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Site preparation to repair two Fort Laramie Irrigation System tunnels in Wyoming impacted by a large-scale breach will start this spring, although permanent repairs won't be finished until 2028, the Star-Herald reported.

Bureau of Reclamation, Goshen Irrigation District, Gering-Fort Laramie Irrigation District and HDR Engineering officials recently held public information meetings to discuss the projects and the impacts, according to the Star-Herald.

Marcus Krall, project manager with HDR Engineering, said July 17, 2019, collapse involved two half-mile tunnels of the Fort Laramie Canal. A collapse occurred in Tunnel No. 2, which caused a breach and damage upstream to the upstream Tunnel No. 1, the Star-Herald reported.

Krall said the canals, which are part of the North Platte system covering 13 districts, were built by the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation beginning in 1905. The Fort Laramie Canal serves the Goshen and Gering Fort-Laramie Irrigation Districts and provides water to 107,387 acres. The two tunnels are half-mile tunnels on those systems.

All landowners on the system lost water because of the breach. The estimated impact to the area in 2019 was $90 million, according to the Star-Herald.

"Emergency personnel were on site very quickly and responded quickly, but the damage was certainly done," he said, noting that the sinkhole was 100 ft. in diameter and 50 ft. deep.

The work on Tunnels Nos. 1 and 2 is likely to occur over two consecutive non-irrigation seasons, with Tunnel No. 2 slated for replacement in fall 2025. The Tunnel No. 1 work would begin in the fall of 2026, with construction completed in the spring of 2028.

Before the construction begins, staging yards in Fort Laramie and near the tunnels will be arranged, with road improvements needed to ensure access to the tunnels, according to the Star-Herald.

Officials thought about excavating and removing the existing tunnels then installing concrete-lined channels and including a steel lining and carbon-fiber-reinforced polymer lining.

Instead, the tunnels will be rehabilitated by extracting the existing tunnel lining with a digger shield and replacing it with a segmented concrete lining built off-site.

Landowners weren't always pleased with the idea at the public meetings, the Star-Herald reported,

Some landowners wanted the canal diameters increased as a safety measure.

And some landowners were upset with the project's proposed cost. Engineers have said cost projections range from $52-84 million.

Engineers are pursuing funding.

The Goshen Irrigation District and Gering-Fort Laramie Irrigation District received $44 million in grants from Wyoming and Nebraska, with the rest coming from a low-interest, long-term U.S. Bureau of Reclamation grant, according to the Star-Herald.

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