Building Iceland’s Lava Barriers

this job site is one of the most unique job sites in the world and probably one of the best examples of man versus nature happening right now in Iceland a a volcano is erupting it is spewing hot lava spouting toxic fumes volcano has erupted in spectacular style for the sixth time since December a spectacular and damaging site in Iceland lava flowed into the fishing town of grenic which was evacuated overnight no one was hurt but the town’s mayor says the eruption is threatening water and electricity Supply flooding is arguably the most devastating natural disaster and how have humans stopped water from ruining Civilizations for thousands of years well with dirt but what happens when you’re toe-to-toe with lava dirt also works here [Music] too despite its name Iceland is one of the most volcanically active areas in the world it sits at top two plates which separate little by little every year resulting on average in a volcanic eruption about every four years so when will the next eruption begin well the eruption is actually going on as we record this beginning in December lava started spewing from the earth in the rake Jenis Peninsula about 45 minutes from the capital of I Iceland rikic lava isn’t necessarily bad but it does become problematic when it starts to creep its way towards civilization which is exactly what happened here the lava threatened a few key areas the first was the town of grindvik home to a few thousand people second was a large geothermal power plant which produces a large portion of rik’s power and third is something called Blue Lagoon which is one of the biggest tourist destinations in the country of Iceland since the first eruption in December of 2023 five other eruptions have happened which have covered a total area of about 15 Square kilm shortly after the eruption originally began Icelandic authorities sprang into action and mobilized an enormous Fleet of earthmoving equipment to build barriers to stop the lava flows and I couldn’t believe the resulting videos with d1’s moving dirt and rock only a Stones Throw from lava and I had to check it out fortunately we had the opportunity to fly to Iceland to see the project for ourselves this July so let’s get out on [Music] [Applause] [Music] site so oh wow there’s a another oh there’s a we Dozer there you go oh there’s a d11 with the background established this is obviously a very critical operation so today they are building this main lava barrier higher and higher and higher like I said we have that power plant right over the hill there that power plant is producing hot water for uh a majority of Iceland that is a critical piece of infrastructure for the people that live in this country and it has to be protected by this Volcano by this lava flow and that earn barrier there is what is doing the trick so they’ve built it up about 20 M and over the past 6 months they’ve moved over 3 million cubic M of material to build that barrier holding back the lava but it needs to get bigger and bigger and bigger because just last week they had the lava coming over it they were using fire trucks putting water onto the lava to cool it down to slow it down so that they could get back to building it higher that’s what’s going on right now and they just keep building it until the lava stops the crosssection of the lava barrier is pretty straightforward it’s essentially a giant berm they’re moving it up and up and up in about 1 meter increments they don’t have to totally worry about compaction because you’re not battling water here you’re battling lava which is a little stickier it can’t get through this Earth uh as easy as water can so they don’t need to worry about compaction as much as a traditional Dam they can bring it up in those one meter increments and keep raising it until this lava stops some specifics of this operation we’ve got a kamasu 375 up top there we’ve got a Lee bear 776 over here a d11 a caterpillar 374 a Dean it looked like a 80 ton excavator not familiar with their nomenclature uh 350 two cat a D6 ton of articulated trucks there’s a ton of Earth moving equipment here because they’ve got to move this what is essentially lava rock as quickly as possible to build that barrier [Music] [Music] [Music] a [Music] it’s lunchtime let’s cut the to the dining hall wherever we’re going to now biggest chicken tendies thank you this is a pretty basic cut to fill operation yes we’re doing with lava here but it’s really just Earth moving at the end of the day we have two large dozers there’s a d11 back there next gen and then that Lee bear 776 it’s actually the first one I’ve seen running out in the wild they are using their enormous rippers to rip this existing lava rock that’s in this field here that’s a long day getting shaken around tearing that rock up that 776 it’s a smaller Dozer I mean it’s not small but it’s still struggling with this even that d11 is struggling this is tough stuff and then once they’ve ripped it they’re pushing it into these big piles and that’s when the excavator can take over and load the trucks this is a key weapon here in this operation to stop the lava these Ripper Shanks we’ve got that Lear and then this caterpillar right here this is about as big of a ripper as it gets you’ve got this entire tractor pulling against this one little area here which is most of the time more than enough to break this rock up to make it pushable to pile it up to load it into the trucks and then to haul it to the fill and in an application like this you can set these reppers up in multiple configurations triple shank double shank single shank this is a single shank because you want as much force as you can on one area to get through this hard ground quick size comparison this is the Lee bear 776 right behind me and here we have the caterpillar d11 [Music] this stack is not just building the lava barriers like the one to my left here they’re also having to do a ton of road work Believe It or Not lava does not care about what’s in front of it it just flows with gravity and so it flowed over a lot of the existing roads and infrastructure and now like the operation is going on and now like this operation here behind me it’s coming in rebuilding these roads to restore access to this [Music] [Applause] [Music] area exit that way oh no it’s upside down exit that way oh no no it’s it’s upside down exit that way it’s still upside down exit that way okay back to the program thanks to istac for having us out I’ve been watching this project unfold for the past 6 months drooling over an opportunity to come out here and they said come on out they showed us everything and I absolutely loved today so now we are going to get in our little rental car drive 6 hours down the coast of Iceland to another road project for another video I hope you enjoyed this as much as I did and we’ll see you next time stay dirty