Sand pumping starts at Broadkill Beach

The first grains of sand bound for Broadkill Beach on Thursday began flowing through a pipeline staged to the south of the entrance to the Delaware Bayfront community.

The sand, 1.9 million cubic yards of it, will be pumped from the offshore shipping channel in Delaware Bay. The sand will be placed on the beach, and will give Broadkill residents and visitors more beach and more storm protection than they've seen since the early 1950s.

At high tide in Broadkill, the widest sections of beach are about 27 feet from the dune to water's edge. At the narrowest sections, houses are surrounded by water. The beach will not only be wider at 150 feet or more, it will also be higher.

The project is expected to cost $30 million in federal dollars. The state will pick up the cost of dune crossings, installing sand fencing and planting beach grass to hold man-made dunes in place.

On Thursday, New Jersey-based Weeks Marine, which won the Corps dredging and beach-fill contract, began pumping sand. The dredged material goes through a pipeline and large objects are captured in a giant screen.

The biggest difference local residents will see is the color of the sand. The newly-dredged material is gray. The existing beach is a buff color.

Ed Voigt, a spokesman for the Army Corps of Engineers Philadelphia District, said that as dredged sand settles in and is bleached by sunlight, it will eventually blend in with the natural beach.

The project is expected to move north first and then shift back to the south end of the 600-home community. As the work progresses, sections of beach will be closed to give equipment operators room to work and to keep people out of harm's way.

Under the contract, Weeks Marine has an April 2016 deadline to complete the work at Broadkill, but Voigt said it is unlikely it will take that long.

Reach Molly Murray at 463-3334 or mmurray@delawareonline.com. Follow her on Twitter @MollyMurraytnj.