US 89 Collapses South of Page, Arizona

[UnrepentantLiberal]

Source: The Inquisitr



Phoenix, Arizona – US 89 collapsed south of Page, Arizona on Wednesday leaving the road in a condition often seen in post-apocalyptic survival games and movies.

The collapse occurred approximately two and a half miles north of mile 526, north of the intersection with U.S. 89A, approximately 25 miles south of Page.

At this point in time, it is being ruled by the Arizona Department of Transportation that what caused the road to collapse may have been an undetermined ‘geological event,’ according to KPHO.

Although the Arizona Department of Public Safety reported several vehicular collisions due to the event, no injuries were reported at this time.

Read more: http://www.inquisitr.com/534066/us-89-collapses-south-of-page-arizona/

[Ian David]

1. "undetermined ‘geological event'" = An Obama Conspiracy with the Reptoids under Mt. Shasta!

[XemaSab]

6. Lemurians to you

[villager]

2. No worries! Arizona's a red state and Republicans don't believe in "wasting" money on infrastructure

So that's OK, the road can stay that way.

Unless the Feds interfere, if it's a US highway.

Well, wait -- they're being sequestered.

So -- seek alternate routes, citizens! (And we don't mean via any of that commie mass transit/rail stuff, either!)

[awoke_in_2003]

22. If you see better pics...

like are linked below, this wasn't infrastructure- it was a pretty big geological fault.

[villager]

25. replacing it will be "infrastructure"

There's the rub.

[awoke_in_2003]

30. Ah, got ya. nt

[wordpix]

24. right, no infrastructure for you, Gov. Brewer!

[Warpy]

3. Here's a slightly better picture

http://twitter.com/ArizonaDOT/status/304244759097143296/photo/1

It looks like the whole hill is giving way and sliding down into the valley. Once the process is complete (and it could take weeks or months), that road will have to be rebuilt and possibly rerouted.

ETA: it's always a mistake to assume land out west is solid. Most of it isn't.

[wordpix]

23. geesh, I would not want to fall into that hole, wowser!

[Angry Dragon]

4. I wonder if Potato Head McCain will ask for money ............

[beerandjesus]

37. I was hoping the story would say that he fell in....

....but realistically, he wasn't even in Arizona, he was in the green room of yet another talk show.

[littlemissmartypants]

5. Has there been any fracking in the neighborhood?

Just sayin'...

Love, Peace and Shelter. lmsp

[ChazInAz]

9. Nope.

But we've been pumping groundwater out at such a relentless pace for decades that considerable areas have subsided.

[dixiegrrrrl]

16. considerable areas have subsided.

We seldom hear about that, and it is important to know.

[davidpdx]

35. I wonder if any drainage or sewer lines are under there

Remember the place in the east last year where there was a railroad tunnel underneath the highway and it caused a giant sinkhole? The damn thing kept getting bigger and bigger. I've never heard if they had any luck fixing that.

[dbackjon]

42. Maybe a few small culvert for drainage - but no other human made strucures

It is the side of a cliff.

[TheCowsCameHome]

7. Looks like a bootstrap got pulled up too tightly.

[Blue State Bandit]

8. There's aerial video from AZDOT.

https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?v=445741948830847&set=vb.117553941649651&type=2&theater

[ChazII]

41. Beautiful mountains

Thanks for sharing as this does give a better view of the situation. (no pun intended)

[LittleGirl]

10. Looks like earthquake damage like Japan

and they had their road fixed in 3 (yes) days. DAYS! I'll never forget that when the news reported the fix was 3 days.

[AtheistCrusader]

18. This is different.

This is an ongoing process, not a quick subsidence due to an earthquake. It's still moving.

[LittleGirl]

32. didn't realize it was still moving!

that's not good at all.

[DemoTex]

11. That's the "Monkeywrench Gang's" A/O

Hayduke lives!

[jtuck004]

47. +1 <G> n/t

[2naSalit]

12. That's pretty intense

I remember that hill. At the top all you can see is this big crack on a large wall of redrock and a little sign that says "HILL" and nothing else. Once you enter the crack, that is about 100 feet long, and come out the other side you are looking at a five+ miles long grade that hugs the rock wall of a mountain on the left side of the road and a long ways down on the other side. For semis, there are signs assuring you that there isa runaway ramp somewhere down the road... as it turns out, that runaway ramp is near the bottom and ends in a gavel pile to the right of the STOP sign where that road Ts with 89A (which is the rim road that goes to part of Grand Canyon NP... north rim think if you turn right at the stop sign at the bottom). If anyone ever needed that ramp, it was placed far too late for anyone to have made it to the ramp. Stupidest one I've ever seen.

I always had uneasy feelings about the stability of the road bed there.

Thanks for the post! Very interesting, I hope nobody was seriously hurt, glad I missed it.

[dbackjon]

14. Driven that road many times. Marvel of road building

[2naSalit]

19. Oh I had many

feelings about that road. I always figured that if my brakes failed while traveling down hill at 80,000lbs I might start hugging/scraping the rock wall on the opposite side of the road since I knew I'd never clear all those curves and especially the big turn to the right about a mile up from the stop sign and the runaway ramp (though I had engine brakes on most of the rigs I drove back then, you still need your service brakes to stop). It's about a 7% grade with little to no warning at the top. I stopped and took a bunch of pictures at the top the second time I went that way. Glad I was trained well and started down in a really low gear and even more so as soon as I could see what was ahead.

It's beautiful country, I just wasn't thrilled about the grade and the way it was engineered and the signage was poor. Might be different these days but back in the day, twenty some years ago, it was pretty unnerving the first time down.

I bought a bunch of jewelry at the tribal swap meet tables near the bottom.

Since it was sort of a "shelf" roadbed I wonder how long it will take to put that back into working order. It's a ways from Page, quite a ways from Flagstaff and the only road to get from one to the other.

[dbackjon]

28. It will take awhile to get it back in order. They really need a new roadway completely

Built to today's standards. See my post below for a bit of the history of it.

You can go via Tuba City/Arizona 98, but that takes you way around.

[Sancho]

13. Fracking in North Dakota was the cause...pass it on!

[SkyDaddy7]

20. That made me laugh!! nt.

[dbackjon]

15. A little history on that section of road

Before the 1960's, the road, and Page itself were not there.

Once the Bureau of Reclamation had decided on the Glen Canyon Damsite (basically on the Utah-Arizona border), they needed access to it. They told Utah and Arizona whomever built their section of the road first would get the town the Bureau would build to support the dam. (Of course, without telling either state they had already arranged a land swap with the Navajo Nation for the mesa that Page sits on.

That section of road was built in record speed - a wonder it hasn't collapsed before.

[Coyotl]

38. It looks like the fill moved, but not the unaltered geology. Humans caused this

by their lack of doing the job properly, obviously. You can see that much clearly on the aerial video.

[kentauros]

43. I can't look at either the video or the twitter image

(work blockage) so it's difficult for me to see a "collapse" versus a thrust fault. It really does look more like the rock moved up through the road than the other way around.

It's too bad as well that the reporter has never seen this kind of thing in person. I never would have considered writing in visuals related to video games and movies

[DallasNE]

17. So Gov. Brewer, Do You Have A 2nd Amendment Remedy Ready

Obviously the infrastructure is in fine shape since no Republicans want to spend a dime on infrastructure meaning it must be a 2nd Amendment issue.

This actually looks like an erosion problem to me. The ground washed out from under the roadbed so it eventually collapsed of its own weight.

[2naSalit]

21. Yeah

that's what it looks like. Thanks for the history of it, no wonder it was set up as poorly as it was. I used to run semis down that "hill" a long time ago, what you said makes perfect sense.


to AZ DOT...

[Monk06]

26. Wow a geological event that only occurs on the painted lines on a highway. No faulty construction

there.

[hunter]

27. It looks like California's Highway One.

Some part of it is always slipping into the ocean.

[CreekDog]

36. we're building a tunnel for that part

it's going to open this year.

[kairos12]

29. Road response to McCain Ben-gayzee questions

[WilliamPitt]

31. So Richter was having a nap? Nationally?

Globally?

Undetermined?

[marble falls]

33. I've worked at Wauweap Marina several summers when Del Webb ran it and it looked sort of post....

apocalyptic even then. A lot of the original "Planet of the Apes" was filmed there and looking out the panoramic window in the restaurant was a lot like looking into a diorama in a museum. Nothing for 100 miles in any of the three ways out of there.

[Politicalboi]

34. This is the "illegal fault"

If they didn't use the road, it wouldn't need fixin.
Jan Brewer 3.2.1....

[Coyotl]

39. McCain and Flake have already blamed Obama.

[RussBLib]

40. You knew it was only a matter of time that the GOP would blame Obama...

...for neglecting the nations infrastructure.

History means nothing to these clowns.

[Recursion]

44. Man. If only we had a bunch of unemployed people we could put to work fixing those roads (nt)

[IDemo]

46. "Leaving the road in a condition often seen in post-Reagan years"