News

AVL storm runoff again blocks road to brewery

By Bill Moss, Published: June 23, 2015

MILLS RIVER — A thunderstorm that dumped more than 2 inches of rain in 30 minutes at the Asheville Regional Airport caused stormwater runoff to flow from the airport site and cross Ferncliff Park Drive on Monday afternoon. The silt-laden runoff from the airport runway area was reminiscent of the retaining wall collapse on Christmas Eve that sent muddy water across the same road and into the French Broad watershed, resulting in the road's closure for a shirt time and a citation from state water quality regulators.

The Mills River Fire & Rescue Department and NCDOT officials were notified at about 5:20 p.m. Monday about the incident.
“We were dispatched out there because there was water going across the road,” said Mills River Fire Chief Rick Livingston.
Image from a video shows stormwater topping a retaining wall at Asheville Regional Airport.A DOT maintenance crew responded quickly to the call and worked to get the road reopened at 6:49 p.m.
“From an economic development standpoint, it was the second time that the main road serving both Sierra Nevada and Empire Distributing was closed, albeit temporarily, and the second time in six months that there was an issue for two companies that depend on transportation,” said Andrew Tate, who is president of the Henderson County Partnership for Economic Development and a member of the Greater Asheville Airport Authority.
Asheville Regional Airport officials did not have an immediate response to inquiries from the Hendersonville Lightning. The airport’s marketing director, Tina Kinsey, said in a message that she was working to gather information about the stormwater overflow.
Michael Reisman, the director of development and operations for the airport, was on the scene around 6:20 Monday evening.
“There was 2 inches of rain in a half hour,” Reisman said. “I checked the rain gauge myself.”
.The retaining wall collapse exactly six months ago caused the Mills River Town Council and the airport authority to question Asheville Regional Airport officials about the construction project and the engineering of the wall, which is about four stories tall at its peak and runs parallel to Ferncliff Park Drive for a quarter mile. The airport officials at the time blamed the failure on a temporary stormwater management system and assured the boards that the problem would be fixed. It came to light that the contractor, Thalle Construction Co., had started work on the retaining wall without securing a building permit from the Buncombe County Inspections Department and did not have one when the wall buckled.
In the December incident, stormwater overflowed the buckled wall after a heavy rain, crossed the highway and flowed into a wetlands area that feeds a tributary of the French Broad River. The state Department of Environment and Natural Resources found that the silt runoff violated the state's Sedimentation Pollution Control Act, the Asheville Citizen-Times reported at the time.

On Monday night, although the wall held, the river of stormwater appeared to have cut down a grassy bank.

The heavy rainfall caused multiple problems for a while, said airport Marketing Director Tina Kinsey.

“A few buildings experienced some minor flooding,” she said. “The airfield experienced some standing water for a short period of time before it was able to drain away. That’s unusual. It was just a large volume of water at one time, and the airport construction site experienced some erosion.”

The retaining wall, now finished, worked as it was supposed to, she said.

“I know because the (retaining) wall there is so visible that’s a big question,” she said. “It appears that the wall withstood these flood-level rains like it was designed to, which we believe will be confirmed by the engineers’ inspection tomorrow.

“It also appears the stormwater management system did work, as it should, and it did mitigate damage that can be caused by such a large volume of water in such a short timeframe. The large amount of water that drained from the site did make its way to the stormStormwater from a heavy rain Monday afternoon caused  bank erosion.water pipes and that concrete flume across the top of the wall,” she added. “There was some water that made its way over the top of the wall. There was erosion that occurred at the construction area south of the wall and there was sediment and water that made its way to Ferncliff Park Drive.”

Kinsey said DENR workers will most likely assess the damage if any today.
“We expect them to be on site today, as is normal procedure when erosion occurs on a construction site,” she said.
Chief Livingston, Tate and Reisman said they did not know if Monday night’s runoff would trigger a finding similar to the one DENR issued earlier this year.
“I have no idea,” Tate said. “From a Partnership for Economic Development standpoint our immediate reaction was to respond to the situation, communicate to the companies that would be impacted and of course outreach to DOT. They were extremely quick to get on site. Best I can tell they were the ones responsible for resolving the issue and managing the flow of traffic.”
Kinsey pointed out that the airport is in the middle of a five-year project that’s important to the economic vitality of the facility and the region.
“This project is the biggest construction project at the airport since it was originally built and opened in 1961, and is very important to the continued growth and economic development of the western North Carolina region,” she said.
The job of moving earth for the new runway is necessarily disruptive, she added.
“The erosion risk is linked directly to the construction project – where massive earthmoving is occurring and conditions are changing daily,” she said. ”Much of the water on the 300-plus acre project is flowing south at this time; however, as construction progresses, new permanent storm water management systems will be dispersed throughout the new airfield, per engineering design.”