BREAST CANCER? THINK MORE THAN PINK WEEKEND BREAK • PAGE 1C
145TH YEAR, NO. 65
WEEKEND EDITION //
FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 29, 2017
ONE DOLLAR
Arcadia
Beach RV
park draws
concerns
Residents worried about
traffic, environment
By BRENNA VISSER
The Daily Astorian
Photos by Colin Murphey/The Daily Astorian
A crew member on the Terrapin Island dredging vessel inspects a section of the dredge arm that submerges below the
surface of the Columbia River.
CLEAR CHANNEL
Dredging projects preserve shipping in the river
CANNON BEACH – Dozens of disgrun-
tled residents voiced their environmental and
safety concerns Thursday about a develop-
er’s plan to build an RV park across from
Arcadia Beach in Arch Cape.
James Smejkal, the owner and devel-
oper of the 17.6-acre parcel of forested land,
sought temporary road access to the parcel
earlier this year with the intent to build an
upscale RV park — mostly because it is one
of the only types of development allowed
with the land’s zoning, he said.
Smejkal’s consultant, Leonard Waggoner,
conducted the neighborhood meeting Thurs-
day. Smejkal was required to invite everyone
within 300 feet of the project to a public pre-
sentation before submitting a development
permit application. “The idea is for the com-
munity to give feedback to the developers,”
Clatsop County planner Will Caplinger said.
But many outside of the 300-foot radius
packed the Cannon Beach Fire Hall, some
as far north as Astoria and south as Netarts.
Organizations such as the Audubon Society
of Portland and the Haystack Rock Aware-
ness Program came out to denounce the
project. Concerns about adding traffic to an
See RV PARK, Page 3A
By EDWARD STRATTON
The Daily Astorian
S
ince last spring, the hopper dredge
Terrapin Island has been mak-
ing passes along the mouth of the
Columbia River, vacuuming up the slough
from a shipping channel that handles
about 46 million tons of cargo annually.
An estimated 10 million cubic yards
of sediment is removed from the shipping
channel each year and placed in the river,
on islands and out at sea. The U.S. Army
Corps of Engineers, charged with keep-
ing the channel navigable, is drafting a
new 20-year maintenance plan.
Sea critters
hitchhiked
on tsunami
wreckage
Clearing the mouth
Great Lakes, the largest dredging
company in the nation, has a contract to
remove 2 million cubic yards of sediment
out of the mouth of the river. After five
months of work, the contract is nearing
completion.
“We’re basically excavating underwa-
ter,” said Shohei Ishikawa, a site manager
for Great Lakes. “We are contracted by
the Army Corps of Engineers. The pur-
pose is to maintain navigable waterways.”
Between 3.5 million and 4.5 million
cubic yards of sediment is removed each
year from the mouth of the river, half a
mile wide and 6 miles long. The mouth
ends at river mile 3, near Jetty A and the
entrance to Washington’s Baker Bay.
Like a giant catamaran, the Terrapin
Island is made from two separate hulls
connected at the top by hinges. On either
side of the vessel are arms, like vacuum
heads, lowered into the water and drug
behind the vessel, excavating 9-foot-wide
swaths of sediment down to between
55 and 60 feet. Pumps in the drag arms
A crew member at the controls of the Terrapin Island looks out over the mouth
of the Columbia River during a recent maintenance operation.
suck sediment into a central hopper, a
giant wheelbarrow with an opening bot-
tom that carries up to 3,000 cubic yards
of sediment, equal to about 300 dump
truck loads, gathered in about one hour of
dredging. The bottom opens up, and the
sediment drops out.
How the vessel dumps sediment is
as complex as the dredging itself. Great
Lakes has three designated dumping
spots. The preferred site is a grid of deep
water about 8 miles offshore in the Pacific
Ocean. The dredge also releases sediment
near Cape Disappointment’s North Jetty
to reinforce the beaches underlying the
rock structure. In foul weather, the dredge
is allowed to dump in shallow water.
The Lower Columbia
from the mouth upriver to Vancouver,
Washington, where an additional 6 to 8
million cubic yards of sediment is taken
out each year. About two-thirds is dis-
posed of in the water, while another third
is put on islands throughout the estuary
and used for beach nourishment.
“We’ve got kind of a core engineering
regulation that charges us with making
sure we have capacity for dredge mate-
rial placement,” said Jessica Stokke, the
Army Corps’ project manager for Lower
Columbia dredging.
Most of the material is course grain
sand. The Army Corps finds places to put
the material to use, such as helping cre-
ate additional off-channel habitat in the
Columbia National Wildlife Refuge or
treating water for the city of Astoria.
A 600-foot-wide shipping channel
is maintained at 43 feet deep 100 miles
Marine migration after
Japanese quake in 2011
By SETH BORENSTEIN
Associated Press
WASHINGTON — Nearly 300 species
of fish, mussels and other sea critters hitch-
hiked across the Pacific Ocean on debris
from the 2011 Japanese tsunami, washing
ashore alive in the United States, researchers
reported Thursday.
It is the largest and longest marine migra-
tion ever documented, outside experts and
the researchers said. The scientists and col-
leagues combed the beaches of Washington
state, Oregon, California, British Columbia,
Alaska and Hawaii and tracked the species
to their Japanese origins. Their arrival could
be a problem if the critters take root, pushing
out native species, the study authors said in
Thursday’s journal Science.
See DREDGING, Page 7A
See CRITTERS, Page 7A
Stroke survivor credits quick response
Back on his
couch two
days later
By EDWARD STRATTON
The Daily Astorian
Ronald Paapke sat down
on the couch in his Lewis and
Clark home one evening this
month to watch the news on
TV when a massive stroke left
the entire left side of his body
paralyzed.
Within two days, Paapke,
54, was back on his couch,
after a quick response by all
involved, a surgery at Oregon
Health & Science University
and a recovery one of his doc-
tors called miraculous.
After a day of running
around, Paapke came home
and sat down to watch the
news just before 5 p.m. on
Sept. 19.
“As soon as I hit my chair,
I felt like a weird sensation on
the left side, mainly in my leg,”
he said.
Paapke tried but couldn’t
move his leg. He tried to get
up off the couch and crashed to
the floor before calling for his
wife, Jane Leino.
See STROKE, Page 7A
‘IT WAS PRETTY MIRACULOUS,
ALMOST AN IMMEDIATE RECOVERY.’
Dr. Stewart Weber | a vascular neurologist at OHSU
Colin Murphey/The Daily Astorian
Ronald Paapke, left, recounts the story of a stroke he suf-
fered and the quick actions taken by his wife, Jane Leino,
right, and emergency responders and doctors.