— FORT PAYNE, Ala. (AP) — Alabama transportation officials hope they have the answer to preventing landslides on Lookout Mountain near Fort Payne: Giant nails.
The state Department of Transportation has hired Soil Nail Launcher Inc. of Grand Junction, Colo., to shoot long, nail-like tubes into slumping soil inside the Fort Payne city limits.
The Chattanooga Times Free Press reports (http://bit.ly/11wG9JD) that the company repairs landslides around the country, including in Tennessee.
Officials say the work will cost a little less than $3 million.
Johnny Harris, the state agency's division engineer for nine northeastern counties, says that amount is three to five times less expensive than going the standard route of building a rock buttress below a soft spot and using rock fill above the buttress to stabilize the slope.
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