Repairs needed on Eagle Harbor cap

Published 1:00 pm Thursday, September 1, 2016

Ferries coming into Eagle Harbor have been damaging the protective cap in Eagle Harbor that was put in place to shield the creosote-contaminated sea floor between the site of the old wood treatment plant and the Bainbridge ferry terminal.

Bainbridge City Manager Doug Schulze said he met with the manager from the Environmental Protection Agency in charge of the Wyckoff-Eagle Harbor Superfund site on Tuesday and was told the sand cap, which was installed in 1993 and 1994, had been damaged.

“They’ve been monitoring the cap in Eagle Harbor, and found that near the ferry dock, the propellers of the ferry are scouring the cap,” Schulze said.

The repair work on the cap will start in November and wrap up sometime in February, he said.

“They’re not exactly sure how they are going to do that yet, because the ferries will still run on schedule,” Schulze said of the EPA’s repair plans.

EPA officials have earlier noted that maintenance work on the eroding cap would be needed to be done late this year, and estimated repairs would cover about nine acres of the cap. The existing cap is a thick layer of sand that covers about 70 acres of sediments on the harbor bottom that was contaminated with pollution by the old wood treatment plant.

Other work at the Wyckoff site later this year will including installing new electrical infrastructure to the site and the monitoring wells there, as well as the removal of invasive plants such as Scotch broom.

The electrical work will involve trenching, but Schulze said noise from the work isn’t expected to be an issue.