A barge visits Wrangell once a week to deliver goods, including essentials like food. It docks at the 40-plus-year-old ramp at the downtown waterfront. Borough officials have expressed concern on the ramp’s condition though. To make sure it’s structurally sound, the borough hired PND Engineers to assess it in early March.
Borough Manager Mason Villarma said the engineering company sent the report to the borough on March 10. It states that the structure is deteriorating. In response, he shut down the barge ramp on March 13.
“I went through the report with a fine tooth comb, and all you really have to do is read that conclusion paragraph that continued operation of that ramp is a risk of failure,” he said. “When we’re looking at safety first, that’s not a prudent thing to continue to operate the ramp. And we’ve had concerns for quite some time.”
The conclusion states that current conditions of the ramp “warrants concern of potential failure of the ramp.” It suggests reducing the current loads and frequency of freight use. It also suggests to operate freight handling of the bull – or the forklift – at an alternative location.
PND engineers analyzed the barge ramp back in 2011, which allowed them to compare the structure earlier this month. At that time, they noted corrosion.
Corrosion extensively progressed since 2011
And now, the corrosion extensively progressed, causing the steel elements to be in far worse condition.
Additionally, they noted that there’s cracked and corroded welds and the barge ramp is bent, due to being overloaded. Not only that, but the weight of the bull itself is too heavy for the ramp.
“All I know is that these are the circumstances we’ve inherited and we need to take measures to safeguard the personnel,” Villarma said. “The most concerning out of that condition assessment is the camber of the ramp going from three inches of curve down to inch minus. And if you look at it, there’s a noticeable sag in the middle.”
The camber is a slight curvature to add support and drainage to the structure.
“the old mill dock…or the six mile mill site.”
For now, the barge will operate and side-tie at the Marine Service Center, where the old mill dock is, less than a half mile away from the barge ramp.
The Marine Service Center served as an alternative barge site in 2021 when contractors repaired the barge ramp’s floating tank.
“There’s a concrete pad where the bull can take freight off the barge there. So it’s kind of a pass pass operation,” Villarma said. “There’ll be a bull on the barge, and then a bull up top, and they’ll lift up one container and pass it off to the next to go store away.”
Villarma said the borough is making plans with the freight operators Alaska Marine Lines and Sampson. He said this is likely a short-term solution and doesn’t have an absolute timeline, but it could be a year to fix the barge ramp.
“We do need to debate, in an expeditious manner what our options are, whether it’s replacing the old mill dock, where it’s currently going to be transitioned to, or the six mile mill site,” Villarma said.
He said this decision to decommission the barge ramp came directly from him as borough manager.
Risk of catastrophic failure
He said he knows it was the right decision and should have happened a long time ago because a catastrophic failure of the ramp could have happened.
“If I can’t say with 100% certainty that somebody’s operating in a safe fashion, whether it’s on city infrastructure or if it’s city employees working in a certain manner, we’re not willing to take that risk,” Villarma said. “It’s not even the lawsuit potential or anything like that. We just don’t want to be responsible for having to call up a family and tell them that our negligence contributed to somebody either passing away or being severely injured.”
He said the borough will meet with AML and Sampson on Friday to discuss options.
Currently, future options include transitioning the barge service to the town’s old mill dock at the Marine Service Center or a dock six miles out of town. Villarma said the current barge location doesn’t seem feasible because there isn’t much space if the local economy expands.
He said he hopes community members will voice their opinions on the new ramp’s location to the Barge Service Yard Transition Special Committee. They are scheduled to meet monthly and their next meeting will be April 17.
