Workers blast massive boulder blocking Colorado Highway 145
Colorado Department of Transportation/Courtesy Photo
CORTEZ — Workers have blasted apart a house-sized boulder that crashed onto and shut down a southwestern Colorado highway linking Durango and Ouray.
The Colorado Department of Transportation says trucks are hauling away fragments of the 1,150-ton rock from state Highway 145 while workers build a temporary bypass.
That bypass could open Tuesday or Wednesday.
The Cortez Journal reports workers drilled 15-foot-deep holes into the rock to insert explosives before blasting it apart on Sunday.
That was done after workers checked the stability of a ridgeline 1,000 feet above from where that boulder and another fell on Friday.
The second boulder crashed across the road, creating an eight-foot trench. No one was hurt.
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