ST HELENS, Wash — Washington State Department of Transportation crews hope to have debris from a May landslide that washed out a bridge and a 200-foot section of Highway 504 cleared by August.
Project Engineer Paul Mason called the slide, and its estimated 300,000 cubic tons of debris, "catastrophic."
“We estimate about 1,200 cubic yards every single minute, so that’s about 120 dump truck loads of material floated by every minute for a solid half-hour,” said Mason.
The state is working on plans to replace the bridge, but in the short term, a temporary one-lane detour around the washout is being created in a $500,000 project.
The road will be used to allow U.S. Forest Service employees access to the Johnston Ridge Observatory, as well as the dozen people who were forced to leave their cars at the observatory because of the May 14 incident.
Tim Uhler was one of the dozen people who had to be rescued by helicopter following the slide.
He feared he might not get his truck back until next year.
“Huge, huge, thank you,” said Uhler, “I understand the stuff takes time. And I think when we're done and we drive off with the car, we're going to be like, ‘You know what, that was actually a pretty fast turnaround.’”
The general public will not be allowed on the road until the observatory opens next spring.
Several other viewpoints along State Route 504 allow for views of the volcano. Following the slide, the U.S. Forest Service reopened the Coldwater Science and Learning Center to the public daily from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.