U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to begin Breach Inlet project this weekend

ISLE OF PALMS, S.C. (WCBD) – The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Charleston District will soon begin a project on Breach Inlet that has been in the works for over a year.

“Between us and Sullivan’s and the Army Corps of Engineers, have been working, it’s really been probably about a year and a half on this project. We were hoping to have sand in place last fall, but just one delay after another so, again, hopefully this weekend it will happen,” said Isle of Palms Mayor Phillip Pounds.

Officials with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers said they anticipate the work will begin this weekend and called it a ‘beneficial use project.’ According to officials, it is different than a beach renourishment project because they are not constructing a dry sand beach.

“We’re actually taking material out of an intercoastal waterway, placing it in an area where we have some suitable material and we’re going to place it in the surf zone at Sullivan’s Island and Isle of Palms and then allow nature to migrate and attach to the beach there, versus constructing a dry sand beach,” explained Jeff Livasy, the Chief of Civil Works for the Charleston District.

Livasy told News 2 the work will begin on Sullivan’s Island and will last about four to six weeks before moving over to Isle of Palms for about four months.

He said they will place roughly 200,000 cubic yards of material on Sullivan’s and another 500,000 cubic yards on IOP. Together, that is equivalent to 700,000 dump truck loads.

“So, instead of them going and finding the material or doing sand scraping projects like they’ve done, this will provide some additional material that will make its way onto the beach and that they can perhaps use in the future to kind of reinforce some of that erosion that they’ve seen out there,” Livasy shared.

Mayor Pounds said while the city will have to pay to shape the dunes and dry sand beach, they will be given $10 million worth of sand for free because of this project.

“The city will probably spend somewhere between half a million and a million to shape that sand and shape the dunes, but a, you know, typical full beach renourishment project for us is probably a $20-25 million project. So, for us to spend, you know, less than a million to get that much sand is just a gift, quite honestly, from the Army Corps,” Mayor Pounds added.

According to the mayor, the city will place about 800 sandbags on the Breach Inlet of the island over the next few weeks until the Army Corps project makes its way to IOP.