There are two culverts that are clogged beneath this road. AquaDams are needed to isolate the culvert entrances to allow cleaning.

Wahlund Construction, Inc. was the contractor that won the bid for the job.

A look at the upstream side of the project. The AquaDam will be placed where the men are standing, and installed, angled to the right.

AquaDams being unloaded from the trailer. Excavators are an AquaDam installers best friend.

Here is the downstream AquaDam, fully installed. The inside of the work area has been dewatered.

The fill tubes of the AquaDam are pulled up and elevated above the body of the AquaDam.

This 8' high AquaDam has made an excellent seal to the streambed. The bypass pump discharge hose is visible behind the AquaDam.

The work area is almost totally dewatered.

Another angle of the almost dewatered area.

This is the upstream AquaDam. It is also 8' tall. The orange suction hoses are sucking out of a sump hole dug in on the right side of the AquaDam.

Contractor is de-mucking the culvert area with an excavator, AquaDam is keeping the area isolated.

Workers continuing to clear the culvert area of muck.

Close up of the work area.

The 8' AquaDam is doing a great job at keeping the area dewatered. The red pump in the foreground is handling any seepage that gets under the AquaDam.

These are the 6" bypass pumps. These are acting as a temporary culvert by pumping the water from one side of the road to the other.

The fill tubes have been elevated on the hay-bales to keep the AquaDam above the level of the road.

And here's the sump pit that the bypass pumps are sucking out of. The second pump is there just in case of a major rain event.

The culverts have been cleaned out, and the area re-rocked.

Although this AquaDam had been deployed before, it has no leaks or holes, and is doing a great job of isolating the work area from the water, in an environmentally friendly way.

The sum total of water being pumped out of the work area is shown here. It is a mere trickle.

On the downstream side of the road, the shorter 8' AquaDam is isolating the opposite end of the culverts.

Again, the downstream side of the road. The whole area has been dewatered, cleaned out, and re-rocked.

The opposite end of the culverts, downstream side.

AquaDam

The discharge from the bypass pumps (orange hose) is being directed under the road surface and into the marshy land on the downstream side of the road.

Downstream side

Upstream side

The excavator operator dug extremely close to the AquaDam. This is not recommended, due to the possibility of tearing/ripping.

AquaDam

Upstream side

The culvert cleaning is finished, so Aqua Dam, Inc. workers have arrived to remove the dams.

Workers are getting the gas powered water pumps started. We'll need to pump water from the stream to the work area to equalize the water levels on both sides of the AquaDam.

As the work area fills with water, the water levels on both sides of the AquaDam equalize. This means that the AquaDam won't get pushed one way or the other when we deflate it.

Because the two work areas are connected with culverts, the downstream work area also begins to fill.

It's amazing what a few 3" pumps can do. The work area is about 1/3 re-watered.

On the left (not shown), the water pumps are now sucking water out of the AquaDam and discharging the water into the work area.

Hard to see, but there is a water pump for each fill tube, pumping water out of each side of the AquaDam at an equal rate.

The end of the AquaDam has been dewatered to the point that Workers can start re-rolling the AquaDam.

We taped 2 24' long 4"x6" together and hand rolled the end of the AquaDam around it. Next, brackets are slid on the ends of the beams. These brackets have a socket welded to the center, to allow the workers to use ratchets inside 4-5' long cheater bars.

The cheater bars allow the workers to generate the torque needed to roll the several thousand pound AquaDam into a relatively tight roll.

Now we have to wait for the AquaDam to lose some more water, so the excavator can pull it back away from the road, to allow the workers to continue to roll it up.

The discharge water from the AquaDam is now being directed to the other side of the AquaDam, because the work area is fully re-watered.

As the AquaDam loses water, it begins to slouch and become wider. This must be taken into consideration before the removal begins.

Now the AquaDam has gotten much lower, and the workers can now roll the AquaDam up to the waters edge.

This worker is taking a break. Rolling an AquaDam is hard work!

A strap was wrapped around both ends of the AquaDam. An excavator is now pulling it into the adjoining meadow so that rolling can continue

At this point, not even a 5' cheater bar can produce enough torque to roll the AquaDam up. The excavator operator was an essential part of the removal process.

The AquaDam has been completely removed from the work area, all that's left is the wrap that was laid under the fill tubes during installation, and the haybales used for elevation.

The AquaDam is completely rolled up, all we need now is some rope to keep it that way when we move it.

AquaDam

It's really important to have a skilled operator help with rolling the AquaDam. Heavy equipment can cause lots of damage if used incorrectly.

The downstream AquaDam has been pumped down, and is being pumped down, as evidenced by the minimal height over the surrounding water.

Walking on a partially deflated AquaDam can be exhausting, similar to walking through deep sand.

As the AquaDam gets shorter, the water encroaches more and more.

This AquaDam already had the doubled 4"x6" beam at the end of it, so workers attached the brackets and started rolling.

This tree was a minor obstruction, as the property owner didn't want us to remove it. The tree had to be worked around.

Pumping has stopped on the AquaDam and we've rolled it as far as we can go.

The excavator pulled the fill tubes to the right, parallel to the road.

After that, we had him pull the rolled up portion into the pit that was made for the culverts. Because AquaDams float in water (at least for a bit), this was not a problem. Once we got it to the road side...

...the excavator picked it up, pulled it across the road, and into the meadow.

AquaDam

The shorter AquaDam was rolled up and placed on the trailer, alongside it's larger brother.

Nothing left but the wrap, same as the other AquaDam.

AquaDams are environmentally friendly and do not leach anything into the surrounding water; nor the water inside them. What you put in is what you get out.

In a matter of weeks, the grass will grow up and the water plants will also re-colonize the work area. Nature is very resilient.