Photos: Caltrans

Update from Caltrans, Monday, April 24, 3:20 p.m.

Our contractors have continued to make tremendous headway towards restoring U.S. Highway 101 north of Leggett in Mendocino County to one-way controlled traffic.

While the past few days had been dry and the slide had remained inactive all weekend, last night’s rains (which carried over into this morning) saturated the hillside and caused minor slide activity to resume.

Crews have been working to install a catchment fence atop the K-rail at the bottom of the slide today, which will catch any small debris that falls down the hillside.

Furthermore, a spider excavator was airlifted to a point above the slope escarpment this afternoon and will work to remove sediment and other debris from the top of the slide. Spider excavators are used to tackle jobs on remarkably difficult terrain, and the subcontractor we’re working with specializes in this kind of work.

Trucks have been standing by to remove fill material and take it to our disposal sites on either end of the slide.

It still appears that we’re on track for an opening later this evening; however, we’re still a few hours out and anything could happen. So long as there are no surprises from the slide, we’ll post to let you know when the highway reopens to one-way controlled traffic later tonight.