A hole lot of trouble at dock

Published 9:00 pm Wednesday, January 14, 2004

MUKILTEO — The Mukilteo ferry dock just can’t seem to get a break.

Fierce winds and huge waves pounded the shoreline in October, flooding Ivar’s restaurant, a waterfront favorite.

Now, a 3-foot-wide sinkhole has opened in a ferry loading lane next to the restaurant.

The section of asphalt crumpled just as the last vehicle was headed onto the ferry about 9:25 a.m. Wednesday. The Ford Explorer’s front tire sank into the hole, terminal supervisor Dan Ferguson said.

"The poor driver. He wasn’t hurt, but he was shaken up," Ferguson said.

After the Seattle driver backed out of the hole, engineers discovered that the ground beneath the loading lane had eroded, leaving a hole the size of a small car.

"It seems like if it’s not one thing, it’s another here in Mukilteo," Ferguson said.

The sinkhole is the latest bad luck to beset the aging ferry dock. The October storm hit Mukilteo the hardest of any area on Puget Sound, causing extensive damage at Ivar’s that will likely keep the restaurant closed until late spring.

Last year, the ferry terminal was closed for a week so repairs could be made to the bridge that allows cars to drive on and off the ferries. The tower that lifts the bridge used to wobble back and forth every time a ferry docked at the terminal.

Engineers inspected the sinkhole Wednesday and said it won’t cause a huge hassle for drivers. One access lane to the ferry is closed, and heavy trucks are temporarily barred, a restriction that could be lifted as soon as Friday afternoon.

"Nothing larger than a Suburban is going to be able to go across. Everybody else is going to have to drive around" to reach Whidbey Island, said Susan Harris-Huether, a spokeswoman for the ferry system.

Forty to 60 heavy trucks use the ferry every day. Other ferry traffic was normal on Wednesday, and the hole didn’t seem to attract much attention from drivers boarding the ferry.

The sinkhole was caused by water seeping in through a rotting wooden seawall. The section, which linked Ivar’s seawall and the ferry terminal’s concrete wall, wore away over time, Ferguson said.

The erosion may have been exacerbated by bad weather this fall and winter, he said.

Crews are expected to repair the damage today. Sheets of corrugated metal will replace the wooden seawall, and the area beneath the loading lanes will be filled with cement, Ferguson said.

The state expects to eventually build a new ferry terminal, which likely will be located north of Old Town.

Ivar’s restaurant also will inspect its seawall, general manager Steve Anderson said.

"That was one of the concerns we had, whether there would be some washout from the October storms," he said. "It’s been interesting with the snow and the big windstorms we’ve had."

Holley Carey, who has lived in Mukilteo for 13 years, stopped to get a look at the sinkhole after buying some chowder from Ivar’s walk-up window, which is still open.

"These are such freak things," she said. "We’re such a good town, and look what keeps happening."

Reporter Katherine Schiffner: 425-339-3436 or schiffner@heraldnet.com.