Greene Family Heading Out

We are the Greene family - Phil, Emily, Jonathan and Evelyn - and we begin our journey to Yabus next week! We arrive on March 14th, and will oversee the installation of the cable. Check out this Foundation Construction Drawing for a depiction of how this bridge comes together. Please pray that all the logistics come together on schedule, that nobody gets hurt, and that we can open the bridge for traffic before the rains hit!

Good News and Bad News

We have been able to remove much of the softer stone in front of our granite problem but have dug down and found another slice of granite. Wow, the sound the sledge hammer makes when we hit it! It is a high pitched ding, almost like hitting metal. We are searching around to try and find a chink in the armor of this stone and hopefully remove it piece by piece.

Finished Approach Walls

Here is a picture of the finished approach walls on the south side of the river. We will begin to fill the open space with a mixture of broken rock and sand. We beat it soundly with a sledge hammer essentially making a large stone.

Down for a few days

Of course we talk about pouring our blood and sweat into work but I took it literally this last week when a digging bar slipped and sliced my foot. I have a few stitches and will be laid up for a few days. It feels good when I keep it up and I have been able to get some needed work done (like updating you on this blog).

Getting sewn up at the clinic here in Yabus

That Dreaded Stone

Plan B is often the route to take in Sudan. Rarely does anything go as planned here. We have struggled greatly with a granite stone that lies in the place of our anchor. We tried many things to remove it (check previous posts) and looked at many other options. The route we are taking now is to remove the (not much) softer stone in front of it and put the anchor there. While this means the shape of our approach will have to change a little, it saves us hundreds and perhaps thousands of dollars from bringing in expensive equipment and lets us continue working right now. Note the large cracks in the rock that we have been able to put in by simply hammering large chisels into the stone.