For Sparky and myself, curiosity drives passion which in turn fuels our life's engine. Our passion was capturing the story of both unbuilding the Grace (1929 - 2007) and Pearman (1966 - 2007) Bridges and discovering the unbuilders. It takes a lot of passion to track a project from July 2005 until April 2007 - rain, shine, hurricanes or moving to Singapore. We discovered the joy of discovery learning. Ken Canty opened the front door for us - then Steve Testa, Ponch Billingsley and Mickey Rogers opened many side doors. Below are the highlights of what we discovered, who we met and what we learned.
And a reminder from T.S. Eliot (East Coker from the Four Quartets)
Home is where one starts from. As we grow older The world becomes stranger, the pattern more complicated Of dead and living. Not the intense moment Isolated, with no before and after, But a lifetime burning in every moment And not the lifetime of one man only But of old stones that cannot be deciphered.
Last Wednesday, C-2 (Pearman) had two bearings while C-1 was empty.
Today Sparky watched the unbuilding of the left bearing on C-2
Both the left and right bearings
Another view
Meanwhile, Mickey's team is using the John Henry for more vertical drilling.
a closer view
Now the hard part - cutting the bearing loose from the pier cap
Stan is doing the burning while Carlos is keeping the process organized and overseeing all the bits and pieces required to safely remove the bearing structure.
Manny stabilizes the bearing while Stan cuts through the base
Burn
Burn
Burn
with a crowd of onlooking as the drifted by
more burning
On the barge are other pieces - some with a bit of growth from their underwater home
while others never touched the water
Finally the bearing is free
and Manny starts the lowering process.
Down
Down
almost on the barge -but some rotation
then lower
tilting into the sleeping position
closer to sleep
and down
A good view of the pin
and C-2 without a bearing
The worksite after
and on the Capt Gary (or Eddie R) - Manny, Stan, Scott and Carlos
and a view from Mt Pleasant
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons License.
C. Frank Starmer