 |
Hobbs,
Upchurch & Associates, P.A. Superior Performance Through Innovative Design |
| "Wood" you be surprised? | Printable Page |
 Whether
working at Fort Bragg, or any military base, there is always the possibility
of a surprise waiting underground for the unsuspecting excavator.
The NC National Guard Military Academy at Fort Bragg was a typical
site development project. However, the academy was designed to be
squeezed into a tight space between two wetlands streams. There was
obviously no room for the buildings to be relocated due to their precarious
position and the new buildings required the relocation of two water
transmission mains. Prior to building the new facilities, the site was excavated so the two transmission mains could be relocated. During excavation, an unexpected surprise was encountered. Lying between the two paralleling water transmission mains was a wooden waterline. The unearthing of this old wood waterline was a big surprise to all. This site was intensely monitored due to an old archeological site excavation of the original Butner farm home site. Therefore, the Army's subsequent archeological investigations delayed this project. Fortunately, because the wood line was not in service, removal was made much easier.  The finding of a wood waterline would lead some to believe this was an extremely old line but that is not the case. It was constructed and installed in the early 1940's during World War II. This was during a time when metal was quite valuable for the war effort in tanks, artillery, and airplane construction and to use metal for a waterline in the ground was not on the Army's priority list. This waterline is quite interesting in that it was made out of oak or redwood slats. These slats were constructed with a tongue and groove system and a steel wire was spirally wound on the outside to hold the wooden slats together when under pressure. As the wood slats were saturated with water from the inside, the wood swelled and sealed all the joints, a process which is very similar to wooden liquor barrels made of slats with supporting outer bands. The adjacent two transmission mains were relocated while several hundred feet of the wooden line were removed to be investigated and were kept as samples. The joints of the wood pipe had typical bell and spigot ends which is still used in waterline pipe manufacturing today. |
|
|
|
|
| Water | Wastewater | Grants & Funding | Geographic Information | Site Development | Transportation | Surveying |
|
|
Southern Pines - Hampstead
- Nags Head - Charlotte
- Beaufort |