Potential Dangers- Swimmers Beware

April 24, 2016

Most of us know that this winter was hard on our streets. Over the winter months there were several freezing and thawing cycles where water could work its way into crack, freeze and expand and damage the cement in our roads. The city is currently making plans on how to deal with our infrastructure however, there is a more potentially serious outcome of this winters climate that I want everyone to be aware of. The winter was not just hard on our roads but other exposed surfaces as well. The freeze/thaw cycles were also hard on our cliffs along the river. During this late winter and early spring some of the cliff-side had fractured and fallen into the river. This is a normal process of erosion and an example of how our landscape is constantly changing. I want to bring this particular spot of erosion to everyone's attention because I heard that some people have used this particular over-hang to jump into the river below. 

 

I know with warmer weather coming to our area and the approach of graduation some people's attention will be drawn to spending time in our parks and around the water. While I would never recommend anyone jumping off our cliffs into the river where the depth constantly changes, I want to point out what is different this year. The over-hang that stuck out over the water edge by a couple of feet has lost much of the rock that did over-hang the water. What makes things even worse is that couple of feet of rock is now in the river which extends the shoreline out a couple of feet. In other words, a jump which in the past would have landed a person 4 feet from shore, would now place that jumper onto some very hard and sharp rocks. Don't kid yourself! You will not clear those rocks (the ones above and below the surface). In the picture below you can see the amount of rocks that have fallen from the cliff and into the water.

This is all I wanted to cover in this article this week. I wanted to make sure everyone was aware of the new dangers. I know this seems like we are taking some fun away, but we just don't want anyone to be seriously injured! Please be safe and be aware of this new danger in our area. The City is looking into options to address this situation.

Yours in service,

Chuck Bradford,

Mayor - City of Mantorville

MantorvilleMayor@Gmail.Com

MayorBradford.BlogSpot.com