These photos were taken by Brendon Shave last night around dusk of Paul’s Slide on the west side of the highway. He drives the school bus through here 4 times a day M-Th. He believes this happened the day he took these or the day before. On the other side of the k-rail, there is 3 feet of mud or so…or there was last night at dusk. With more rain on the way, I sent these photos to Cal Trans and suggested an engineer take a look at this. I had originally scheduled this for first thing this am, but Cal Trans asked to be able to respond, so I postponed the post until I received their response.

A Cal Trans Geoengineer responded and sent me the first two photos, with the dates noted on them.  The last 6 photos are by Brendon taken at dusk last night.

“I received the photographs taken by a concerned citizen of the scarp adjacent to the road at Paul’s Slide yesterday. Our Maintenance Engineering and Geotechnical personnel have been observing that location for years and documenting it through photographs during the ongoing construction project. See the attached photograph from January 6^th showing very similar geometry to the photographs sent yesterday, and a photograph from October 1^st showing the same scarp feature before the fill reached the roadway elevation. The scarp and down-dropped material at that location are features of the landslide that constantly move and become more visible when the contractor is not actively working to place fill over them. We do not anticipate an imminent failure there and plan to fill in the dropping area when the site dries out and the contractor can access it. Please keep in mind that Paul’s Slide Complex is an active landslide and continued movement above and below the road are expected. The Department continues to monitor and maintain the area with our Maintenance Personnel and the contractor, including active patrols during the storms this week.”