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Flooding of the railway on the Somerset Levels


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Looking at the video they're blue 20ft shipping containers. The guy mentions the blue, and they don't look like wire cages.

 

 

When I saw on the local lunchtime news that the EA were to use containers filled with rocks and rubble ...(mmmm... an NR idea!) to stop the scouring of the river bank by the huge pumps and that they were filmed being filled with said rocks before being lifted into place. Surely, I thought, they would be too heavy to lift into place instead of filling them when in situ.

 

There would seem to be a level of incompetence at the EA. because, lo and behold, they have announced that they're buckling when being lifted and will have to be unloaded. :scratchhead:  :rolleyes_mini:

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There would seem to be a level of incompetence at the EA. because, lo and behold, they have announced that they're buckling when being lifted and will have to be unloaded. :scratchhead: :rolleyes_mini:

Are there any civil or mechanical engineers in charge there? The mind boggles. It's one of the first things they teach you when slinging crane loads. And it's something I remember from that certificate I got 37 years ago!

 

Just thought - they've taken the tops off the containers to get the rocks in - so reducing their mechanical strength.

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When I saw on the local lunchtime news that the EA were to use containers filled with rocks and rubble ...(mmmm... an NR idea!) to stop the scouring of the river bank by the huge pumps and that they were filmed being filled with said rocks before being lifted into place. Surely, I thought, they would be too heavy to lift into place instead of filling them when in situ.

 

There would seem to be a level of incompetence at the EA. because, lo and behold, they have announced that they're buckling when being lifted and will have to be unloaded. :scratchhead:  :rolleyes_mini:

They obviously missed the lesson on the Principle of Moments at school..

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Third item down. If it wasn't so serious it would be funny.

 

http://www.itv.com/news/westcountry/uk/

 

It beggars belief doesn't it John.

I get the impression they didn't read the writing on the end of the container - the bit about the maximum load!!  I also see that they were lifting without a spreader beam - right pack of idiots.   And yes it would be laughable if it wasn't so serious - it would also be laughable if they weren't funding their incompetence with public money.

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I would laugh if by a fluke they were full water tight containers full intact door seals and floated away lol

 

 

containers may all look alike but are designed for many purposes,

 

air tight, water tight, air/water tight, dry lined, wet lined and many many more specialized purposes

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I get the impression they didn't read the writing on the end of the container - the bit about the maximum load!!  I also see that they were lifting without a spreader beam - right pack of idiots.   And yes it would be laughable if it wasn't so serious - it would also be laughable if they weren't funding their incompetence with public money.

With the tops removed the max load in the container wouldn't have had much truth in it if you'd try to lift then by the corners. Removing the lid reduces the strength, so even if the max load had not been exceeded then the rigidity of the remaining body would be insufficient, spreader beam or no. You could possibly have compensated by choosing a different slinging position, but whatever we say is now immaterial because they've bent it.

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Totally agree with all of the above it really does make you wonder if the so called engineers have any common sense :banghead: I really do feel that's its time to get back to basis on the whole question of land / drainage management . I was employed to conduct track and drainage inspections in back in 2005 /6 and one of the lines that we surveyed was the main line from Bristol to Exeter and from what I remember the section across the levels is dependant on the water from the track formation draining into purpose built ditches and onward into the levels drainage system. Back then the ditches were in very poor condition and in most cases were virtually totally full of debris and standing water.

Prior to my railway career I was a farmer and one thing that I know from practical experience is that land needs to be managed and maintained. Good practise at the back end when the cows where wintered one of the first jobs was to cut the hedges and clear the farms ditches therefore allowing the field drainage systems to work as intended. I know that the current flooding is  very extreme in nature but years of land mismanagement has not helped and more than likely the situation we find ourselves in today has been building up for years.

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but years of land mismanagement has not helped and more than likely the situation we find ourselves in today has been building up for years.

Probably not helped by the inexperienced "new" farmers buying up farms as a play thing and lifestyle move on their exit from the "city". Nice house, lots of acres and room to keep a horse or two along with goats, llamas, chickens and grow veggie burgers. (Unfortunately I know one such couple) The £1M+ bonus goes a long way in the status race compared to a 3 bed semi in central London or a derelict bungalow on the Thames.

 

However, it doesn't come with all the years of land management knowledge or the understanding of the purpose for which the land should be used. They created a big pond (habitat) in the paddock for their ducks and geese to feel at home by blocking up a drainage dyke. The pond has now overfilled and flooded the house, but the ducks are happy.

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As soon as you cut any amount of metal out of a shipping container it reduces the structural integrity by a significant factor as they are effectively monocoque in design. Often people, including engineers, mistakenly believe that the frame is providing 99% of the structural intergrity and that the skin can have holes cut into it with no implications. They should have loaded them with bags of aggregate through the end doors and then lifted them into place, which can be done safely with chains and a standard spreader beam (which will be standard kit carried on every crane).

 

It doesn't surprise me as most of the people on site are probably soil engineers and the like.

 

Cheers,

 

Jack

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It doesn't surprise me as most of the people on site are probably soil engineers and the like.

 

 

Yes, I'm no engineer, but those I worked with in the railway industry were very discipline-specific. Mechanicals, Civils, Power Supply, Signals, Plant & Machinery, each with specialist knowledge within their own discipline, too - and you seldom found them stepping outside their comfort zone. Part of the art or science of engineering, though, ought to be knowing when you don't know, and asking around?

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Yes, I'm no engineer, but those I worked with in the railway industry were very discipline-specific. Mechanicals, Civils, Power Supply, Signals, Plant & Machinery, each with specialist knowledge within their own discipline, too - and you seldom found them stepping outside their comfort zone. Part of the art or science of engineering, though, ought to be knowing when you don't know, and asking around?

Ian, the art of being an engineer IS recognising when your knowledge does not extend beyond what you are attempting. It is very fulfilling to be working at the forefront of a field but it is embarrassing (and sometimes downright dangerous) to attempt the unknown without proper planning and risk assessment. Engineers almost invariably were able to discuss problems and issues without any 'loss of face' as the orientals put it. The few who couldn't  rarely lasted long in that discipline.

 

The fact that we can, for example, watch the progress of NR's restorative works at Dawlish show how much has changed in a generation. Time was when you could go about your work and suffer the odd ignominious event as you c@cked up occasionally but you didn't have the world (which is now an expert in everything) constantly staring over your shoulder.

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Yes, I'm no engineer, but those I worked with in the railway industry were very discipline-specific. Mechanicals, Civils, Power Supply, Signals, Plant & Machinery, each with specialist knowledge within their own discipline, too - and you seldom found them stepping outside their comfort zone. Part of the art or science of engineering, though, ought to be knowing when you don't know, and asking around?

I think its the old adage about not knowing enough to realise how little you know

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The fact that we can, for example, watch the progress of NR's restorative works at Dawlish show how much has changed in a generation. Time was when you could go about your work and suffer the odd ignominious event as you c@cked up occasionally but you didn't have the world (which is now an expert in everything) constantly staring over your shoulder.

 

Absolutely agree. But the other side of this is the recognition for the job that the NR team at Dawlish has been doing. Actually seeing the conditions under which they have been working and the challenges that are being managed (not least via this thread) has probably done a lot for NR's reputation.  From what I have seen of media reporting, most has been positive, whereas secrecy could have had exactly the opposite effect.  

Best wishes

Eric

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Absolutely agree. But the other side of this is the recognition for the job that the NR team at Dawlish has been doing. Actually seeing the conditions under which they have been working and the challenges that are being managed (not least via this thread) has probably done a lot for NR's reputation.  From what I have seen of media reporting, most has been positive, whereas secrecy could have had exactly the opposite effect.  

Best wishes

Eric

An interesting comment.  Working on the sea wall on a major breach is probably not much worse nowadays than it ever has been (although there have indeed been very bad storms of late of course) but with more machines and far better protective clothing and 'workplace safety' arrangements than was ever the case in the past.  Plenty of other railway work, not just civil engineering, has been carried out in atrocious conditions over many years and often in far more dangerous situations which were simply 'part of the job' (and had a death and injury toll to go with it).

 

The difference now of course is that we can see it, or at least some of it, and might perhaps wonder at and thank those who are doing it but at the same time we don't know or see countless other jobs which have to work in equally bad conditions.  Gismorail mentioned above the matter of farmers hedging & ditching and its easy to forget the conditions in which much of that was done, lots of railway jobs involved working in the weather - however bad it was - because the job had to be done and the railway industry was not alone in that.

 

So not to belittle those having to stick it out at Dawlish or the work they are doing but not to overlook that in many respects countless others over the years endured equally bad working conditions but we just never noticed them.

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Hi Gismorail,

 

Back then the ditches were in very poor condition and in most cases were virtually totally full of debris and standing water.

 

 What did you do about it? Did you take ownership of the problem? (Not trying to get at you,) but with the way that stuff is organised these days, too many subcontractors, etc., too much emphasis on cost and not value, etc., problems exist around the system edges/interfaces, communications, or lack of.

 

I would have thought, that among all the folk messing around at Dunball, someone would have realised that dropping the pump outfall onto the river bank was a bit daft, and that chopping up a container and then trying to move it when loaded was not going to work. But, if you are a subby, are you going to speak up? The existing four sluices at the drain go into a concrete sump, and a few yards away towards BW is a sort of concrete ramp, but basically longer pipes would be best. 

 

It appears that there is nobody around on  the EA site with any useful experience. It would help if the dead wood at the top of the tree was pruned. In reality, I think much of what is going on is 'a face saving exercise', and that's not working either.

 

Best wishes,

 

Ray

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Apparently if they had positioned the pumps correctly they would not have eroded the banks.

Not so much positioned the pumps differently (they were on the apex of the bank, from the photos), as provided longer outfall pipes, rather than ones that discharged half-way down the bank. Even some sort of sheeting on the bank below the mouths of the pipes would have helped to reduce the erosion.

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Interesting that the people on the Dawlish thread that knew better than those "on the job" were vilified and moderated.

 

Ed

 

No; posts which were repetitive and argumentative were removed. Those "on the job" are doing pretty well without advice from fundamentalist armchairs and they shouldn't have to waste time addressing the untrue/unsound/unwise.

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So not to belittle those having to stick it out at Dawlish or the work they are doing but not to overlook that in many respects countless others over the years endured equally bad working conditions but we just never noticed them.

 

Again, I would not disagree - nor underestimate the efforts made/risks taken by previous generations. I was merely making the point that openness, in this case, has allowed recognition of good work - a good PR result. As you rightly put it, in the past "...we just never noticed them."  And no doubt the press of the day would have had a whingefest about the lack of trains, without understanding the challenges of putting things right.

Best wishes

Eric   

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A friend's family has booked well in advance to travel to Guildford this Friday from Penzance (and return on Monday).

The first part from PZ to St Erth is by coach, there's apparently some track damage in the Longrock area.

He's not sure how many on and off coach changes will be involved in getting to Guildford, but he thinks it might be easier to take his family up there in the car, return for the weekend and go back up Monday and collect them.

 

My cousin who's staying in Dawlish looking after my very ill Aunt, came down from Lancaster a couple of weeks ago, the normal 5+ hour journey, took 10+ hours with coaches involved as well - She was knackered.

 

So, as someone who lives west of Penzance, let alone Plymouth, where the services have in the long term already been downsized (catering etc.,) I'm obviously hoping a good job will be done at Dawlish, not just reinstating the sea defences, but improving them, and of course across the Somerset levels too.    

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The edging used in canals and rivers and for coffer dams would surely have worked and EA should be familiar with them and the plant needed?

You mean Larssen piles, I believe? They would have needed to put them on both banks; is there access to the other side for kit with the sort of weight concerned (40t+ piledriving rigs)?

Even spacing the pumps a bit further apart might , and angling the outfalls, would have made more sense than bunching them as they did.

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Hi,

 

Getting a bit of a problem uploading photos, but hopefully the links will work.

 

I managed at last to get down to Dunball (not far from me) after four or five attempts during last week - either it was p*ss*ng down, or nowhere easy to stop, what with cranes, lorries and tv vans. Today it was relatively sunny, and most 'observers', and machinery has either left or been installed. I had a chat with the EA guys, who were glad of the sun and were drying out a bit.

 

The first image shows the four gates I mentioned earlier. They will only be using the pumps when the gates are closed (automatically when the river level is above the drain level). It then started to rain, hence the lonely coffee mug in the second blurred photo. Currently they are running in loads of scalpings and other backfill, it's a little bit muddy there (but dry compared to places out on the levels..)

 

 

http://www.yertiz.com/pic1204/SDIM1515s.jpg

 

http://www.yertiz.com/pic1204/SDIM1517s.jpg

 

Best wishes,

 

Ray

 

 

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