Great Lakes Dredge & Dock Removes Shoaling from C&D Canal

Great Lakes Dredge & Dock Co. has completed emergency dredging on the C&D Canal using the clamshell dredges 51 and 52 and transporting the shoal material to Poplar Island in Chesapeake Bay. The dredges removed 721000 cubic yards of material in the final weeks of 2012 and beginning weeks of 2013 in response to shoaling that was restricting ship traffic starting in November.

The $8.6 million project was paid for by the Baltimore and Philadelphia Engineer Districts which contributed $7.1 million and $1.5 million respectively.

The Chesapeake and Delaware Canal connects the Delaware River to the Chesapeake Bay and Port of Baltimore. The waterway a channel 35 feet deep and 450 feet wide extends from Reedy Point on the Delaware River about 41 miles below Philadelphia. The Army Corps of Engineers Philadelphia District maintains the canal as well as the five high span bridges that cross it: Reedy Point SR 1 Summit St. Georges and Chesapeake City bridges. The canal carries 40 percent of the shipping traffic in and out of the Port of Baltimore.