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Powerscreen Chieftain 1400 - Hurricane Ivan
SJ&L Inc. know all about storm recovery. Ivan is just the latest hurricane to which the Mobile, AL, general contractor has responded using the Powerscreen Chieftain 1400.
Hurricane Ivan
Alabama Department of Transportation officials called SJ&L as soon as Ivan’s fury receded. Company owner Michael Tew sent crews south to clear roadways of sand. A lot of sand.
“The sand was three and four feet deep over Highway 182,” recalled Ronald Glass, vice president and operations manager for SJ&L. The gritty material covered the pavement for up to 8 mi. (12.8 km).
There was no mystery about where the sand belonged. The powerful hurricane’s wind and surging waters had carried it northward from its natural habitat.
Glass observed that one nearby beach that had been 200 ft. (61 m) wide had disappeared.
SJ&L assembled equipment — some owned, some rented — to relocate the sand to the beaches. Loaders scooped up the sand and loaded it into off-road trucks.
Much of the sand was mixed with debris and natural materials so it had to be screened to sift out foreign material. A Powerscreen Chieftain 1400 unit is the center of that operation, screening about 350 tons an hour for 10 hours or more each working day, Glass said. The cleaned sand then is carted back and dumped next to the now-calm Gulf waters.
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Slowly, the area is beginning to be reclaimed.
“There is a drastic change in how it looks since I first saw it right after the storm,” Glass said in late October, a month after Ivan passed through.
He recalled seeing a house that had been picked up by the water and moved more than 300 ft. (91 m) north to the other side of the highway.
“I’ve never seen a storm tear up condominiums like Ivan did,” he said. “It must have been a pretty good wave to do what it did. I wouldn’t have wanted to be there.”
SJ&L and other contractors working in the area are systematically coordinating their jobs, Glass said. “Everybody is working real well.”
As the DOT highway work wound down in the coastal area, municipal officials in and around Orange Beach talked to the company about other projects. So in mid-October, one SJ&L crew remained nearer the coast while another worked on DOT highway repair work further inland.
“We’re been real busy,” said Glass, in something of an understatement.