HINTON, W.Va. — A temporary bridge will be built this weekend on state Route 20 in Hinton near a sinkhole that has grown larger in the past week.
The heavy rain from what was left of Hurricane Nicole made a problem that surfaced in June worse. The sinkhole grew forcing closure of Route 20 and forcing students at Summers County Middle-High School to go on remote learning this week.
The state Division of Highways held a news conference in Hinton Tuesday to explain the repair plans.
DOH Deputy State Highway Engineer Joe Pack said the 125-foot steel bridge will built Saturday and Sunday to allow the road to reopen.
“Our plans are to construct a steel bridge, which will sit on the road surface, which will span the hole in its entirety and will sit on solid ground, what we are all driving on,” Pack said.
Once that work is done, crews will begin repairing the sinkhole. The hole was caused by a break in a pipe of a 90-year-old drainage system in Hinton. The underground system was built for a spring that flows into the New River. Pack said part of the pipe collapsed in recent months causing the hole to form.
The DOH is unable to use normal sink hole repair methods because of what Pack calls a “toxic amount” of lead that has been found in part of the soil. Engineers have had to come up with an alternate plan.
“It’s a bore and jack project where we use a horizontal drill to bore a six-foot diameter steel pipe which will end up being the drainage structure,” Pack said, adding the price of the project will be in the millions.
Once the new pipe is in, the hole will be filled, the bridge dismantled and a new surface for Route 20 put in place.
Hinton Mayor Jack Scott credits the DOH with being on the project since the sink hole developed in June. He said expansion of the sinkhole has accelerated their efforts.
“There’s a sense of urgency now to help us get this fixed. I think when you bring the school into this, the students into this and their safety, I think it helped us shed a little more light on this,” Scott said.
Scott said Hinton has benefited from the designation of the New River Gorge as a National Park. He doesn’t think the road closure will slow things down.
“A lot of positive things are happening here and this is just a little bump in the road or hole in the ground that we expect to get fixed relatively soon it sounds like,” Scott said.
Summers County schools are closed next week for Thanksgiving break.
WJLS Reporter Keith Thompson contributed to this story.