Rising to the challenge
September 1, 2004 By: Darren Constantino, North Coast Media Pit & QuarryJ.E. McAmis tackles 1.2 million cu. yd. of excavated sand using versatile stacking conveyors to load barges.
Maintenance dredging, environmental remediation, and the expansion and protection of coastal waterways, ports, inlets, levees and beaches are essential to economic and social health. Yet these activities can have many effects on public recreation areas, wildlife habitats, native sea grass resources, and the welfare of sea-dwelling creatures such as manatees. Therefore, environmental harmony is a key issue in civil and marine-engineering projects.
California-based civil and marine engineering contractor J.E. McAmis Inc., has 30 years of experience in developing creative methods to complete these difficult projects on schedule and with environmental safety as a top priority. The company combines specialized and diversified equipment with its broad knowledge of heavy construction, and marine contracting and dredging.
 By using conveyors, J.E. McAmis Inc. keeps trucks, dozers and loaders away from the water. |
In February 2003, the Army Corps of Engineers awarded a $26 million contract to J.E. McAmis for the Florida coast's Peanut Island environmental restoration project. In large part, the contract involves excavating 1.2 million cu. yd. of fill (sandy soil) from the north half of the island and transporting it by barge nine miles south to Lake Worth Lagoon to create the new Snooks Island Natural Area. This area will protect a system of mangrove islands, oyster beds and sea grass habitats.
J.E. McAmis began work in May 2003, and the project is currently well ahead of schedule. Its success can be attributed to careful planning, near-zero downtime, and the use of innovative conveyor systems that transfer and place dredged and excavated materials to and from custom-designed barges, while eliminating any disturbance to natural resources.
J.E. McAmis worked with Morris, Minn.-based Superior Industries, a conveyor systems manufacturer, to design two independent conveyor systems that could span beach areas and shallow waters, while eliminating the need for noisy, dusty and invasive haul truck and loader usage.
 Peanut Island |
Barge loading
"The circumstances of this project are fairly unique - being on an island, in such an environmentally sensitive area, and always being very much in the public eye," says J.E. McAmis Project Superintendent Scott Vandegrift. "So our goal was finding a way to operate quietly and with minimal impact to everything around us. We had a good idea that we wanted to use conveyor systems to transfer material to and from the barges, as it would be the only way to span certain sea grass areas. The idea is moving material but keeping equipment like trucks, dozers and loaders as far as we could from the water. And we needed to eliminate noise and pollution issues, such as the possibility of an oil spill."Also, conveyors mean a shorter truck haul and more fuel efficiency," he says. "We collaborated with Superior Industries to figure out exactly want kinds of conveying systems we needed, and coupled that with belt scales and our GPS systems."
The barge-loading process begins with excavated material being dumped into a 35-ton haul truck dump hopper, which feeds a 150-ft. stationary stacking conveyor. That conveyor is making a surge pile over a tunnel reclaim conveyor that is feeding a Superior Industries' Extender Plus conveyor, a unit that eliminates the need for multiple transfer units. The Extender Plus offers the flexibility to extend or retract one adjustable conveyor to meet a particular length of transfer.
 J.E. McAmis Inc. uses a Superior Industries' Extender Plus conveyor, a unit that eliminates the need for multiple transfer units. |
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