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| :: Crossing Interstate 93 without Stopping Traffic |
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:: Crossing Interstate 93 without Stopping Traffic ::
Everyone knows what a hassle it is when a highway is under construction. We'd never make it on time
anywhere if a road had to be shut down every time a utility needed to be extended across it. Fortunately,
directional drilling can happen so invisibly that drivers aren't inconvenienced and utility companies
don't have to pay for road reconstruction.
In March 2005, Henniker Directional Drilling (HDD) crossed Interstate 93 in New Hampshire, a north/south
road that runs the length of the state from Massachusetts to Canada. Working as a subcontractor for East
Coast Utilities, HDD's job was to install an 8-inch steel sleeve for Keyspan Corporation, a gas utility
company. The crossing took place at exit 16, a busy area north of the capital city of Concord, NH.
"Cutting through the road and rerouting traffic would not have been a good option on this section of
the interstate," says Jeff Martin, president of Henniker Directional Drilling. Instead, Martin and his
crew Charlie Hunt and Corey King set up the 50 x 100 Vermeer rig and a vacuum truck on a dead end side
street off the exit, away from highway traffic.
Using a 14-inch reamer that cut through silty material and a few gravel seams, the bore was completed
in a single shot in just four hours. The next day, a 335-foot steel sleeve was installed 22 feet under
I-93. The job took just two days - a fraction of the time it would have taken to shut down part of the
interstate, reroute traffic, open cut the road, haul away material, and reconstruct the road.
Tracking the bore head across the busy highway was the only challenge Martin's crew encountered. To avoid
large volumes of traffic, the crew began working after morning rush hour. To keep the crew off the road,
the bore head was tracked to the edge of the road, kept on course, and relocated at the median.
Corrections were then made before crossing the next two lanes.
For safety, NH State Police were on site and the NH Department of Transportation regularly monitored
the job's progress and safety. Because Martin's crew was located off the highway except during bore
head tracking, traffic was never stopped during the process.
"Overall, the job went very smoothly and we all enjoyed working with such quality contractor and
professional crew," says Martin. "In this case it was less expensive to bore than open cut."
"Our only real pressure was getting the job done before a huge snowstorm hit the city," continues
Martin, whose team helped lay the infrastructure for a gas line into a building that had been
sustaining on propane during the cold winter.
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