Clearing Waikokopu Slip Was Mammoth Task

For more than a month the roar of 19 bulldozers has filled the air with noise at the great slip at Waikokopu, where railway communication with Gisborne was broken on August 12.

Working day and night, except for brief spells when the weather stopped them, men and machines have slowly whittled down the enormous mass of rock and rubble which swept away 13 chains of the line and buried the Opoutama road.

A week after work started the scene of the disaster was visited by the Minister of Railways, Mr J. K. McAlpine, accompanied by the General Manager of Railways, Mr A. T. Gandell, and the district engineer, Wellington, Mr N. Russell.

×

 

• 

Mr George Moody, Inspector of Permanent Way at Wairoa, on the spot with Mr Gandell, Mr Russell, and Mr McAlpine.

×

 

• 

Bulldozer works high above Nuhaka Road

×

 

• 

Bulldozers in line made wide shelf in face of slip

Skill And Daring played their part in the work, as these pictures show. Bulldozer drivers, working exceptionally long hours, proved themselves almost as tough as their machines. After only a few hours rest, they were back on the job again, guiding their mechanical monsters to the very edge of the face for hour after hour, day after day, and week after week.

Pictures on first three pages of this feature were taken on August 21, nine days after the slip came down.

×

 

• 

Bulldozer shoves dirt over face high above beach

×

 

• 

Men enjoy brief break for morning cuppa

×

 

• 

This job requires skill and nerve

The big job, which extended from August 13 to September 9, was delayed at intervals by a series of violent storms from the south. The final stages were completed in a southerly gale and occasional rain showers.

Exposed to the full force of the weather, railwayman and bulldozer drivers laboured day and night under the direction of the senior engineer of railways at Napier, Mr D. Early, to have the line open again within the four weeks.

×

 

• 

Pictures taken two days before line was re-opened shows how broad shelf was cut across slip to take line, laying of which has started from Nuhaka end

×

 

• 

Ballasting the line after re-laying

×

 

• 

Bulldozers finishing off job at Opoutama end where creek had to be piped under slip.