The Yaquina is a 200-foot dredge vessel that visits Morro Bay annually.
“200 feet by 58 and then when the arms are out, it goes out to 70 feet,” said Kamuela Johnson, Army Corps of Engineers Assistant Master.
Since 1990, the vessel has been coming to Morro Bay to remove sand from the waterways, allowing for deeper pathways for boats to travel through.
“Right before they come in, we’ve had some issues with shoaling coming off the sandspit where boats have been getting stuck in the sand,” said Chris Munson, Morro Bay Harbor Vitality Director.
The annual month-long trip to Morro Bay helps improve safety in the harbor.
“You don’t notice it, but when you go out of the bay, there are often large waves that come in. By dredging it, it increases the depth and decreases the amount of waves that come in,” Munson said.
Johnson explained how the vessel sucks up the sand.
“It comes up the arms, goes inside the ship through the pumps, then it runs straight up just in front of this deck, shoots it forward, and this is where it spills into our hopper,” Johnson said.
A minimum of two people man the equipment and actively monitor the tide.
“Because we need to know how deep we are digging. If we don’t have an accurate tide, we don’t know how far we are putting the gear down,” Johnson said.
The ship can hold 90 dump trucks' worth of material, which they fill up in about an hour.
The dredging is done all day and all night long. The sand they collect is deposited about 2 1/2 miles south off the beach.
The Yaquina will be in Morro Bay until June 6.
