Yuma, Ariz. - The Bureau of Reclamation’s Yuma Area Office is initiating river maintenance and wash fan channel clearing at the Quien Sabe Wash Fan along the Colorado River beginning on Monday, Nov. 30, 2015. The Quien Sabe Wash Fan is located within the Colorado River Indian Tribe’s reservation perimeter, seven miles north of the Aha Quin Resort at River Mile 151.1 on the California side of the river.
Reclamation will be operating long-reach excavators, haul trucks, and bulldozers along the banklines and access roads leading into the area. Due to public safety concerns, all boats launches and river recreation will not be permitted in the area until construction activities are substantially complete. Reclamation timed the maintenance work to take advantage of the current low river channel flow season which occurs from November 2015 through March 2016.
Over the past several years, flash floods in the surrounding watershed transported large amounts of alluvial material into the river channel, forming wash fans adjacent to and in the river channel. In conducting the work, Reclamation crews will remove approximately 16,000 cubic yards of mostly fine sandy and some gravely material from the channel area with excavation extending four feet below the navigational level of the river. The project surface area will cover about 2.3 acres. Excavated material will not be stockpiled in the wash fan area or discharged into the Colorado River.
The maintenance planning and construction work is performed by Reclamation under the authority of the Colorado River Front Work and Levee System Act of 1946 for the purposes of controlling floods, improving navigation, and improving the flow of the Colorado River through Arizona, Nevada, and California.
For further information about this upcoming maintenance project, please contact Chris Wallis at (928) 343-8215.
Source: Bureau of Reclamation
