Sandslide Story

Sunday I went over to Temple Street to view the damage from Saturday nights sandslide. I guess that's what were calling it. It really is mostly sand.

I spoke with Jennifer, the nice young girl who was on the news. She's a student at U Mass, renting in Holyoke with her boyfriend. I felt so bad for her. Her car is totaled. Filled with water, and sand.

Jennifer is lucky she and her boyfriend weren't hurt. The sandslide happened quickly while Jennifer was trying to rescue her car. If the sandslide was twice as big, both Jennifer and her boyfriend could of been buried alive.

I walked up the hill to see the source of the sandslide.

After last months Railroad washout, just a few hundred feet away, the Railroad opened up this old stone arch culvert. Well it's not really a culvert, but that's another story.

The same culvert last week when the RR opened it up.

And here it is on Sunday.

Sediment from the Elmwood neighborhood has been washing down to this area for a long time., notice the shopping carriage to the right, but the water that caused Saturdays sandslide is from a new source.

I was asked by the Railroad to look into this, and document, via my blog. The RR is really pissed. Pissed because this damage is so costly, and also because they were immediately blamed for it.

The flooding moved stones that sat Since 1870.


I walked up the tracks to find the source of the water.

Remember the pile of bricks from last months washout?

It's not really a pile of bricks, but a lot of building waste used for land fill behind the Charter School, and Holyoke Flea Market.

Directly behind the Flea Market is the source of the flooding water. The storm water drain system has totally failed.

What happened is when the Charter School was built they plumbed the roof water from the entire building into the storm water drains. The system obviously couldn't handle it, and during last months rain the pressure blew out the underground pipes, blasting all the water out in this one spot.

4 inches of rain on Saturday, multiplied by a 20 acre site, is a lot of water in this one spot.

The City ordered the property owner to fix this last month, but the partners are in disagreement about what to do.