Mike Pearson's Adventures on a Pale Blue Dot

Believe it or don't, but when I finally finished that job for the wealthy customer, and the balance owing was a tad over 10,000 bucks, he paid without fuss or phone calls within a week. So a happy ending for that one after all.  I started to prep for the move to work on the Sea to Sky Job immediately. I had to tell customers and digging contractors that it was all over and to start calling the other guy from now on. I would say that my wife was less than impressed with me working away from home at this point. It's not far as the crow flies, but we would be separated by the Langdale/Horseshoe Bay ferry ride. Kiewit set me up with an apartment in North Vancouver, only a few minutes drive to the project. I went home on weekends and during the week sometimes if it was at all possible  A brief side tour.  How did it come to be that the monster company Peter Kiewit Sons ended up making that phone call? Well let's go back a bit. I was working on a subdivision job on Gambier I...

Cut 14 is the area that was featured in the "Helicopters and Dynamite" story.   http://adventuresinmikeslife.blogspot.ca/2011/11/superbowl-sundayhelicopters-and.html This section of work was at the very north end of Segment One of the S2S Highway project. It featured very tall, steep rock bluffs that had to be sliced and diced to make room for a wider roadway.  This requires that we as the blasting crew have to do "pioneering" work, to get up on top of the rock features, so that we can drill down vertically for the actual cuts. In some cases, horizontal blast holes ( lifters ) can be used to minimize trail building, but it is extremely hard to control lifter shots. Lifter shots create lots of unpredictable fly-rock, more vibration and more noise than properly planned vertical hole shots. ( we did use lifter shots on Cut 9 and 10, when there was no alternative....and nothing to hit with the fly rock ) 330 Cat excavator up on a pioneer trail that's onl...

Here are a few more Cut 9 photos from photographer/videographer Joe Tompai. With notes that I have added to orient you to what it is you are looking at. I've added one of my older photos for contrast between the beginning of the cut and a later stage. Here are a few photos of the Cut 9 wire mesh being installed by the scaling crew....these are all taken by Joe Tompai Me, Joe and machine operator Randy returning from a photo shoot, the landing area is between Cut 7 and Cut 8....photo by Robin MacGregor