Weirs Beach Boardwalk Washed away!

[WeirsBeachBoater]

Camera Phone pic, not the best.

[WeirsBeachBoater]

One more picture from this morning.

[ironhorsetim]

you can see a couple of pic's of the boardwalk and the fire at peddle pushers on front page of www.laconiadailysun.com

[WeirsGuard]

It's been a long time, but I remember the same area washed out in the mid to late sixties. At that time the asphalt walkway to the beach washed away and the tracks were left hanging in midair. The B&M Railroad and the Army Corps of Engineers were involved in repair and remediation. Guess the repairs weren't made to last forty years.

[kaj]

Some more pics of the damage

[RamJet]

Flash flood washes out portion of Weirs Beach tracks & boardwalk
BY RAY CARBONE
THE LACONIA DAILY SUN

LACONIA — In an event pubic officials said was unprecedented in modern times, a 120-foot portion of the sidewalk, metal fencing, boardwalk and ground beneath the railroad tracks along Lakeside Avenue in Weirs Beach was washed out during last evening’s strong thunderstorm.

Officials said that around 8 p.m., the rushing waters apparently rolled down Tower Hill in the area of the N.H. Veteran’s Association Campground, crossed Lakeside Avenue and slammed into the waterfront structures, tossing them aside like children’s toys. “There was a heck of a lot of water,” said Laconia Fire Department Lieutenant Mike Shastany.

“I’ve never seen anything like that,”he said observing the tangled mess of metal, cement, dirt, sand and wood. Police roped off the area, preventing an army of onlookers that filled the area shortly after the evening thunderstorm passed.

In addition to the main area of damage, firefighters reported two other sections of the nearby shorefront might have also been harmed, including a smaller section along Lakeside Avenue closer to Route 3, and an area not far away in Meredith.

Officials said despite the numerous problems caused by the storms — including a three-alarm fire started by lightning and serious flooding in some parts of town — there were no reports of serious injuries at about 10 p.m. Around that time, Department of Public Works (DPW) Director Paul Moynihan arrived on Lakeside Avenue to evaluate the situation. He entered the roped-off area and took a closer look at the washed out section.

One bright spot Moynihan noticed immediately was the water line that runs along the shoreline and is connected to the Lake Winnipesaukee River Basin Project did not appear to be leaking any sewage.

“I can see the pipe is exposed but I’m not smelling anything,” he said. “And my assistant (Luke Powell) was down here earlier when it was lighter and he said he didn’t notice any damage (to it). It may have a small leak but it doesn’t appear to have any major damage right now.”
All the same, a representative of the river basin project was trying to get to the site of the Weirs Beach washout last night, Moynihan reported. If there was reason to be glad about the sewer pipe issue, there were still plenty of reasons to be concerned about the damaged area.
An immediate concern to Moynihan was the extent of harm done to the railroad tracks. Early today representatives of the NH Department of Transportation (DOT) and the Hobo/ Winnipesaukee Railroad are expected to be on the scene to evaluate the situation, he said. “The DOT owns the tracks and the Hobo Railroad rents them for their usage,” he explained.

In the dark, Moynihan could not make much more sense of the tangled mass of wood, metal, dirt and concrete. He indicated he would ask Fire Chief Ken Erickson to move the public further back off the boardwalk from the impacted area since he was not aware of how strong the structure was in the wake of both the heavy storm waters and the washed out sections underneath.
One thing he did now was that it was “going to take a lot of work” to get the Weirs Beach landmark area back to what it once was.

Officials were expected to continue working and patrolling the area throughout the night and to be on the scene early this morning.

[krm]

Originally Posted by WeirsGuard

It's been a long time, but I remember the same area washed out in the mid to late sixties. At that time the asphalt walkway to the beach washed away and the tracks were left hanging in midair. The B&M Railroad and the Army Corps of Engineers were involved in repair and remediation. Guess the repairs weren't made to last forty years.

The Army Corp is not exactly known for quality work just look at the everglades, New Orleans and many other project they have done, unfortunately due to a supreme court ruling they take zero responsibility.

Maybe they will take advantage and do something new with the boardwalk.

[sa meredith]

Just sickening to see. My God...I guess summer will be coming to an abrupt end for "the Strip". As if things were not already tough enough this summer.
You'd have to blind and deaf to not realize ouir weather patterns in NH are changing at an alarming rate. A tornado touches down, we have daily thunder strorms of gargantuine proportions, and now this. What's next? 75 degrees on Christamas? Oh wait, that already happened...2006 (or was it 05)

[RI Swamp Yankee]

Thanks for those pictures kaj. I was there yesterday afternoon escaping all the rain in North Conway and my wife and I were saying how good the weather was. It was a bit cloudy with some sun and we enjoyed being away from cloudy and rain. We left just in time it would seem. I also watched the live pictures of Meridith on WMUR last night. The amount of water was amazing. We only had a little rain in North Conway and the Saco river is going back down next to our campsite.

[no-engine]

I was at weirs area at 9:30am. A passer by I chatted a second with said last night that water was very near top of that black fence along sidewalk. So, the bubble gave way!

In a quick observation, there seems no significant damage from the Ship's ramp & ticket office proceeding north.

The undermining was a little towards Laconia, as photos show, at the stairs leading to the docks. There must be catch basins clogged or just could not handle the amount of water coming from the hill.

[CanisLupusArctos]

Originally Posted by sa meredith

Just sickening to see. My God...I guess summer will be coming to an abrupt end for "the Strip". As if things were not already tough enough this summer.
You'd have to blind and deaf to not realize ouir weather patterns in NH are changing at an alarming rate. A tornado touches down, we have daily thunder strorms of gargantuine proportions, and now this. What's next? 75 degrees on Christamas? Oh wait, that already happened...2006 (or was it 05)

The warm December and early January of 2006 was the effect of a very strong El Nino in the Pacific. It alters the weather pattern over North America. When it broke down in mid-January, the jet stream changed to allow the floodgates of the arctic to open, the lake froze very thick, very quickly, and the first few months of 2007 were extremely cold -- we had a white Easter.

The tornado and thunderstorms have been the result of relentless Canadian cold air masses that will not let our summertime air dwell in peace over New England -- we have felt them in the form of sub-70-degree highs the last couple of days. We're on the cold side of the boundary. These cold air masses barge into the warm air every chance they get, lift it, and storm towers form -- thunderheads.

Heavy precipitation happens when the air cools off, when warm air is forced to mix with and become cold air. Cold air can't hold as much water vapor as warm air. At some point, the once-warm air becomes too cold to retain its moisture, and the excess falls out. The more drastically it cools off, the heavier that precip is going to be.

Yes, things are changing, but the common denominator I keep seeing is aggressive behavior by cold air.

Incidentally, it's repeating today. Radar currently shows thunderstorms *parked* over the area just east of Concord along a line from Barnstead to Manchester. The slow-moving nature of these storms was really what got us yesterday. We've had heavier rainfall rates than yesterday but not usually sustained for three hours like we had yesterday. It usually lasts 20 minutes and then it's done. Storms are also firing (and sitting) on the Ossipees now, just north of the lake. More heavy stuff is moving in from western NH and will be here in an hour or so. The weathermap character responsible for this is a low pressure area parked over southern Canada, something I see more often in winter when it causes lake effect snow in western NY. This time of year, the counterclockwise flow around it is making use of the warm moisture of summertime in its path, and therefore doesn't need the relative warmth and moisture of the Great Lakes in order to create weather.

I forgot I'm in "general discussion" and not weather thread.... oops. Forgot to stay on topic. Well since I was just down at the Weirs, I can say I saw the work crews using an excavator to bash in anything over the washout that's unstable (like the ties from the tracks) and they're shoring it up with steel plates. The water has a pollution containment boom in it now. The Weirs is otherwise open, aside from the 100-foot section of washed out boardwalk to the west of the train station. The MOUNT and all its boats are docking and departing with passengers. Their HQ is open, as are the arcades and the beach itself. The docks are open (Gatto Nero docked there, with me aboard) and you have to use the MOUNT ramp to get to and from the docks. That's the way I always preferred to go anyway. Hopefully the MOUNT people are benefiting from the fact that everyone is now forced to walk past their operations in order to access the docks from the strip. Just don't stray too near the washout or someone will yell at you, and you obviously can't take a train ride until they fix the tracks. The Weirs may also be benefitting from everyone showing up to watch the happenings. What do you do when you get bored of watching them run machinery? All the businesses have their doors open and you can still park down there -- there's just a little less parking until they fix everything.

Looked like they were making temporary repairs because of what's moving in this afternoon. While I was there a well-dressed woman in a NH Resources and Econ. Development car (license plate - "D7") came into the cordoned-off area and parked. Channel 9 is there with a satellite truck. The cleanup process appears to be happening quickly, but the weather may slow it down. Pics coming in a bit.

[sa meredith]

Uuuummmm, yeah, Ok. That's what I meant to write...I was just pressed for time.