A massive mudslide struck Route 3 east of Hinton four miles about 2 pm on February 11. Hundreds of tons of trees, stone, and molten soil snarled traffic and put the DOH crews into an extended emergency as the hillside oozed for days.
Warnings for years by residents of East Woodrumtown Road came to pass on February 11 as a section of their county road 3/6 descended onto Route 3. The highway department has closed the lower end of county road 3/6 indefinitely.
Jan Darrah reported, “I was driving out that day and as I turned off East Woodrumtown Road towards Hinton, I saw a large rock come bouncing down the hill and narrowly miss a pick-up truck coming the other way. I slowed down to glance up the hill and saw that the whole hillside was sliding, so I called 911.”
The passage up the hill had been becoming more precarious for years. For years the district engineers have sought funding for the project. Over 500 linear feet need to be stabilized. In 2020 the situation was thoroughly surveyed, designed, and the cost estimated. It will exceed $1 million dollars. The funding was dedicated to it but the bidding and contracting process was still creeping along.
Notified of the slide, Jim Moore, district engineer, responded, “We are aware and have contacted management to expedite letting the contract that we already submitted. Sorry for the inconvenience.”
Now the DOH may be facing a need to retain the bank at the bottom of the hill as well as along East Woodrumtown Road.
Closure of the grade up into East Woodrumtown Road will require at least 10 households with nine daily commuters and other residents to use the long narrow West Woodrumtown Road with its own similar number of residents.
Stabilization will take weeks of driving long I-beams into the bank, setting the retaining wall, backfilling, and resurfacing. Because the project hangs directly over Route 3, it will probably require flagging traffic below and slowing the installation.
Shortly after the mudslide occurred local EMT officials assured The Hinton News they have an ambulance available on both sides of the mudslide to respond to any emergencies from either side of the closure.
