulations.”
The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Detroit District, maintains a navigation system including 81 harbors and channels joining lakes Superior, Michigan, Huron, St. Clair and Erie.
The Detroit District provides vital public engineering services in peace and war to secure our Nation, protect the environment, energize our economy, and reduce risks from natural disasters.
