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Lake Zumbro Dredging Project reaches halfway mark

6:54 pm Minnesota News, Top Stories

NEAR ORONOCO, Minn. (KTTC) – The Lake Zumbro dredging project is now halfway complete.

The goal of project is to remove sediment, which is a build up of silt and sand under the water. A total 450,000 cubic yards needs to be removed. Dredging crews are at the halfway mark having removed 225,000 cubic yards.

This stretch of Lake Zumbro is next to Fisherman’s Inn. An island of sediment has hindered ski shows from taking place here the past couple years. The dredging project will remove nearly all the sediment in this particular stretch of water, allowing the area to prosper once again.

Two dredges are working 24 hours a day, five days a week. On Wednesday, they were in front of Fisherman’s Inn removing the sunken island that’s built up on the bottom over the last several decades.

Ross Johnson is the project manager

“The sediment’s only a foot to 18 inches under the water, and [we’re] dredging down to five-and-a-half foot water depth. This will be a restored area, which the ski team will appreciate,” said project manager Ross Johnson with JF Brennan Company. More people, particularly boaters and skiiers, will have access to the lake again as well as navigable water.

The $7.5 million dredging project has been at least 10 years in the making, while sediment buildup on the lake has been happening for almost a century. Five million dollars will be used to dredge the sediment two miles east from the lake, while the other $2.5 million was used to construct a combined disposal facility, or reservoir, to dump it in.

Work is expected to be done on November 1.

Shannon Rousseau

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