CUT-AND-COVER TRENCHING IN SNOW

• Main Author: Waterhouse, R. W.
• Other Authors: SNOW ICE AND PERMAFROST RESEARCH ESTABLISHMENT WILMETTE IL
• Format: Text
• Language: English
• Published: 1960
• Subjects: Snow; Ice and Permafrost; Construction Equipment; Materials & Supplies; Structural Engineering and Building Technology; *SHELTERS; *SNOW; *CONSTRUCTION MATERIALS; DENSITY; MILITARY ENGINEERING; ROOFS; MILLING MACHINES; UNDERGROUND STRUCTURES; GREENLAND; ARCTIC REGIONS; WALLS; HARDENING; Arctic; Gage; Greenland; Ice; Ice cap; permafrost
• Online Access: http://www.dtic.mil/docs/citations/AD0652713; http://oai.dtic.mil/oai/oai?&verb=getRecord&metadataPrefix=html&identifier=AD0652713

During 1955 and 1956 a technique was developed and tested in Greenland for making snow-arch covered trenches designed for use as subsurface military shelters and communication ways on the Ice Cap. The initial installation consisted of a trench 8 ft wide and 10 ft deep over which an arched snow cover was formed on a removable steel form system. A track-mounted Swiss snow-milling machine driven by a gasoline engine was used in both the trench- cutting and roof forming operations. Five hundred feet of covered trench was formed and instrumented to gage the time deformation and closure rate of the cavity. A sequence of photographs are included to show details of the construction technique. The appendix contains details of the snow forms.