Blasting begins to remove unstable rock face that closed Highway 97

Highway crews have begun blasting chunks of rock off the unstable rock face that forced the closure of Highway 97, between Kelowna and Penticton through B.C.'s Okanagan Valley.

Crews must remove at least 60,000 cubic metres of loose material on the slope before officials can reopen the highway, the province's chief geo-technical engineer said Tuesday.

Mike Oliver said they carried out small, controlled blasts to take off the top layer to stabilize the rock face. One small blast brings down about 2,000 cubic metres of rock, he said.

"We don't have to take out the whole thing.… We don't want to really shake this slope up because we don't want to get in there with a mess going on," Oliver said.

Highway engineers discovered a huge crack in the slope above Highway 97, between Summerland and Peachland, on Oct. 22 during a road-widening project.

The highway was closed two days later on the advice of engineers who feared the hillside could collapse because the crack had begun to expand.

The transportation ministry has since asked drivers whose vehicles weigh more than 27 tonnes to detour via Highways 97C, 5A, 3, and 3A or via Highways 3 and 33, when they want to travel between Kelowna and Penticton.

Other smaller vehicles have the option of choosing the Okanagan Falls Forest Service Road 201 between Penticton and Highway 33, southeast of Kelowna.

The ministry has also hired two 75-passenger water taxis to transport people for free between the Summerland Yacht Club and the Okanagan Lake Park water taxi terminal. The taxis run every hour from 5 a.m. to 9 p.m. PT, seven days a week.