CONGRESSIONAL DISTRICTS: DE-AL
APPROPRIATION / PHASE: Operation & Maintenance, General
BUSINESS PROGRAM: Navigation
LOCATION: The project is located north of Milford in Sussex County, DE.
DESCRIPTION: The waterway rises in Kent and Sussex Counties, Delaware. It flows northeasterly 13 miles along the boundary line between the two counties and empties into the Delaware Bay about 16 miles above Cape Henlopen, Delaware. The waterway provides an entrance channel six feet deep and 60 feet wide from Delaware Bay to the landward side of the jetties.
CONCERNS: This waterway supports the only launch service that provides safe transport of personnel and supplies to tanker vessels anchored in Delaware Bay and the nearby Atlantic Ocean. Reports of vessel groundings and associated damages have occurred during lower tide stages and
prolonged blow-out tide periods.
The U.S. Coast Guard has expressed concern that future shoaling in the channel could delay the response of oil spill emergency clean-up and containment contractors during lower tide stages. Failure to perform routine maintenance dredging will result in hazardous navigating conditions, damage to commercial, charter and recreational vessels, delays in service to the shipping industry utilizing the Delaware River, Philadelphia to Sea Channel, restricted and/or delayed Coast Guard national security vessel audits and economic hardships.
The jetties are rated failed relative to structural condition, but still functional in terms of navigation channel conditions.
PROJECT GOALS: The purpose of this project provides for an entrance channel from the Delaware Bay to the landward side of the jetties
PROJECT MANAGER: Monica Chasten