Corps Connection: Episode 4 (January 2021)

The Buffalo District takes us to Sodus Point New York, where they are constructing a shoreline protection project along Lake Ontario  The Jacksonville District talks about the challenges of trying to control an invasive species found in the Florida waterways Also, our 55th Chief of Engineers, Lieutenant General Scott Spellmon, debuts a new segment called “55 from the field”, where he goes on location and interviews Corps employees about the projects they are working on.

And finally, we’ll give you an update on a project we highlighted last month from our Little Rock District. But first, work along the Missouri River is always ongoing, the Omaha District monitors and repairs sections of the federal levee system, which reduces the risk of flooding to acres of agriculture, commercial, and residential land as well as local infrastructure. One such project in Iowa is nearing completion.

01:32 - So currently we’re constructing a setback levee so we’re taking the existing levee and bumping it landward we started in January 5th with the initial repair had the levee back to full height by March 1st that was our temporary repair and this is our full replacement repair we started on the setback September and we’ll finish in January what purpose does the levee serve that’s really two main purposes one it protects the interstate and infrastructure and two it protects the agricultural ground around us so L594 represents that has 13 000 acres in kind of the u we’re in between two creeks Plum Creek Wabaunsee Creek there’s three residents that live in there pretty much what it’s for so currently we’ve worked 145 000 man hours on this project that’s for the levee project it’s roughly 8 500 feet long it’s gonna be eight 850 000 cubic yards of dirt 5500 tons of levee surfacing cohesive fill and cohesionless fill and topsoil roughly 850 000 yards For ten years the USACE’s Engineer Research and Development Center has been championing the intentional alignment of natural and engineering processes to efficiently and sustainably deliver economic, environmental, and social benefits through collaborative processes.

Engineering With Nature marked this milestone with some well wishes from many stakeholders and partners from across the globe.

03:35 - Ten years of Engineering With Nature our overarching vision for the Engineering With Nature initiative is to move beyond the view that engineering and infrastructure development are achieved at a cost to nature to an approach where nature and human engineering are partners and allies in the development of infrastructure value the connections that we’ve made across organizational boundaries the strong relationships that we’ve built with people across the country and around the world and the collaborations that we have developed have fueled our progress over the last 10 years happy anniversary Engineering With Nature happy 10th anniversary happy anniversary Engineering With Nature and we look forward to the next 10 years of your collective good work congratulations Engineering With Nature happy 10th anniversary congratulations Engineering With Nature happy 10th anniversary congrats Engineering With Nature on 10 awesome years congratulations on 10 years and keep pushing forward congratulations to the Engineering With Nature initiative on its first 10 years and may there be another 10 years after that so happy anniversary Engineering With Nature here’s to many more happy 10th anniversary from Buffalo New York congratulations and happy 10th anniversary to Engineering With Nature congratulations Engineering With Nature happy 10th anniversary happy 10th anniversary to Engineering With Nature so congratulations Engineering With Nature and happy 10th anniversary and on behalf of the Philadelphia District I’d like to congratulate the Engineering With Nature program on its 10-year anniversary happy 10th anniversary EWN and congratulations I want to congratulate the U.

S. Army Corps of Engineers Engineering With Nature program on their 10th anniversary congratulations Engineering With Nature happy 10th anniversary and congratulations to EWN on your 10th anniversary happy 10th anniversary Engineering With Nature congratulations and happy 10th anniversary from the Port of Huelva and I wanted to congratulate Engineering With Nature on 10 successful years we look forward to many more to come congratulations and happy birthday we are going to build strong relationships learn from others and share our successes our mutual successes over the next 10 years and beyond the future is bright with opportunity for Engineering With Nature Lake Ontario makes the up the final major body of water the Great Lakes region drains through.

And with it’s wind whipped waves and fluctuations in water levels, shorelines along the lake can be vulnerable to erosion. One such portion of the lake’s shore is being reinforced by the Buffalo District near Sodus Point New York.

06:28 - hi I’m Tory Towndrow with the Corps of Engineers we’re out here in Sodus Point New York on our east break water project the project consists of roughly 500 feet of stone revetment and this revetment will help with shoreline protection in this area Out here on the east side of the project is the tie-in revetment the revetments made of bedding stone which is the smallest stone under layer as you can see here and an armor stone that’s currently out in the water eventually the armor stone will come all the way up to about halfway up the slope To many Water Hyacinth is a beautiful flowering floating plant species.

But, in the United States, with no major predator to keep its growth in check, this invasive species can quickly grow out of control forcing out native species and decimating the local ecology, and economy. The Jacksonville District takes us to South Florida to see how they, and their partners, are working to keep this destructive plant in check.

07:50 - My co-workers that work in this industry it’s the same thing for them you know they really have a personal deep love and respect for our natural environment that’s why we do what we do The flowers are beautiful the plant is it’s just pretty and that’s why it’s a problem Throughout history since the advent of aquatic plant management we tried everything and when I say we I mean stakeholders I mean government agencies we the people of the state of Florida we tried everything because it was necessary management of aquatic plants is an absolute necessary an essential thing plants like water hyacinths do not play well with others they will dominate the natural area and eventually you will end up with a monoculture of water hyacinth other animals don’t eat water hyacinth they’re not being consumed so as they as they out compete our native plant species that other animals and insects may use then you’re losing that habitat so we manage invasive species by bio control herbicide spraying and then also harvesting So bio control in general does not wipe out the plant every once in a while we get a really good insect that does do some great work so like the alligator weed flea beetle did some spectacular work and now you hardly ever see alligator weed but water hyacinth hasn’t been that easy for us and so our insects if you put them at a really high density will crush plants but we don’t see those high densities in the field what our insects do is they actually help augment this kind of herbicide control when our insects are found on the plants you can actually spray a lower concentration of herbicide and spray half as often and get the same effect so even though our insects are not the primary force wiping out the plants they are helping manage the plants With herbicide with the chemical spraying it’s effective because it allows us a little bit more flexibility when it comes to treating the plant we can cover a decent amount of acreage with very little equipment one of the biggest myths that i hear is that when we come through we kill everything our herbicide applicators the operators do their best to minimize any off-target damage and the herbicides that we use are specifically designed to target the plant species that we’re after they have a specific mechanism of action so they they have a special way to get into the plant and kill that plant where it won’t affect the native plant Mechanical harvesting has a place in aquatic vegetation control it definitely has a few more variables that come into play regarding water levels plant mass or plant density type of vegetation and if it’s mixed in with other native species you want to make sure that we’re not having that native non-target damage out there working with the other agencies what we’re looking to do is to make sure we’re minimizing our impact to that this area by making sure we’re disposing of the aquatic vegetation at the appropriate locations and that we are getting the most out of these programs utilizing the stakeholders money so we want to be as cost efficient as we can They can literally double their footprint in as little as six to ten days during a standard growing season which you know within two weeks of doubling that acreage so if you’ve got a thousand acres of plants within two weeks you’ve got two thousand and you do the math on that and it can become catastrophic at the end of the day you know we’re out here trying to do the best we can to minimize our impacts on the native environment and also just allow access for people to get out and you know explore the river recreate on the river fish on the river if we weren’t managing plants the way that we are a lot of those people might not be able to get out on the river Lt.

General Scott Spellmon, our 55th Chief of Engineers, does a lot of traveling; visiting Corps Districts and Divisions, getting a firsthand look at the projects and the people behind bringing these projects to fruition. In a segment we call “55 From The Field”, the Chief introduces you to the people he meets and the projects they are working on. With the first one coming from the Savannah District as they work on a project on Pope Army Airfield in Fayetteville, North Carolina.

12:50 - I’m Lieutenant General Scott Spellman 55th Chief of Engineers and I’m coming to you from the field this morning at Fort Bragg North Carolina specifically Pope Air Force Base I’m here with our great Savannah District Commander Colonel Dan Hibner and our 18th Airborne Corps Engineer Colonel Dave Fielder Dan you have a sustainment restoration and modernization project of national and strategic significance can you talk to the team a little bit about this project yes sir this is a two-year program overall it’s a 90 million dollar project most significant to it is that we’re going to have to shut this airway down for a period of time a planned shutdown of 120 days and that means that all of the operations that happen here are going to be operating at installations and regional facilities elsewhere uh making the runway closure very important that we try to keep that as short as possible the goal is 120 days and we’re going to work very hard to make it 120 days great thanks Dan hey Dave we uh we don’t do anything By ourselves we do everything with through partners and with strong partnerships and you’re a great partner for us here from 18th Airborne Corps can you talk a little bit about the importance of this project here mission absolutely sir at 18th Airborne Corps is probably one of the biggest players on this on Fort Bragg but it also has a number of special mission units FORSCOM is very much in tune with this project too and we partnered with Dave Hibner and his team down here we ensure that we have everybody some of the special missing units the new second airborne division even USARC that have stakeholders under this project and his team and my team here will work together to make sure that there is no stopping of any of this and that we are on time and on budget great thanks Dave, Dan we’re all about finishing quality projects on time and within budget and i know you’ve got a teammate here that’s helping us do that yes sir someone who’s central to that is Marcia Meekins if i could get you to come up here Marcia our area engineer at Fort Bragg newly arrived not too long ago from Fort Gordon her last accomplishment there was a delivery on time on budget of the Army Cyber Headquarters there at Fort Gordon so we’re relying on her expertise we’re relying on her partnership building of which she is expert at in order to make sure that we’re delivering this facility on time and on budget she’s the right person for the right job already in the trenches already doing an incredible job to make sure that we’re successful in this process come on up here one of the ways i like to say thank you is with a helmet sticker college football style so i just want to say thanks to the entire Corps team because you are actually one of our strongest teammates helping us build strong and stay Army Strong so thanks for all you do in the last episode of Corps Connection we highlighted the efforts to reopen Toad Suck Park along the Arkansas River we return there this episode as the commander of the little rock district announces the park’s reopening So after a year and a half today today’s park reopening serves a reminder of not only how devastating the flood was uh but also the the potential of what can be and where we’re headed in the future and we have a lot of work to do but I’d like to welcome you back to toad suck park and starting tomorrow again our visitors can make reservations and begin camping here again and enjoy Arkansas’s beauty you can make reservations for camping and other activities at Toad Suck Park or other Corps projects via the recreation.

gov website a link is available in the description portion of this video also if you are interested in learning more about Engineering With Nature or any of the other projects we highlighted in this episode links are available in the description portion of the video so that does it for this month’s edition of Corps Connection we will see you next month with more highlights from around USACE and thank you for tuning in once again I’m Patrick Bloodgood and this has been Corps Connection.