Ice Jam Buster To Be Given Job

Monday, January 14, 2008 04:25 PM

Prince George, B.C. - Opinion250 has learned that Eco Technologies of New Brunswick will begin work on removing the ice jam at the confluence of the Nechako and Fraser River.

Details remain sketchy as a news conference has been planned by the City of Prince George at which time Paul Laplante, the owner of the company, will lay out his plans for the clearing of the ice jam. In earlier conversation Laplante said that it would take about 4 days for his equipment to get here from New Brunswick to begin the operation.

It is known that he flew the ice jam today and came away confident he can do the job.

The whole idea of using Eco Technologies first surfaced after an Opinion250 reader, “heidi 1555" “placed a comment on our site suggesting this could be a way to break up the jam. It was then Jim Whyte of the Provincial Emergency Program who took up the chase and was able to have Laplante come to the city.

Laplante is expected to be here for about 10 days.

The City has just released information saying the time is right to now remove the ice from the Nechako "Now that river ice experts have determined there is sufficient open water on the Fraser to try to move ice from the Nechako river channel, it will be possible to safely use an amphibious excavating machine. The unseasonably warm temperatures of the past week have resulted in open water on the Fraser River, creating an opportunity that did not exist before to move ice out of the Nechako.

“The Emergency Operation Centre is pursuing short- and medium-term solutions to the ice jam problem,” said Derek Bates, EOC director. “Now that our ice expert has confirmed that the time is right for moving ice from the Nechako into open water on the Fraser, we can proceed with that short-term solution.”

The City has also indicated the full price of the 2.7km hot water pipe plan is $500 thousand. The Provincial Emergency Program is paying $400 thousand dollars of that total.

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Posted on Monday, January 14, 2008 04:25 PM in News by 250 News

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Comments

Posted by: owl on January 14 2008 4:36 PM

Now let's see how the City might recognize the source of the suggestion ...... "Citizen of the Year" if the machine does the trick? ....

:-)

Posted by: giterdun on January 14 2008 4:37 PM

WOW! ABOUT TIME, THIS IS GOOD NEWS. GO PAUL GO!

Posted by: Jayda on January 14 2008 4:57 PM

This is great news!! Way to go Heidi!

Posted by: bohemian on January 14 2008 5:02 PM

The most important office held at City Hall is not "Mayor" or "Councillor," but CITIZEN - heidi 1555 is a perfect example of that.

We need to change the culture at City Hall - one that serves the citizens, not fight them; one that listens, not ignores; one that brings community together, not divides it.

The City circled the wagons and hid from the Citizens for weeks; this appears to be their MO on a regular basis. With no productive way for the average resident to contribute to solving the problem, people found another venue - Opinion250 and letters to the editor at the newspapers.

Imagine if the citizens of Prince George could (and were encouraged to) contribute to their own community through City Hall?

The ice would have been cleared weeks ago, and we would have saved $millions.

Posted by: bohemian on January 14 2008 5:40 PM

"The unseasonably warm temperatures of the past week have resulted in open water on the Fraser River, creating an opportunity that did not exist before to move ice out of the Nechako."

Boy, is that a load of after-the-fact smelly spin.

Creating an opportunity that did not exist before? As far as the city knew (based on ice "experts") there was nothing that could be done except wait for Mother Nature to run her course. But now those same "experts" are confirming it's safe to do what they previously had no idea they could do. WTF?

Is this why they hired a PR person? To serve the community or to revise history and create spin?

Posted by: bohemian on January 14 2008 5:43 PM

look at post time of above 2 posts - same idea at nearly the same time. (I must of still been composing while qwaszxter was posting).

When the Citizens of Prince George start calling out the BS from City Hall on a regular basis, you know there are going to be changes in November!

Posted by: paladin on January 14 2008 5:55 PM

Way to go Heidi! Congrats and hope you are appreciated.

Posted by: ChrisAnnB on January 14 2008 5:57 PM

Yes, great job, Heidi! Gotta give Mr. Meisner credit too for getting Heidi's idea out there!

Posted by: owl on January 14 2008 6:02 PM

There was open water on the Fraser before. Anyone who was flying south and had a window seat would have seen that about mid December, when the ice jam first hit, there was open water about a couple of km downriver from the Fraser River Bridge.

Even at that time the machine could have been used .... remember, the examples on the net are 10+ km long.

Try this ..... was the machine waiting in the wings for the river to open up more? Was the operator flown up here to determine how much open water he required?

This is BS and they know it. They have their spin doctor and he is either not being allowed to tell the story or he is giving them bad advice.

Posted by: realitysetsin on January 14 2008 6:05 PM

Who cares if the press release is somewhat ambiguous to the source of the idea. Point is they listened.

Posted by: owl on January 14 2008 6:09 PM

qwaszxter ... you said you were surpirsed that the idea was not tossed aside.

I think they had not choice. While the province supposedly cannot tell the city what to do (which in an emgergency case such as this is not quite understood by mne) they can make it a bit "hot" for the city. That is what they did by flying the Amphibex people up here.

When the operator told them he cold do it, the City had no more choice in the matter. Law suits would have been flying for all sorts of damages if they had not accepted.

Posted by: heidi1555 on January 14 2008 6:10 PM

lol.... this is too funny! Thanks for the kind words and even if they take credit i'm still smiling :) 4 days for amphibex to get here sounds way better than maybe squeezing the pipe job into two weeks.
:)

Posted by: northman on January 14 2008 7:14 PM

Congrats Heidi and the voice of Opinion250.. Heidi should be getting some kind of recognition for resourcefullness and willingness to share it. Perhaps Mayor? Cheers!

Posted by: realitysetsin on January 14 2008 7:43 PM

Imagine the billboards, heidi1555 citizen of the year!?!?! Heh heh.

Did you just do a simple internet search to find the solution? Because that would be hilarious.

Posted by: REALIST on January 14 2008 7:46 PM

Yeah Heidi!! Glad to see that the intelligent posters here are heard despite the postings of some who don't seem to have any intelligence at all. Thanks Heidi! People like you make it worth while to add intelligent comment where it often seems the intricacies of intelligence are lost on the great unwashed. If this works, you get my vote for C.O.Y.! Heidi, your fifteen minutes have officially begun!!

Posted by: NMG on January 14 2008 7:53 PM

Hopefully it works!

Posted by: heidi1555 on January 14 2008 8:34 PM

Hopefully it works??? It better work now!!! lol.. If not we can give credit to the city after all for finding it ;) Just kidding.

realitysetsin this is how I found it (I have it written down :) )

Not sure when but I posted a comment about a smaller machine and owl made the excellent point that it was only good for clearing surface ice so I thought to myself there must be a bigger/better machine.
-google
-entered "ice breaker machines for rivers"
-was found on second google page
-saw "New ice-breaking machine set to bust jams" link so followed it
-in article it mentioned the amphibex AE-400
-googled "amphibex"
-scrolled and saw "The ecological solution for all your enviromental work" link so clicked on it
-brought me to ecotec site :)

Posted by: tinyapplecork on January 15 2008 12:12 AM

First I'd like to throw my vote in the ring for heidi as citizen of the year too! WTG!

Next: C'mon people, did u really expect commonsense from the politicians?? lol

Reports still suggest they're going ahead with the hot water idea. So much for proper river maintenance!

........now, I'm going to get a nomination form for heidi to elect her as citizen of the year....WHO'S SIGNING??

;)

Posted by: turbocat on January 15 2008 12:17 AM

Great idea you found Heidi....have you seriously considered running for say a council seat to get your feet wet before going for mayor in say a couple more terms?

If not, why not?

Posted by: thereasonableman on January 15 2008 4:25 AM

Pat on the back to Heidi, pat on the back to Jim. Let's get this problem beat and get those people back to work.

Pleased to see the way this idea was pursued.

Posted by: thereasonableman on January 15 2008 4:26 AM

I can't wait to see this machine at work. I hope they take Heidi for a ride in it !

Posted by: RUEZ on January 15 2008 5:50 AM

Is it possible to get our money back from the "ice experts" who told us we would just have to ride it out until spring?

Posted by: flood guy on January 15 2008 7:20 AM

Heidi - along with the rest of the gang, let me say thanks much for finding this machine and pushing the right buttons. I think the money that RUEZ is talking about should go to you, not back to the city.

I have studied the site you found as well as some others where the machine was used. Someone needs to consider that if he is successfull in opening the river, as I imagine he will be, then while the machine is still here, it cud be used for dreging.

Did the slightly warmer weather the last few days contribute to the problem ?

Posted by: heidi1555 on January 15 2008 7:29 AM

lol.....because i'm too honest turbocat ;) Politics drive me crazy and by the way I respect the people on this site so you all have to tell me who to vote for!!!! It's so hard to tell these days.
Once my youngest is in school I do hope to try and get a job in a spa as an esthetician. Still paying off student loans so mine as well use what I went to school for :) If those men/women want to take credit for amphibex then fine as long as they come to me once i'm working. I'll give them a good wax job ;)
Sorry haven't had my coffee yet :)

Posted by: YamaDooPolCat on January 15 2008 7:56 AM

I am still a little surprised that this fellows machine will work on the Fraser.

I'm an equipment operator and spent lots of time on ice. I've seen numerous cats and trucks that have went down through the ice and killed people.

Seems like this thing is a modified swamp crawler like they use in Florida swamps or a peat bog machine.

Remember that the murdering Fraser is always looking for it's next victim.

Posted by: Dozer on January 15 2008 8:11 AM

Seems to me that the wizards at city hall should be treated as ordinary business owners when they make serious mistakes. They pay for it out of thier own pockets.Me thinks if the idiots at city hall had to do this a few times things would be different.We pay these morons big money to manage our city affairs and they take no resposibilty at all.In private reality the least that would happen would be termination of thier jobs.We can and should get rid of the Mayor and his spinless councilors in the fall....DOZ

Posted by: realitysetsin on January 15 2008 2:52 PM

I think the Security guard from the CN Center should present Heidi with the key to the city!

Posted by: turbocat on January 15 2008 5:42 PM

Posted by: YamaDooPolCat on January 15 2008 7:56 AM
I am still a little surprised that this fellows machine will work on the Fraser.

I'm an equipment operator and spent lots of time on ice. I've seen numerous cats and trucks that have went down through the ice and killed people.

Seems like this thing is a modified swamp crawler like they use in Florida swamps or a peat bog machine.

Remember that the murdering Fraser is always looking for it's next victim.

I understand it acts like a boat and floats, has a propeller for propulsion etc....so its not just going to sink into the bottom and be swallowed up .

I plan to go down and watch it work some, i bet its cool to see.

Posted by: woodpecker on January 15 2008 10:05 PM

I believe we have to insist on two conditions before this machine goes in the water!!!!

1: It must be named HEIDI1555
2: A security guard must be hired
(wonder who)to protect it from
being screwed up by ALL the
POLITICIANS

Posted by: thereasonableman on January 16 2008 4:26 AM

"I am still a little surprised that this fellows machine will work on the Fraser."

That is what it was designed for...what are you thinking ?

This thing works in white water.

Take your cab heater off of "recycle" and get some fresh air.