volume 13, no. 1 summer 2017 - sargent corporation...volume 13, no. 1 summer 2017 cover photo:...

Excellence for Generations . . . Safety for a Lifetime

Sargent Corporation ON TRACK Summer 2017

Volume 13, No. 1Summer 2017

COVER PHOTO: Sargent crews spread sand over the liner system and place stone over the leachate collection piping at the Juniper Ridge Landfill in West Old Town. For more information about the cover photo, see p. 3. Story on pp. 16-17.



A message from Herb R. Sargent

We’re close to the largest backlog ever for Sargent Corp.:What does that mean? What doesn’t it mean? Before I sat down to write this message, I read every other newsletter message I’ve penned since 2005. Why? Because frankly I was struggling a little bit with context. As of this writing, we’re teetering on the verge of the highest backlog the company has ever had, and I’m trying to inform myself – and you – the context of what that means…and what it doesn’t mean. I read about the complete breakdown of Maine’s industrial base in 2007; the economic collapse of 2008; how fortunate we were in 2009 to have the backlog we had (when dozens of companies in Maine and across the country were struggling mightily); the in-creased backlog of 2011; then a return to modest revenues in 2012; the extreme weather and workload challenges of 2013; and finally, a return to some semblance of economic predictability in 2014 and 2015 that gave us something to cheer about.

* * * Things We’ve Learned Over the Past 10 Years. What does today’s strong workload mean in the context of the last ten years? What does it mean in the context of the current world in which we work? Does any of this inform the way we ap-proach our market, or the way we approach and execute projects? It should. What I (we) learned between the years of 2008 and 2013 is the I was damn glad we kept ourselves in good shape. In one newsletter I wrote that companies don’t get in trouble during the bad times; they get out of shape during the good times, and that condition manifests itself when times get tough. From 2009: “Like a survivor of a disease brought on by our own actions, we can take control of our destiny and improve our condition.” That critical health stage likely didn’t happen all at once, in isolation. It happened over a period of years. While I always believe we work lean, in those years when the economy was in freefall we doubled down on fitness. Af-ter years of a monotonous drumbeat in my newsletter articles to improve, improve, improve, it dawned on us that it’s not enough to preach: we needed to provide the tools. So we did. We implemented P3 Inspections and the Productivity Anal-ysis, as well as other procedures intended to keep the people executing the work completely informed as to the details the owner has asked us to construct – and to do so safely.

* * * What This Strong Backlog Means—and Doesn’t Mean Back to what I believe this strong backlog means: I believe it’s an incredible opportunity to continue to earn the confi-dence owners and engineers have shown for your efforts, and to build on that confidence. It’s a time to make sure we keep a bright light shining on all the things we have in our control. It’s a chance to make sure that all of us, as individuals, evalu-

ate our surroundings for areas where we can make an impact. As I’ve said before, that opportunity to make an impact is a gift to us, and we should all be proud stewards of that gift. And to what the strong backlog doesn’t mean: it’s not an opportunity to relax our standards, whether that be safety, quality or productivity. It doesn’t mean we can take anything – or anyone – for granted, whether it’s a customer, an engi-neer, an end-user or each other.

* * * A Blanket of Caution While we’ve got a great backlog and I’m more optimistic than I was 2-3 years ago, there is also reason to wrap that optimism in a blanket of caution. World events affect us tremendously, perhaps now more than at any time in history, and we need to be aware of how global activities could have an impact on our markets. Recalling 2008 and the great backlog we had at the time instructs me that this is no time to be frivolous with our resources, and it’s that frame of mind – put in a more positive tone – that I’d like to continue to operate with. As Herb E. used to say, “never stop honing your craft”, and my point here is that I want to have excellent corporate health when the good doctor pulls our number again (and he will…he always does, every so often). I want the good doctor to smile and beam at what tip-top shape we’re in, and the only way to do that is by diligent attention to the things that have always mattered to this company – the things that, over 90 years, have NEVER changed: always improving; respect for others; unparalleled commitment to our customers; support the community; forever challenge ourselves.

* * * Be Ready for Opportunities—and PLEASE be safe! I apologize if, in the context this wonderful backlog, I come across as saying “brace yourself for a real good time”. I want to enjoy what we’ve got for what it is, and I want to be ready for every opportunity that comes along. So enjoy it; work hard; love life. Do just one thing a little bit better today than you did it yesterday, whether it’s at work or home. Take advantage of that gift of an opportunity to make an impact. The biggest gift you’ll ever receive is that of giving…. On another note, as of this summer we’re celebrating having awarded over 250 scholarships to family members of employees in the last twelve years. This is an incredible op-portunity for the company to give a meaningful THANK YOU to employees for all your efforts! Please, please, PLEASE, be safe out there, and thank you all again – so much – for everything you do to lead this great company into the future. —Herb



On Track is published twice a year for the employees of Sargent Corporation.

HERB SARGENT, PresidentDAVE WOLLSTADT, Editor

Comments, suggestions, story ideas or address changes for ON TRACK should be forwarded to:

Lori OuelletteSargent Corporation

P.O. Box 435Stillwater, ME 04489

207-817-7557e-mail: [email protected]

Sargent Corporation, an ESOP company, is an equal opportunity/affirmative action/drug-free employer. Women and minorities are encouraged to apply.

www.sargent-corp.com

Sargent completes final cap on Phases 10 and 12 at Crossroads Landfill

Jim Richards on the excavator and Dave Sinclair on the dozer place 12” of protective cover soil on Phase 10.

tion manager and site engineer for the owner, Waste Management. CES of Brewer was the engineer. The project was a design-build project, with Sargent and CES working as a team to design and build the caps. “The owner put the job out for bid with-out a design,” said Colby. “Sargent brought CES in as the designer, even though CES was still working as the engineer for Waste Management.” To start the capping operation, Sargent crews had to relocate 20,000 cubic yards of waste to get the Phase 10 and Phase 12 areas up to design grades. Once that was done, the project required 25,000 cubic yards of clay, 26,000 cubic yards of protective cover, 13,000 cubic yards of topsoil, and 1,000 linear feet of gas piping. The crews had to go through the same process for both phases. First, they had to remove the temporary liners from both phases; this was done in sections to mini-mize water infiltration into the landfill. After removing the temporary liner, the crews started to build the cap. In areas where regrading was needed, they started by strip-ping off the existing sand layer and stockpiling it. After regrading, they put the sand back on. Then the crews placed a 12” layer of clay on top of the sand, followed by the liner and a geocomposite layer that drains excess rainwater from the protective cover soil to enhance stability and prevent infiltration of water through the landfill cap system. On top of the geocomposite, the crews placed a 12” layer of protective cover soil—a mixture of sand and loam—and six inches of

Sargent crews have completed the final cap on Phases 10 and 12 of Waste Management’s Crossroads Landfill in Norridgewock, ME. The project covered a total of 16 acres, as the two phases each encompassed about 8 acres of landfill area located about half a mile apart. Work began in May 2016 and was com-pleted in October 2016. Colby Currier was the operations manager for Sargent Corp., John Sturgeon was the proj-ect manager, and Dennis Bemis was the field cost manager. Dave Preble was the estimator. Tim LePage was the superintendent. the key foremen were Mark Wright, Mike Hamby, Jake Stevens, and junior foreman Jeff Hutchinson. Sherwood Mckenney was the construc-

the cover soil and topsoil from the top, but about one-third had to be pushed up from the bottom of the side slope. Colby said the crews were helped by the weather, as the 2016 was a very dry summer. “Tim and his crew were able to place a lot of material in a short amount of time,” he said. “The job went very well. Tim and his crew worked very hard and had some long days, but they also worked very smart. They were a really good crew, with everybody pulling in the same direction.” After the cover soil and topsoil was in place, P. A. Lyford of Hermon was brought in as a subcontractor to do the hydroseeding and mulching operations.

COVER PHOTO: Sargent crew members operating CAT D6N LGP GPS dozers spread sand to grade over the liner system during the Cell 10 construction project at the Juniper Ridge landfilll, while a T-770 Bobcat skid steer places stone over the leachate collection piping. The dozer operators are Brian Loiselle (bottom left) and Eric Nickerson (top left); the skid steer operator is Brendan Sargent. Working in front of Eric’s dozer are Holden Kimball and Jake Cormier, who are weighting down wrinkles in the composite as the sand is placed. Photo by Craig Shorey.

topsoil. The protective layer was designed to protect the geocomposite and the liner and provide additional moisture retention so grass would grow in the topsoil. Within the protec-tive layer, the crews created about 4,800 linear feet of surface water swales to carry water down the side slopes of the landfill without eroding the landfill cap. Colby said the Sargent crews had good management plans and did a good job of getting soils onto the cap with the least amount of people and equipment. Both phases had a fairly wide area at the top of the landfill where soils could be pre-positioned. The crews put most of the clay on the top so they could push it down the side of the landfill, because it’s much easier to push downhill than push up. That changed after the liner was installed, because once the liner goes on, everything has to be pushed from the bottom up. Colby said Tim and his crew came up with a good plan. They positioned protective cover and topsoil at the top of the landfill, and when they started putting the liner on, they brought the protective cover and topsoil from the top down the access road and placed it on the area where the liner had been installed.

The crews still had to push the cover soil and topsoil up on the lined area, but they didn’t have to push it all the way up the side slope of the land-fill to get there. On one of the phases, the crew was able to preposition all of the cover soil and topsoil and place it in that manner. On the other phase, they were able to place part of



Sargent crews complete $4.9 million project to construct new I-95 interchange at Trafton Road in Waterville

do a full-blown construction blast like in a quarry because they were dealing with small patches of rock. It was also difficult to de-termine where to put the dirt that was being excavated. Dirt from a cut area had to be put someplace, but we didn’t want to put it on top of a hump of ledge, where we’d have to move it again in order to blast.” Another challenge was getting the grav-el material in place to construct the on- and off-ramps, which required 28,000 cubic yards of gravel when measured in place. “There was so much product to move in,” said Sean. “We had to start at the be-ginning of each ramp and work our way out. There was one way to back a truck in and one way to drive a truck out. We didn’t have a big construction site where we could drive in, dump, and circle around and drive out. The ramp travel lanes were 14 feet wide—just wide enough for one truck at a time to back up and dump. It was time-consuming.” The crews placed about half of the gravel for the interchange ramps before taking the winter off. Normally, they would have resumed work in mid-April, but a combination of wetter-than-normal and colder-than-normal spring weather caused a later-than-normal thaw, which resulted in a three-week delay due to road postings remaining in effect longer than usual. “This was a very important three

a very wet spring in 2017, and the crews couldn’t do any work on Trafton Road un-til May 5. The crews grubbed the site in Septem-ber and started excavating to build the gen-eral shape of the ramps. The project was originally estimated to contain 50,000 cubic yards of excavation and 5,050 cubic yards of ledge excavation. After completing the blasting, it was calculated that the project had about 45,000 cubic yards of

Sargent Corporation crews, led by Su-perintendent Tim LePage, have completed a $4.9 million project to construct a new interchange for I-95 at Trafton Road in Waterville, about halfway between Water-ville exit 127 and Sydney exit 120. The new interchange opened for traffic on July 14, 2017. The project was funded with a com-bination of state, private and federal dol-lars. Trafton Properties Inc., which owns 921 acres in Sidney and Waterville and a former mill building in Waterville, contrib-uted $1.81 million, plus engineering and other costs. The balance was provided by a $1 mil-lion grant from the federal Economic Devel-opment Administration and $2 million from the Maine Department of Transportation. Work on the project began in September 2016 with an anticipated completion date (at the time) of June 30, 2017. “That didn’t leave us much time,” said Sean Milligan, operations manager for Sar-gent Corp. “The construction season usu-ally runs through November, and Trafton Road is normally posted in the springtime for heavy traffic. That meant we had five months—September, October, November, May, and June—to build a $4.9 million highway interchange, and we would have to contend with fall and spring rains.” To top it off, the Waterville area had

excavation and 10,000 cubic yards of ledge. The additional ledge was used to help make crushed gravel for the project. Excavation was a challenge because the crews often had to deal with thin layers of ledge that were very close to the subgrade. “The ledge was only a foot high in some spots,” Sean said. “There were a lot of places where the crews had to shatter that thin layer of rock to get down to subgrade without really blast-ing it. They couldn’t

Maine Gov. Paul LePage dedicates the new Trafton Road interchange on I-95 in Waterville.

Sargent Corporation self-performed the task of installing the signage for the new Trafton Road interchange.



Sargent crews complete $4.9 million project to construct new I-95 interchange at Trafton Road in Watervilleweeks,” Sean said. “With a June 30 com-pletion date and about half the gravel left to place, we had a lot of work to do.” One of the first tasks in the spring of 2017 was that the existing shoulders at the ramp tie in points needed to be excavated and new gravel placed. Coastal Road Re-pair was brought in to grind off the pave-ment on the shoulder of the highway, and Sargent crews excavated the old shoulder gravel and installed new gravel to meet current MDOT specs. With the on and off ramps located in close proximity to the existing Trafton Road overpass, the edges of the road had expanded a bit under the bridge to accom-modate the new on and off ramps. With the road widened out, the MDOT saw the need for a cast in place barrier wall to protect motorists from striking the bridge piers in the event of an accident, so the design called for a barrier wall on each side of the Trafton Road overpass abut-ments The challenge was that barrier wall had to be in place before the gravel and pav-ing could be done, and with such a small window in the springtime, everything had to go perfectly. First, the base slab had to be excavated, formed, poured, and allowed to cure for seven days. Then, the barrier had to be formed, poured, and allowed to cure for seven days. If everything went well, construction of the barrier would take about a month, which would leave a 30-day window for the gravel and paving. Thanks to a lot of hard work, everything went very well. Sargent did the excavation and backfill, and N. S. Giles was hired to do the cast-in-place concrete work. “It went as good as I’ve ever seen a concrete placement go,” Sean said. “The DOT bridge inspector said it was one of the best products he had ever seen in in-specting DOT work; his comments were extremely complimentary to N. S. Giles.” After the grinding, excavation, and bar-rier wall were completed, Pike Industries crews started putting their paving layers down in June. “It went very well,” Sean said. “The crew did a fantastic job. It’s pretty hard to work on the edge of a highway and get good production. You have to be extremely

aware of what’s go-ing on around you, as the traffic is mov-ing very fast and is very dangerous. The safety on the job was awesome.” As soon as Pike completed the pav-ing, Sargent crews completed the work on the edges of the road before the fin-ished surface was installed. Tim and the crews worked very hard and got good production numbers despite the muddy conditions. “The crews knew they had a looming deadline, and they were determined to meet it,” Sean said. “I give them tons of credit. Their tenac-ity for wanting to get the job done was incredible.” Pike crews placed about 6,500 tons of asphalt and competed the three paving layers—base paving, binder paving, and surface paving—within the deadline. In a departure from past practice, Sar-gent decided to take care of the informa-tional signs that were required for the new highway interchange rather than hire a subcontractor to do it. A new interchange requires a lot of signs, and last winter Sargent managers debated whether to hire a subcontractor or self-perform the work. They decided to self-perform. Designs for cast-in-place bases and steel supports for highway signs were completed over the winter months while Rocal Signs out of Ohio completed the manufacturing of the entire sign package. “Tim, Matt and the crew did a great job on the signs,” said Craig Shorey, project manager. “We’ve never done sign instal-lation before, but we made a plan over

the winter months and worked the plan, and everything went well. We’ll probably self-perform this type of work on future projects. It’s good to expand our skillsets to include different types of work because it makes us more versatile as a company.” Subcontractors who helped complete the job were Rosengren Landscaping, plantings; C.A. Newcomb & Sons, fence and guardrail installation; Maine Drilling & Blasting, blasting and shattering the thin subgrade rock; L&D Striping, the highway striping; and A.D. Electric, site lighting. Key foremen on the project were Josh Taylor, Jeshua Dearborn, Jacob Stevens, and Matt Chambers, and key operators were Art Morin, Brian Loiselle, Dave Sin-clair, and Matt Hatch. Gail Thibeault was the field cost man-ager, and Dave Preble was the estimator.

Sargent crews excavated the old gravel and placed new gravel on the shoulder of I-95 to meet current MDOT specifications.



Sargent crews on target to complete $6.1 million reconstruction project on Route 16 in Berlin, NH, by September 30 target date

let out for the summer, the crews were able to reconstruct the block between 7th and 8th Streets, where the Brown Street School is located. Also scheduled for 2017 is the sidewalk construction, landscaping, and final paving. One very positive aspect of the project has been the cooperation between Sargent and the local power company, Eversource (formerly Public Service of New Hamp-

crews had to dig within three or four feet of the river bank. The crews started by doing the mill-ing and overlay work north of the 12th Street Bridge. From August to October 2016, they started at St. Anne Church and worked northward to Maple Street. When the crews returned in May 2017, they tackled the section from Maple Street to the 12th Street intersection. After school

Sargent Corporation crews are on sched-ule to complete a $6.1 million reconstruc-tion project on Route 16 in Berlin, NH, by the target date of September 30, 2017. The contract was awarded on June 1, 2016, and Sargent mobilized on site on July 5, 2016. The project includes full reconstruction of 1.6 miles of Route 16 from St. Anne Church to the 12th Street Bridge, and mill-ing and overlay on an additional 1.2 miles from the 12th Street Bridge to Cates Hill Road. The reconstruction includes installation of a new storm drain system to replace the existing system. In addition to the reconstruction and new storm drain, the work on Route 16 is also a beautification project, with the installation of concrete sidewalks, brick pavers, and granite curbing and a substan-tial landscape package. Traffic signals are also being upgraded along the route. Glenn Adams is the operations manager for Sargent, and Ian McCarthy is the proj-ect manager. Aaron Tidd was the estimator. Mark Nicklin is the superintendent, Jeff Costello is the field engineer, and Chris Lee, Bob Mann, and Ethan Eckhoff are the foremen. Glenn said the storm drain installation was challenging because the crews had to deal with a complex existing network of sewer, water, and other utilities buried along Route 16. “We had to do a fair amount of in-field redesign work, changing the elevations and sometimes changing the layout,” Glenn said. “Sometimes we had to make allow-ances for other utilities that we didn’t know were there. The contract said we shouldn’t have to move water and sewer lines, but sometimes it was easier to do that than to reroute the storm drain.” The process was also complicated by the presence of ledge and the proximity of the Androscoggin River. “We were trying to keep everything out of the ledge,” Glenn said. “We had to put all three networks [sewer, water, storm drain] below the frost line but above the ledge. There wasn’t a lot of room to do that.” Most of the Route 16 project was locat-ed within 100 feet of the river, and much of it was within 30 feet. In a few areas, the

Bobby Mann checks the line on the RCP as part of the Route 16 reconstruction project.

The crew backs up recently installed granite curb.



Sargent crews on target to complete $6.1 million reconstruction project on Route 16 in Berlin, NH, by September 30 target date

shire) to rebuild and relocate 1.6 miles of power lines. Eversource owned the poles, which also carried lines belonging to Fairpoint (the telephone company), Time-Warner (now Spectrum, the cable company), and the City of Berlin Fire Alarm, as well as fiber optic lines. Glenn noted that utility relocations of-ten present a significant challenge on road construction projects, but he said working with Eversource was a pleasure. Gary Fysh and Jeff Noyes had lead roles for Eversource, and for Gary, who lives in Berlin, it was his last major project before retirement. “Gary and Jeff really drove the utility portion of the project,” Glenn said. “It was a nasty winter in Berlin, but the Eversource kept their crews setting poles. They were excellent partners, and they cared very much about staying on schedule.” Glenn also said that HEB, the city’s

engineering consultant, has been doing an excellent job of communicating with the public. Jay Poulin, HEB’s chief engineer, also lives in Berlin and has taken a special interest in the project. “Whenever there’s been a conflict, Jay gets involved and tries to keep things mov-ing,” Glenn said. The owner is the City of Berlin, NH, and the engineer is HEB Engineers of North Conway, NH. Mike Perreault is the public works director for the city. Kevin Hamlin is the on-site engineer for HEB. The project required 6,800 linear feet of pipe removal, 27,000 cubic yards of common excavation, 5,000 cubic yards of concrete road bed removal, 450 cubic yards or rock excavation, 3,000 cubic yards of granular backfill, 32,000 square yards of roadway grading, 5,000 square yards of walkway and driveway grading, 25,000 cubic yards of gravel, 12,500 tons

of hot mix asphalt paving, 7,400 linear feet of 12”-36” concrete pipe, 82 4’ diameter catch basins/manholes, 24 5’-8’ diameter catch basins/manholes, 4,400 square yards of concrete sidewalk, 2,750 square yards of concrete pavers, and 14,500 linear feet of granite curbing. Subcontractors on the projects include R&D Paving, Franklin, NH, paving; Tri-State Curb, Weare, NH, sidewalks and curbing; Cameron’s Landscaping, Farm-ington, NH, landscaping; Ted Berry Co., Livermore, ME, pipe inspection; L&D Safety Marking, Barre, VT, pavement striping; and Moulison LLC, Biddeford, ME, traffic signals. Key suppliers have been Ferguson Water Works of Wests Lebanon, NH, pip-ing; Superior Concrete, Auburn, ME (a unit of American Concrete), precast catch basins and manholes; and A&B Excavat-ing, Lancaster, NH, aggregates and gravel materials.

Sargent crew works on box cutting and installing roadway gravels as part of Route 16 reconstruction project in Berlin, NH.



Sargent crews complete pipe and revetment project for City of Portsmouth wastewater treatment plant on Peirce Island

Aerial view of the Portsmouth, NH, wastewater treatment plant on Peirce Island, showing a Sargent Corp. excavator placing boulders on the revetment.

Chris Lee in the CAT329E excavator battles the tide while tying in the water line for the new treatment plant.

Sargent Corporation crews completed a small pipe and revetment project during the winter of 2017 at the City of Portsmouth, NH wastewater treatment plant, located on Peirce Island, in the middle of the Pisca-taqua River. Sargent was a subcontractor to Methuen Construction on the project, which has a contract to construct a new treatment plant in the same space as the existing treat-ment plant. The owner was the City of Portsmouth, and the engineer was AECOM. Glenn Adams was the operations man-ager for Sargent Corp., and Ian McCarthy was the project manager. Matt Thibault was the superintendent, Alex Hardy was the field engineer, and Chris Lee and Jim Lagasse were the foremen. Adam Tenan and Pat Dubay were the estimators. Work on the project began January 8, 2017. The crews finished in early March. Glenn said the biggest challenge was access to the site. “Mobilization was an issue,” he said. “All traffic to Peirce Island had to go through downtown Portsmouth, which has very nar-row streets. Some of the streets were only 16 feet wide, which doesn’t leave a lot of room for low beds to turn corners.” All of the heavy equipment and large deliveries had to be brought in after hours. For Sargent, that meant before 7 a.m.

For the piping portion of the project, Sar-gent crews installed 2,000 linear feet of 8”-12” water line and 600 liner feet of sewer force main for the new treatment plant and 1,200 linear feet of 8” temporary water line for the existing treatment plant. One partic-ular challenge was excavating the trenches for the water and sewer pipes. Crews had to work against the tide in some locations, excavate around many existing utilities, and also hoe-ram some high ledge in areas. The revetment work involved placing

large boulders in a “stairway” type slope design in three areas along the shoreline surrounding the treat-ment plant. Glenn said the island is basically a big chunk of rock, but there are a few sec-tions where the rock is weathered and start-ing to erode. Sargent purchased the large boulders from the Pike quarry in Wells, ME, brought them to Peirce Island, and stacked them per design details

to counteract the wave action. Some of the boulders were as big as 6’x6’x6’. The biggest boulders went on the bottom; the smallest boulders—3’x3’x3’—went on the top. Glenn said the total was 650 cubic yards—about 1,000 tons of boulders. Renaud Trucking was a subcontractor to Sargent for hauling in the majority of the revetment rock. Sargent rack truck driver Nick Faloon also aided in mobilizing some of the largest boulders to the project site.



Sargent Construction Academy successfully completes 2nd year Sargent Corporation recruited 13 high school graduates to attend the 2017 Sargent Construction Academy for six weeks in June and July and then spend the rest of the construction season working on Sargent projects in Maine and New Hampshire. “They’re a hard-working group,” said Kev-in Gordon, director of workforce advancement for Sargent and supervisor of the Academy. The Academy started on Monday, June 19, and ran until Friday, July 28. The grad-uates, who were Sargent employees while they attended the Academy, started work-ing on projects on July 31. The new employees are: Charles Artus, Medford, Penquis Valley HS; Jesse Bab-cock, Stetson, Central HS; Jonathan Blake, Norway, Oxford Hills HS; Trey Brown, Winterport, Hampden Academy; Jake Cormier, Chester, Mattanawcook Acad-emy; Jakob Erskine, St. Albans, Nokomis Regional HS; Matthew Faloon, Howland, Penobscot Valley HS; Jacob Harford, Searsmont, Belfast Area HS; Reginald Johnston, Charleston, Foxcroft Academy; Hunter Morgan, Bingham, Upper Ken-nebec Valley HS; Calvin Smith, Bradford, Central HS; Cody Sylvester, Milo, Penquis Valley HS; and Mitchell Wallace, Carra-basset Valley; Mt. Abram Regional HS. During the six-week training period, the group received training in construction and mining safety, daily inspection and heavy equipment operation, general surveying tech-niques, and underground utility installation. In addition to Kevin, the instructors were John Milligan, a former Sargent employee who teaches heavy equipment operation at UTC, and Ken Thurlow, an operator who was brought in from the field for five weeks. Jason Frederick, safety and training co-

ordinator for Sargent, provided a variety of safety training activities, including OSHA 10 construction safety training, MSHA new miner training, confined space training, and rigger safety training, as well as coordinat-ing the busing and housing and taking care of all the logistics. He also coordinated tours and worked with the Old Town Fire Department to provide training in first aid, CPR, ladder safety, and fire safety. Kevin said the Academy tries to dovetail classroom training with field experience. “We try to get them out in the field, work-ing on equipment and small tools,” he said. In one exercise, the Academy students divided into four groups and went to the Old Town Rec Center (a non-profit organization located next door to Sargent’s Stillwater headquarters) and devised plans for exca-vatig two additional parking areas—how

they would do the work and what materials they would need. Each group presented its plan to the Rec Center director. He picked one plan, and that crew did the work. The other three groups did varied mainte-nance work around Stillwater. One group had to develop plans for a ditch line—figuring out the grade and slope and then excavating the ditch one. A second group repaired a road behind the fabriation shop that was very low. The group had to figure out the grades and then shim the road up and build a ditch to drain water off the roadway to a catch basin. The third group had to straighten gate posts—digging them out, putting them back in, and then lining them all up. In another training exercise, the Acad-emy students constructed an addition to the parking lot behind the Sargent Materials

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A crew from Sargent Construction Academy assist in removing silt, gravel, and debris from the cell that is under construction in Bethlehem, NH.

SaRgenT COnSTRuCTiOn aCademy CLaSS OF 2017—Front row (l. to r.): John Milligan (instructor), Jacob Harford, Trey Brown, Mitchell Wallace, Cody Sylvester, Charles Artus, Calvin Smith, and Ken Thurlow (instructor). Middle row: Kevin Gordon (instructor), Hunter Morgan, Jake Cormier, Jakob Erskine, Reginald Johnston, Jonathan Blake, and Jason Frederick (instructor). Back row: Jesse Babcock and Matthew Faloon.



Sargent completes Phase 1 of access road for new biofuel plant

Sargent Corporation has received the Maine Aggregate Association Achievement in Safety Award for its pit and quarry operations in 2016. Sargent Corporation had zero accidents as reported on the Quarterly Mine and Coal Production Reports for the year. This award recognizes the company’s commitment to the safety of its employees for operations reported to the Mine Safety & Health Administration.

(Continued from preceding page)Sargent Construction Academy

Sargent Corporation has completed the first phase of the access road construction for a new waste-to-biofuel plant that’s intended to handle the solid waste disposal needs of more than 100 municipalities in central and northern Maine. The project included construction of the left side of a 4,600-foot access road—15 feet of roadway and shoulder—with 4,600 linear feet of 8” gravity sewer and 2,250 linear feet of 8” force main. The access road and sewer lines run from Coldbrook Road to the location of the proposed plant—a 10-acre site between I-95 and Route 202 in Hampden. The project also included installation of a 22-foot tall, 10-foot dia meter pump station about mid-way down the access road, along with 19 sewer manholes, an air release manhole, a grinder manhole, a 60-foot-long precast bridge (a three-sided culvert), and 1,350 linear feet of 6” and 12” underdrain pipe. Work on Phase 1 began in October and was substantially complete in January. Sean Milligan was the operations man-ager for Sargent Corp., Jim Braley was the project manager, and Gail Thibeault was the field cost manager. Chris Lynch was the superintendent, and Jake Harris, Randall King, Jake Stevens, and Chris Curtis were the key foremen. Installation of the sewer line and the pump station was a major challenge for the Sargent crews. “The soils were not good,” said Sean. “The first 1,700 linear feet of the gravity sewer coming out of the pump station were 12 to 14 feet deep, putting us well below the water table and into unstable soils. The trench walls would cave in before we could even set the first trench box in the ground. These issues, coupled with winter condi-tions, made the 8” gravity sewer installation very difficult. However, Jake, Randall, and their crews persevered, maintained a posi-tive attitude, and were able to meet budget.” Sargent crews had to import 6,000 cubic yards of suitable granular fill to complete construction of the sewer line. The unsuit-able and excess soils were stockpiled on an adjacent lot. The crews placed 4,600 cubic yards of

building, excavating the project area and using a bulldozer to prepare the site. One of the highlights of the training period came in mid-July when operations manager Glenn Adams called Kevin and asked for some help with the North Coun-try Environmental Landfill project in Beth-lehem, NH, which had been plagued by heavy rains. “Glenn called and asked if we could send some guys out there,” Kevin said. “I told him we could send the entire crew.” All 13 Academy students finished their work in Stillwater on Friday afternoon, July 14, and drove out to New Hampshire Friday evening and stayed in a motel. Early Saturday morning, they started working to help remove silt, gravel and debris that had washed into the cell that was currently un-der construction during a rainstorm earlier in the month. The material had to be re-moved from the liner for the project to con-tinue. They spent the next 9½ hours work-ing with other Sargent employees shoveling the material into wheelbarrows and bringing

it to the edge of the cell, where they loaded it into Joe Conn’s excavator bucket. When-ever his bucket was full, Joe placed the ma-terial onto the slope of the existing landfill. “They did a real good job,” Kevin said. “It was hot, hard work. They were pretty happy when they drove home Saturday night. It was the first time they’d been able to get out and actually work, helping a Sar-gent crew get its work done.” The 2017 class at Sargent Construction Academy is bigger than last year’s class, and the employees come from a wider geograph-ic area of Maine—from as far away as Bing-ham, Carabassett Valley, and South Paris. Four employees in this year’s class at-tended the Tri-County Technical Center in Dexter and three attended the United Tech-nologies Center in Bangor. Last year, 11 employees completed Sar-gent Construction Academy training. Of those, eight returned to work for the 2017 construction season, and one more may come back later this year. “That’s awesome,” Kevin said. “That’s what we want to do. We want these em-ployees to come back. We’re trying to build our work force for the future.”



Sargent completes Phase 1 of access road for new biofuel plant gravel to build the first half of the access road. They also placed 20,000 square yards of fabric on the subgrade beneath the gravel to stabilize the subgrade and prevent the subgrade soils from migrating into the gravel. The pump station was 22 feet deep, so the crews had to drive sheet piles to create a coffer dam to allow the excavation and construction of the foundation. The Sargent Fabrication Shop in Still-water helped with the sheet piles Phase 2 of the project, which began this spring, will include construction of the second half of the access road. Phase 2 also includes the installation of 5,500 linear feet of 12” water line along the shoulder of Coldbrook Road, an additional 4,600 linear feet of 12” waterline to the end of the access road, a mile of cross country sewer force main connecting to the existing gravity sewer at the Ammo Industrial Park in Hamp-den, another 1,000 linear feet of underdrain piping and eight Filterra drainage structures. The project owner is the Municipal Review Committee, Inc., a non-profit asso-ciation of Maine communities that has part-nered with Fiberight to offer an innovative solution to recycle and process municipal solid waste (MSW). The engineer for MRC is CES of Brewer. The MRC-Fiberight plan calls for process-ing MSW into several different products, including recyclables, which will be sold on the open commodities market; post-hydrolysis

100 of them have agreed to send their MSW to the Fiberight facility in Hampden for processing and recycling.

Rick McKinley and Jake Harris drive the first sheets for the pump station cofferdam.

Dakota Therrien fills the stone box wile Pete Melanson backfills the sewer trench.

solids, which will be used to fuel on-site biomass boilers; bio-methane, which will be piped to the adjacent Bangor Natural Gas Loring Pipeline; and biomass fuel (sugar), which will be sold on the open commodities market. Fiberight estimates that approximately 80% of the incoming waste will be converted to products, and the remaining 20% will require disposal at a licensed landfill. The MRC currently has 187 members—cities, towns, counties, and other municipal entities in central, northern, and eastern Maine. More than

Randall King and his crew set the first footing on a prepared stone base for the precast bridge.



Runway 1-19 rehab project nearing completion at Mecklenburg airport

Aerial view of Phase A1 pavng and grading operations at the north end of the runway.

Sargent Corporation is nearing comple-tion of a $4.1 million project to rehabilitate Runway 1-19 at the Mecklenburg-Bruns-wick Regional Airport in Brodnax, VA. Work started in May 2017 and is sched-uled to be completed in August. The project includes 16,500 tons of variable depth overlay on Runway 1-19 and taxiways, installation of 51,000 square yards of asphalt overlay fabric, and over 30,000 linear feet of crack repair, fillet widening on existing taxiways, and demo-lition and replacement of airfield lighting. Justin Porter is the operations manager for Sargent Corp., and Scott Bartlett is the project manager. Marc Denis is the super-visor, and Tim Powell is the foreman. Pat Dubay was the estimator. The owner is the Mecklenburg-Bruns-wick Regional Airport Commission, and the project engineer is Delta Airport Con-sultants, Inc. Prior to starting any of the grading work along the taxiways and runway, Sargent crews had to build eight sediment basins and 4,000 linear feet of diversion berms. The basins and the diversion berms were completed in May. The project had a significant amount of subcontractor work making coordination between subcontractors very important. Marc did a good job coordinating and se-quencing the work between subcontractors to meet the schedule. Subcontractors are Adams Construc-tion Company, Roanoke, VA, paving; Landsaver Environmental, Richmond, VA, paving fabric; RCS Communications, Max Meadows, VA, electrical; HASCO, Inc, Greensboro, NC, crack repair and pavement marking; Hydroseeding

Technologies, Canandaigua, NY, sod and seeding; Erosion Control Services, Vir-ginia Beach, VA, silt fence; and Cardinal International, Conshohocken, PA, runway grooving. The variable depth pavement overlay of the runway ranged from 4” to 7” and was a process. Adams Construction had to mill in some areas and run a shim lift over other areas to ensure they were placing two

of paving, the paver broke through the existing asphalt, resulting in the discovery of an abandoned well that had to be back-filled. Scott said the project duration is 95 calendar days, and was broken up into five phases all with tight milestone deadlines. The crews are working hard to ensure they meet all the milestsones and complete the job in early August.

separate 2” lifts of P-401. Once the runway was paved, Sargent crews raised the grades of the shoulders and Hydroseed-ing Technologies installed a 7’ wide strip of sod along the runway. During the second day

Sargent crews place fill material along the edge of the existing runway to raise grades to match the new runway elevations.

Sargent crews backfill the abandoned well that was discovered during paving operations.



Scott Moon, Chris Dorr, and Chris Dean backfill Building 26.

Site work completed for 3 new 6-unit townhouses at Husson Sargent Corporation crews have com-pleted the site work for three six-unit town-houses at Husson University in Bangor. The project, called the Husson Uni-versity Village Townhouses, included excavation and site preparation for the three structures, plus underground utilities, access roads, parking areas, courtyards, and sidewalks. Work on the five-acre site started in early November 2016 and was substan-tially complete at the end of July 2017. Sargent was a subcontractor to JF Scott Construction of Winthrop. James W. Sewall Co. of Old Town designed the site. Steve Raymond was the superinten-dent for Sargent until he was assigned to a different project in April 2017. Richard Gushue, who had been a foreman on the project, took over as site supervisor when Steve left. Sean Milligan was the operations manager for Sargent, Jim Braley was the project manager, and Gail Thibeault was the field cost manager. In addition to Richard, the key foremen on the project were Chris Curtis, Scott Moon, and Curt Van Aken. The project required 4,300 cubic yards of imported structural fill, 4,500 cubic yards of subbase gravel, 2,100 cubic yards of base gravel, 1,500 linear feet of storm drain piping, 14 catch basins, 1,000 linear feet of 8” water line, 1,300 linear feet of 8” sanitary sewer, five sewer manholes and 7,800 linear feet of underground electrical and natural gas piping.

A total of 520 cubic yards of ledge had to be removed. Some of the ledge was blasted by Drilling & Blasting Rock Specialists of Gardiner, ME, while the remainder was hoe-rammed by Sargent crews, primarily for trench excavation. Husson University Village Townhouses is located on Farmhouse Road on the east side of the campus. Roughly 850 linear feet of Farmhouse Road was regraded and paved as part of the project, and 500 linear feet of access roads and three parking lots were constructed. Operations manager Sean Milligan said the majority of the construction was located at the perimeter of the Husson campus. “We weren’t in the main campus area except for utility tie-ins,” he said. “We had to cross Kagan Drive to tie in the sewer, water, and underground electric lines near

College Circle. Once we crossed Kagan, we were out of the way.” The number of significant snow storms, an active freeze – thaw cycle and a very wet spring proved to be a great challenge on the project. “We had to maintain access for the general contractor and the subs, even when we didn’t have a full-time presence on the site,” Sean said. “Between the rainfall and the freeze-thaw weather pattern, access around the buildings became very muddy, so much so that the lulls were getting stuck carrying materials to the buildings. Eventually, we brought in steel plates to reinforce the roadways to facilitate access around the buildings.” Dealing with ledge was another chal-lenge as the top of ledge elevation was very random across the site. “We had to hoe-ram a fair amount of ledge in order to install the utilities,” Sean said. “That slowed us up at times.” Subcontractors on the project included Wellman Paving of Winterport, asphalt paving; Dirigo Slipform of Old Town, concrete curb; P. A. Lyford of Hermon, seeding; and Wilson’s Lawn Service of Hermon, pavement marking. HMA (hot mix asphalt) pavement and concrete for the slipform curbs were provided by Sargent Materials. Concrete for the building foundations and slabs was provided by Sargent Materials to Lajoie Brothers of Augusta, which was a subcon-tractor to JF Scott Construction. The new townhouses will be open for the fall 2017 semester.A Sargent crew installs sewer services to Buildings 16 and 26.



Sargent crews excavate for the new taxiway at the Greenville airport.

Sargent completes 4,100’ taxiway at Greenville, ME airport Sargent Corporation has completed a $2.8 million project to construct a 4,100’ taxiway parallel to the 14-32 main runway at the Green-ville, ME, airport. Work on the project start-ed in August 2016, which is late for an airport job. As a result, the project was shut down in November, because it was too cold to transport asphalt from Hermon to Greenville and the ground temperature of the runway was getting too close to 40 degrees F., the minimum temperature for paving. The crews returned in the spring, and the job was completed in June. Colby Currier was the op-erations manager for Sargent Corp., and Travis Fernald was the project manager. Dave Preble was the estimator. Rick Clement was the superintendent, and Brent Williams, Tim Nadeau, and Keith Edgecomb were the foremen. The project required 47,000 cubic yards of ex-cavation and placement of 39,000 cubic yards of com-mon borrow, 28,000 cubic yards of P154 subbase gravel, and 3,800 cubic yards of P208 base gravel. All of the gravel was crushed on-site. About 15,000 cubic yards came from rock that was blasted primarily from the east side of runway 14-32. The remainder came from rock that town allowed Sargent to blast from an adjacent area on site. The project also included installation of 2,200 linear feet of stormdrain, 8,100 linear feet of underdrain (on both sides of the taxiway), 13,500 linear feet of electri-cal trenching for all new lighting down the taxiway, and 4,000 tons of pavement. The crews started in August by excavat-ing part of the old taxiway, which ran be-tween the two runways and passed in front of the arrivals building and two hangars. They started building the new taxiway on

the 14 (west) end, working east toward the in-tersection with the 3-21 (north-south) runway. By November, they had completed the sub-base and installed the subbase gravel (P154) and base gravel (P208) for the entire section. On the other side, the crews had com-pleted the subgrade and placed about 50% of the subbase gravel. Stockpiles of the base gravel and the remaining subbase gravel were in position and ready to go for spring. At the end of the season, the crews left for the winter. With the project area closed off, Greenville continued to use the airport as it normally would. Sargent crews returned in May and fin-ished placing the subbase gravel on the west end of the taxiway, placed the base gravel, and then they fine-graded the entire taxiway. The paving was done by Wellman Pav-

ing, using hot mix asphalt from the Sargent Materials plant in Hermon. In addition to Wellman Paving, subcon-tractors on the job included Comprehen-sive Land Technologies (CLT) of South China, clearing; Maine Drilling and Blast-ing, Gardiner, blasting; County Electric, Caribou; Norpine Landscape, Kingfield, hydroseeding; ProSeal, Waterville, crack sealing in the runway and markings on the new taxiway; and FGS/CMT, Bangor, quality control testing. The owner was the Town of Greenville; the engineer was Stantec of Caribou. Colby said the Stantec engineers were a very good group to work with. “They were right on site with us full time,” he said. “Any issues that came up were resolved quickly.”

All of the gravel for the taxiway construction was crushed on site.



The completed pump station with Bracy Cove in the background.

The concrete subcontractor places concrete for the frost wall footing around the wet well at the Bracy Cover pump station.

for the remainder of the winter. When the pump skid arrived on March 29, the crews set it on the concrete slab and spent the next two weeks doing a lot of interior piping down in the wet well. When the piping was complete, the crews did a start-up of the pump station with rep-resentatives of the owner, the pump skid manufacturer, the owner-supplied genera-tor company, Sargent, and Wilcox Electric of Bradley, the electrical subcontractor. Everything went well during a trial start-up, so the equipment was shut down as the crews prepared for the final tie-in. During the trial start-up, the old pump station was shut down, and the new pump station was pumping fresh water from the new wet well for the test. To keep the system operating, the sewage had to be pumped into septic trucks supplied by Action Septic of Trenton and Terry’s Tank Service of Southwest Harbor. They took the sewage to a different pump station down the road, where it was pumped back into the town sewage system. The new pump station was started up; the piping leaving the new pump station was tied into the town sewer line. Finally, the existing pump station had to be deacti-vated, and the line bringing sewage to the old pump station had to be tied into the new system. Once that was done, the new system was operational, and the Sargent crews rehabbed the site, cleaned up, and left in early May. Wellman Paving did the permanent road crossing in the spring. Lander Group and Project Flagging provided flagging services.

After the access road was constructed, the crew installed the force main piping in the roadway and ran the electrical line in a trench along the side of the road and across Route 3, where it was tied into the existing utilities on the north side of the main road. While the construction was underway, the crew had to ensure that the existing pump station and force main continued to operate. The crew worked from November through January on the pump station struc-ture, which included the 10-foot-diameter concrete wet well, a slab on top of the wet well that provided a platform for the new pump station, and a foundation that was erected around the pump station in case the owner wanted to put up a building some-time down the road. Blasting for the wet well was done by Drilling & Blasting Rock Specialists of Gardiner, and the wet well was provided by American Concrete of Veazie. L.E. Norwood of Bar Harbor did the concrete

Sargent crews have replaced a pump station for the Town of Mt. Desert to en-sure continued sewer services for residents on the east side of Bracy Cove on the southern tip of Mt. Desert Island. The project included a new 10’ diameter wet well with a slab on top and a founda-tion around it so that the owner could erect a building on top of it in the future. It also included new force main piping, which was tied into the town sewer line on Route 3 (Peabody Drive). Colby Currier was the operations man-ager for Sargent Corp., and Travis Fernald was the project manager. Peter Broberg was the superintendent. Key foremen were Keith Wasson, Chris Curtis, Mike Hamby, John Koch, Jake Stevens, and Chris Wilson. The owner was the Town of Mt. Desert, and the engineer was Olver Associates of Winterport. Work started in November 2016, as the crew constructed a 200’ access road to the pump station from Route 3. Before leaving the site at the close of the project, the crew restored the site to its original appearance. The project required 200 cubic yards of excavation for the wet well, 200 cubic yards of rock excavation, and 300 linear feet of electrical trench. Colby said the crew had to be very care-ful about working around the pump station and the rest of the project area. “There were a number of features that the owner didn’t want disturbed, including certain rocks, trees, bushes, and fences,” he said. “This was a very sensitive project.”

work for the slab and the foundation. After the founda-tion was completed at the end of January, the crews had to wait for the pump skid (the mechanical system that sits on top of the slab and does all the actual pumping), which was being supplied by the owner. Since the pump skid wasn’t scheduled to arrive until the end of March, the crews left in early February

Pump station replaced at Bracy Cove for Town of Mt. Desert



Sargent crews begin work on Cell 10 at Juniper Ridge landfill in West Old Town

The pipe installation went very well, but it was a challenge for the crews because of the number of pipes—existing gas transmission lines, drainage piping, electrical conduit pipes, etc.—that were encountered in the tie-in area. “After we completed the tie-ins, installing the pipe installation was pretty straightfor-ward,” said Sean Milligan, operations man-ager for Sargent Corp. “However, working around the tie-in point is always complicated. You have to get the box placed safely without disturbing all the other utilities.”

After the gas line was installed, the crews started grubbing the new cell area. Excavation for the cell—a total of 26,100 cubic yards—was completed in 2½ weeks, and the crews then proceeded to put down the first layer of sand—a 1’ thick drainage layer with an underdrain pipe system that drains to a storm drain pond on site. The sand layer and pipe system are designed to help move groundwater out from underneath the liner. After the sand layer, the crews placed

Crews install the new 24” valve for the 24” HDPE gas header pipe.

The liner crew deploys the GCL (white) on top of the HDPE liner (black).

Sargent crews have begun work on Cell 10, a new 5½ acre cell at the Juniper Ridge landfill in West Old Town. Cell 10 will be the last cell to be con-structed under the landfill’s current license. An application to double the size of the landfill was recently approved by the Maine Department of Environmental Pro-tection and is currently being reviewed by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and the City of Old Town Planning Board. Work on the project started in early May with the installation of 500 linear feet of 24” HDPE pipe to allow gas from future landfill cells to be transported to the land-fill’s gas treatment plant.

The geocomposite liner—a plastic grid sandwiched between two layers of fabric—also rolls out on top of the HDPE liner. The grid allows water (leachate) to migrate through it to get to the main drainage pipes for the landfill. In most cell construction projects, the liner subcontractor purchases the liner system and then installs it. In the Cell 10 project, however, the owner, Casella Waste Management, purchased the liner system, and ESI is installing it. ESI installed the first two layers—the GCL and the 80-mil liner—in tandem, placing only as much GCL in one day as the crew could cover with the 80-mil liner that same day. ESI didn’t want to place the GCL too far ahead of the liner, because rain will ruin the GCL if it isn’t covered by the liner, and then it has to be removed and replaced. As ESI crews install the liner system, Sar-gent crews will be right behind them, placing a 1’ thick layer of drainage sand on top of the geocomposite, along with leachate collection pipes surrounded by drainage stone. The sand provides a buffer between the trash and the liner system and helps protect both the liner system and the pipes from sharp objects. The drainage stone allows the water that wicks through the drainage layer to enter the collection pipes and be transport-ed out of the cell to an onsite storage tank. The stone also prevents the perforated collation pipes from becoming plugged, which would probably occur if the pipes were placed directly in the sand. Sean says the crew hopes to finish the cell by Labor Day, which will depend in part on the weather.

18,000 cubic yards of clay in a 2’ thick layer that provides an extra measure of security—an imperme-able barrier to protect the environment in the event a hole appears in the liner. Starting in mid-July, Sargent teamed up with the liner subcontractor, ESI of Baton Rouge, LA, to place the liner system over the clay layer. The liner system is made up of three layers—a geosynthetic clay liner (GCL), an 80-mil HDPE liner, and a geocomposite liner (a plastic grid sand-wiched between two layers of fabric). The GCL—1/4” of pow-dered clay between two lay-ers of fabric—functions like a foot of compacted clay but is in a form that rolls out onto the clay layer.



Sargent crews begin work on Cell 10 at Juniper Ridge landfill in West Old Town

“Installation of a liner system requires a lot of favorable weather,” he says. “That’s why we like to schedule liner work for July or early August, which are the two driest months.” Doug Barnes is the superintendent on the project, and Scott Moon and Randall King are the foremen. Key operators are

Brian Loiselle, Eric Nickerson, Ken Thur-low, and Pete Melanson. Craig Shorey is the project manager, and Gail Thibeault is the field cost man-ager. Pat Dubay was the estimator. In all, the project will require 22,000 cubic yards of sand in two layers, 18,000 cubic yards of clay liner, 5.5 acres of new

liner system, and 6,575 linear feet of new HDPE pipes of various sizes. In addition to ESI, subcontractsors on the projects are: MC Electric, site electrical work; C.A. Newcomb & Sons, litter fence installation; Leak Location Services, liner leak testing; and RTD Enterprises, tempo-rary stormwater control measures

Sargent crews installed a wastewater pre-treatment system at the Seawall Camp-ground at Acadia National Park as part of an upgrade to the campground’s sewer system. Sargent was a subcontractor to CCI En-ergy and Construction Services of Augusta on the project. CCI is an Alaska Native Corporation-owned firm. The crews installed three rows of precast concrete chambers with a Septitech pre-treatment system within the chambers. The Septitech system treats wastewater from the campground and bathroom facilities and pumps it back across the road to the leachfield. The project included installation of 200 linear feet of 6” PVC sewer line and 220 linear feet of 2” force main and air lines. Subcontractors to Sargent included Hampden Electrical; DiCenzo Crane Service, which set the precast structures; and American Concrete, which provided the precast tank units, pulled them together, and sealed them. Once the units were put together, the joints had to be sealed and the holes plugged. American Concrete crews then performed vacuum tests on the units to

make sure they did not leak. Work on the project started in Novem-ber 2016 and shut down on Dec. 1. The crews resumed work in May—the restart was delayed by late snowstorms in March and April—and finished on May 23, 2017. Colby Currier was the operations

manager for Sargent Corp. John Sturgeon was the project manager at the start of the project and was replaced by Pete Parizo when John retired. Dennis Bemis was the field cost manager. Peter Broberg was the superintendent; John Koch was the foreman.

Wastewater pre-treatment system installed at Seawall Campground

Panoramic view of Cell 10 at the Juniper Ridge landfill in West Old Town.

The large excavation at Seawall Campground ready for installation of precast concrete chambers.



Sargent crews nearing completion on earthwork for 8 tower wind farm in Canton, ME

American Concrete of Veazie; the smaller structures were made by Dirigo Timber-lands Co. of North Anson. The culverts were 18’ long to accom-modate the width of the access road. They were designed to be strong enough to sup-port the wind tower components that had to be trucked in to the site. Sargent crews placed footings on both sides of the stream for each culvert. The crews then placed the top section of the culvert into position, with the sides resting on the footings and the top forming the deck of the bridge. “The stream stayed natural,” said Colby. “We never actually disturbed the water.” The bridges were installed before the crews did any clearing or site work. “We had a nine-week window to get the culverts in place,” Colby said. “DEP regulations place a time limit on in-stream work. We couldn’t start until August 1, and we had to be out of the water by September 30. Getting eight bridges in place within that time span was a challenge.” After culverts were installed, Sargent brought in the clearing contractor, Thorn-dike and Sons of Strong, one of three landowners in the project area.

Sargent crews are nearing completion on the earthwork for an 8 tower wind farm in Canton, ME, about five miles east of Jay. Sargent is a subcontractor to Eco Indus-tries LLC on the project. Sargent also did the earthwork for Eco Industries on two other Maine wind farms—the 12-turbine Saddleback Ridge Wind Farm in Carthage in 2014, and the 10-turbine Spruce Moun-tain Wind Farm in Woodstock, in 2011. Work on the Canton project began in July 2016, with most of the earthwork scheduled for completion by August 2017. The project included: • Construction of about five miles of access road with eight bottomless culvert bridges. The access road included four miles of an existing logging road that had to be widened and upgraded for heavy trucking, and one mile of new road. • Construction of two miles of ridge road and site work for the eight turbine sites. Colby Currier is the operations manager for Sargent Corp. and Travis Fernald is the project manager. Steve Perry was the estimator.

Rock anchors were placed within a series of holes drilled by Maine Drilling & Blasting in the leveling slab at Tower 1 in June. The anchors were grouted in place.

The access road and the erosion protection were both in excellent shape in June. The streams along the side of the access road were flowing with clear water.

Mark Wright is the project supervisor. The key foremen are Jason Millett, Pete Williams, Tim Blais, Brent Williams, Bob Mann, Chris Lee, and Corey Buck.

The first task was installation of the eight bottomless culverts, including four with spans of 10’ to 25’ and four with 4’ spans. The larger culverts were made by



The ridge road at the Canton Wind Farm in early March.

Sargent crews nearing completion on earthwork for 8 tower wind farm in Canton, ME

Thorndike crews started clearing in the fall, starting along the access road and then clearing about 5 acres in the area where the access road intersected with the ridge road. Thorndike crews also cleared about 4 acres along the ridge road, which provided access to seven of the turbine sites, and along a third road that led to the eighth turbine site, where another 36 acres were cleared. A high priority for the Sargent crews was erosion control. “The stream crossings on the access road were very sensitive to erosion, so we had to have all the silt fence in place before we did any trucking,” Colby said. “Just like most other wind farms, stormwater and erosion control is very important. We had to keep a close eye on it.” In all, Sargent crews installed 42,000 linear feet of erosion controls—a mix of silt fence and stump grindings/bark mulch. As the project area was cleared, Sargent crews came in to do the excavation and rock crushing. The excavation totals included: 15,500 cubic yards of earth excavation, 35,800 cubic yards of rock excavation, and 4,900 cubic yards of bedrock ripped with a CAT D10 bulldozer. Maine Drilling and Blast-ing performed the blasting. Some 32,000 cubic yards of the rock excavation was crushed to make gravel for the roads. By the end of June, all of the roads on the site had been graded, all of the electri-

cal work had been completed (including 10,000 linear feet of electrical trenching), and Sargent crews had demobilized. As this issue of ON TRACK went to press at the end of July 2017, Reed & Reed, a subcontractor to Eco, was pouring the foundations for the wind turbines and preparing to do the tower erection. The components were scheduled to come in the first week of August. To prepare for their arrival, Sargent crews are scheduled to return and backfill the foundations. As Reed & Reed erects the wind tow-ers, Sargent crews will close out the roads, which were constructed to a width of 34’ because they had to be wide enough to accommodate the crane and the wind tower component delivery vehicles. As the towers are completed, Sargent crews will reduce the width of the roads to 17 feet, taking a few inches of gravel off one side and putting it on the other side, and then adding loam to replace the gravel. At the start of the project, Sargent crews stripped 24,000 cubic yards of topsoil prior to excavation. Almost 15,000 yards of the topsoil was stockpiled to close out the roads. Law’s Inc. of Lewiston is the seeding contractor for Sargent.

* * * As the Sargent crews started excavating, they discovered that the elevations shown on their GPS equipment didn’t match up well with the elevations shown on the plans.

The biggest differences was found at Tower 6, where the actual elevation was 20 feet higher that what was on the plan. At other locations, the difference was as much as 6 to 7 feet. This was a major challenge for the crews, because with that much of a differ-ence in elevation, the project’s earthwork didn’t balance any more. “We basically had to go back and redesign the job,” Colby said. “We had to change the elevation of some towers to try to balance the job. We did this on the fly as we were building the project.” Colby said Jason Millett and Dave Preble did most of the redesign work for Sargent. “Working with Eco and their engineers and our engineers, we raised and lowered some pads, which meant raising and lower-ing the towers, too,” Colby said. “We just had to make sure we didn’t raise any of the towers too high, so that we stayed within the tolerance allowed by FAA.” Colby noted that the difference between the actual elevations and those shown on the plans wasn’t the result of something that someone did or didn’t do. When a job is being designed, topographi-cal information often comes from aerial photography—flying over an area and taking topographical readings. When a plane is fly-ing over a ridge, the topographical informa-tion can be affected by tree cover, resulting in a greater possibility of error.



Sargent completes underground dam to block seepage from Jacobs Quarry North to Jacobs Quarry South in Rockport

Sargent crews excavated at this site between Jacobs Quarry North (left) and Jacobs Quarry South (the landfill area to the right) to build a subsurface dam to prevent water flowing between the two.

Sargent crew puts steel beams in place to create a 12-foot-wide hole to excavate as the first step in creating a subsurface dam to prevent water from Jacobs Quarry North from infiltrating Jacobs Quarry South.

the estimators, The owner was the MCSWC. The engi-neer was Sevee & Maher of Cumberland Center, ME.

the leachate to the Camden Wastewater Treatment Plant for treatment. Currently, about 20 million gallons of leachate are pumped to the treatment plant each year, resulting in an annual sew-age disposal cost of more than $100,000. MCSWC officials are hoping that reducing the flow of water from the north quarry will reduce the leachate pumping and treat-

ment costs by 40% or more. Work on the project began in October 2016 and was completed in December. Colby Currier was the operations man-ager for Sargent Corporation, and Travis Fernald was the Project Manager. Adam Tenan was the superintendent, and Keith Wasson was the foreman. Mike Thibodeau and Tim Folster were

Crews from Sargent Corpora-tion have succeeded in walling off the two halves of Jacobs Quarry in Rockport, ME, to reduce the amount water that seeps from one half to the other. The quarry consisted of two very large holes, both about 300’ deep and connected by “the gut,” a narrow passageway between the two areas. The towns of Rockport and Camden have been using the hole on the south side of the quarry (Jacobs Quarry South) as a landfill since the 1940s, while the other side (Jacobs Quarry North) has filled with water. For many years, water from the pond has been infiltrating into the landfill, where it becomes part of the leachate. The landfill and transfer station at Jacobs Quarry is now operated by the Mid Coast Solid Waste Corporation (MC-SWC), which is required to pump

Darin Flewelling cuts off the excess steel sheet that was above the grade of the initial concrete pour for the subsurface dam between Jacobs Quarry North and Jacobs Quarry South.




Sargent completes underground dam to block seepage from Jacobs Quarry North to Jacobs Quarry South in Rockport

A view of Jacobs Quarry during the late 1800s or early 1900s, when it was a prime supplier of high-quality limestone building materials for the East Coast.

Sargent crews began by excavating about 16’ down to 104’ elevation (bed-rock), taking material out and setting it aside. Next, they started excavating an addi-tional 36’ in the narrowest part of the “gut”

“but the work had to be done in a 12-foot square hole, and the operator had to drive in and try to dig material out with ledge in front and steel sheets on both sides.” Prock Marine of Rockland brought in a crane with a clamshell to assist with trying

to remove as much material as possible. “Nobody knew what was in there,” Colby said. “We were pulling out rocks, car parts, waste, everything, to get down to bottom.”

Sargent Materials truck delivers concrete from the Damariscotta plant to the Rockport Quarry project. The crews delivered 400 cubic yards of concrete, starting at 7 a.m. and finishing around 6 p.m.

All sorts of debris, including this axel with wheels (left), was excavated from “the gut.”

down to 68’ elevation, using a CAT 349 excavator with a long stick. The crews drove two rows of sheet pile into the ground trying to hit bedrock—the bottom of the “gut”—and they ended up reinforcing the sheet piles with steel trench boxes, allowing a 12-foot-wide excavation area. The idea was to create a box with two sides being contained by bedrock and two sides by the sheet piling. Ma-terial excavated from the box would be replaced with dense concrete, and a dam-style structure would be construct-ed on top of the concrete. Colby said the excavation was challenging and time-consuming. “Theoretically, it’s pos-sible to excavate 36’ deep with a long stick,” he said,



(Continued from preceding page)

A crew from New England Boring drills holes to the bottom of the concrete to determine if it bonded with the rock underneath. In some areas it didn’t, so a grouting solution was forced down to the bottom to complete the seal.

Jacobs Quarry When the crews reached the bottom, the plan was to fill the hole up to the steel sheets—104’ elevation—with concrete. The water level in the landfill hole (Ja-cobs Quarry South) was about 95’ eleva-tion. “We were digging in water,” Colby said. “When we were filling the hole with concrete, we were pumping the concrete in water.” Sargent Materials filled the hole with concrete all the way to 104’ elevation. Then New England Boring Co. of Derry, NH, came in and bored a series of a half-dozen 2” holes down to the bottom of the concrete. “We were checking to make sure that we had concrete on rock to seal off Jacobs Quarry North from Jacobs Quarry South,” Colby said. “We found out that in some places we had that seal, but in other places we didn’t—we had a gap where the sludge layer on the bottom prevented the concrete from sealing with the bedrock.” Sargent opted to have New England Boring do a pressure grouting—using the holes that they had cored to force a grout-ing solution down to the bottom to seal off the sludge layer. Once that was done, Sargent crews cut

The crew completes the first pour of 400 cubic yards of concrete to fill the “gut.” The pour started at 7 a.m.; the photo shows the crew finishing that night with the help of lights from the excavator.

Jim Guerra, manager of the Mid-Coast Solid Waste Corporation, took this photo of the Sargent crew a few days before the project was finished.

off the steel sheets flush on either side and built a retain-ing wall on the remainder of the hole up to the surface. The wall was constructed of large pre-cast concrete Redi-Rock blocks from Haley Construction of Sangerville. “The water level is at 95’ elevation, but we built the retaining wall in case the water level in the pond rises,” Colby said. “If it does, the retaining wall will be in place as a blocker.” Once retaining wall was complete, RTD Enterprises of Madison was brought in to place a white, exposed liner on the face of the wall as a sealant. Then Sargent crews fin-ished the job by backfilling



Sargent crews place Redi-Rock blocks to form a retaining wall between Jacobs Quarry North and the Mid-Coast Solid Waste Corporation transfer station at Jacobs Quarry South in Rockport.

the retaining wall to the original grade and paving the area. Other subcontractors included Hagar Enterprises, Damariscotta, paving; and C. A. Newcomb, Carmel, fencing. The project required about 2,400 cubic yards of earth excavation, 1,300 square feet of steel sheeting, excavation of about 360 cubic yards of rock and material from between the steel sheets, 500 cubic yards of pressure grouting, 1,400 square feet of Redi-Rock retaining wall, 2,900 square feet of HDPE liner for the retaining wall, and 2,400 cubic yards of backfill to bring the retaining wall area up to grade. The MCSWC transfer station and Ja-cobs Quarry South remained active during the project. Canisters were placed where the public could put recycled material, etc., but the landfill had to remain operational for trucks and local people bringing in con-struction and demolition debris and other approved material.

Historic views of Jacobs Quarry limestone mining operations



Sargent Corporation crews completed two proj-ects at Procter & Gamble’s Tambrands plant in Auburn during 2016-17. The projects were under separate contracts, but Sar-gent was a subcontractor to Cianbro on both. The first project, which started in June 2016, was a continuation of a park-ing lot project that Sargent completed the year before. In 2015, Sargent did the earthwork for a large truck drop lot—a place where truckers drop their trailers so that a Tambrands driver can jockey them around to the different loading docks and return them to the lot to be picked up later. During 2016-17, Cianbro asked Sargent to pave the drop lot and install a series of infrastructure improvements, including light bases and electrical conduit, gravity and force main sewers, and 6” and 1” water lines. Sargent also provided utilities for a se-curity guard office and truckers’ rest room that Cianbro is constructing for the Cones-toga Drive entrance to the P&G facility. The project required 800 linear feet of grav-ity sewer, 350 linear feet of force main sewer, 7,300 linear feet of electrical trenching and backfill, 20 light pole bases, 600 linear feet of 1” and 6” water line, and 5,200 tons of paving. The crews installed a prefabricated

sewer pump station supplied by George Roberts of Biddeford. HD Supply of West-brook was the pipe supplier, and Pike In-dustries of Hermon did the paving. Matt Tenan was the project supervisor on the drop lot project in 2016, and Scott Merrithew was the foreman. Tyler Davis took over as the project supervisor in May 2017. The scheduled completion date is September 2017. The second project, called the Yukon Expansion project, started in October 2016 and was completed in August 2017. Sargent’s part of the job was excavation for a building expansion, construction of a new filter pond and site utilities, along with relocation of an access road and relocation of a 10” fire protection water line that en-

circles the building. Soil conditions for about one-third of the building expansion area were very poor, so Sargent had to over-excavate and fill in the area with lightweight fill—3,500 cubic yards of Geofoam fill in the form of 4’x4’x8’ foam blocks. The foam blocks weigh 40 lbs. per cubic foot, while gravel weighs 120 lbs. per cubic foot. The crews excavated to a designed sub-grade elevation and then placed three lay-ers of the foam blocks to replace the vol-ume of the soil removed. The blocks were manufactured by Branch River Plastics of Smithfield, RI. The project required 7,200 cubic yards of foundation excavation and construction of a 6,900-square-foot filter pond for site drainage. Ferguson Waterworks of Portland supplied the piping, Glidden Excavating and Paving of Gorham did the paving, and Burns Fencing of Westbrook installed the guard rails. Troy Harvey started as Sargent’s site superintendent for the Yukon Expansion project. When Troy was reassigned in the spring of 2017, he was replaced by Kendall Bickford, who had been one of the fore-men. Tyler Davis and Jim Lagasse were the other foremen. Glenn Adams was the operations man-ager for Sargent on both projects, and Ian McCarthy was the project manager. Pat Dubay was the estimator for the drop lot project; Mike Thibodeau was the estima-tor for the Yukon Expansion project.

Sargent completes 2 projects at P&G’s Tambrands plant in Auburn

Sargent crew excavates for the building subgrade and Geofoam block placement.

Paving operations at the Procter & Gamble Tambrands plant in Auburn.



Sargent Materials’ asphalt plant in Hermon.

After a year of operating under their belt, the crew of the Sargent Materials as-phalt plant is looking forward to 2017. “We’re optimistic about doing more tonnage than we did last year,” said As-phalt Operations Manager Doug Morrison. “We started up well, the plant’s running well, and we’ve made a number of im-provements during the winter that should help us increase our productivity.” Doug said the plant’s first operating day this year was April 28; since then, the crew has been busy producing upwards of 3,000 tons some days to service large projects. This year’s crew is the same as last year—Doug, Vaughn Thibodeau III, quality control; Ed Barnes, plant manager; Dustin Plummer, plant technician; and Donnie Kepple, loader operator. The plant also picked up a big DOT job in Old Town and Howland for which Sar-gent Corp. was low bidder. Sargent Materials will be doing the mix for that project—4.5 miles of Bennoch Road from Cresecent Lumber past the Old Town Trading Post to the I-95 Alton exit, plus 1.5 miles adjacent to I-95 in Howland. “That will be about 10,000 tons of MDOT mix,” Doug says. “We’ll start in late July and go to late August.”

* * * One improvement at the plant this year is now we are including RAP (recycled as-phalt pavement) in its mix designs. “Last year, we didn’t run any RAP in our mix,” Doug said. “As a new plant, we wanted to focus on learning how to run the plant; adding RAP would have introduced additional variables that we didn’t want to have to deal with.” This year, the plant will be making as-phalt with anywhere from 10 to 20% RAP.MDOT allow up to 30% RAP in mix de-signs.

* * * Doug said the core group at the asphalt plant kept busy over the winter looking at all the ways to improve the process com-pared to last year. The result was several process changes or new features that are designed to im-prove plant operations. Some of those improvements are:

• Water pressure at the wash-out rack has been increased by adding a booster pump and a 2,000 gallon surge tank. Last year, when concrete plant ran, it drew so much water from the water service to the site that the asphalt plant would lose pressure. “We couldn’t wash our trucks while the concrete plant was running,” Doug said. “Now we can. With the booster pump and surge tank, the plant has 2,000 gallons on hand to make sure that we always have ad-equate pressure when trucks get washed.” Doug points out that washing the trucks is a very important part of the mix process. “If you can’t clean the body of the trucks, then you end up with the possibility of contaminating your mix,” he said. • A gravel bypass chute has been added with a conveyor that allows the plant to separate the waste gravel and the recycled asphalt that are generated during the startup. The bypass chute was designed in-house by Ed Barnes. It uses a divert gate with a pneumatic air cylinder and a 40-foot conveyor. “This is important to us, because we sell the waste gravel we produce,” Doug says. “The bypass chute allows us to keep the waste gravel clean without asphalt con-tamination.” Doug explains: What happened last year is that every time the plant started up or shut down, a certain amount of gravel

would be wasted, either because it got mixed with asphalt that hadn’t gotten up to temperature or because it wasn’t com-pletely coated with liquid asphalt. With the bypass chute, the operator can send the gravel one way and the waste asphalt another way—then, when the mix meets all the specifications, it goes to the silo. That allows the waste aggregate to be resold as gravel—after all, most people don’t want their gravel they buy contami-nated with chunks of asphalt. “The bypass chute makes our waste gravel a nicer, more sellable product—and we generated about 3,000 tons of waste gravel last year,” Doug says. “The chute also allows us to generate more asphalt that can go back in as recycled RAP (recycled asphalt pavement).” • Pneumatic cylinders have been in-stalled to open and close the cold feed bin gates. This is important, because if a rock gets in the bins, it can clog the gate hole openings. “Last year, the only way we could get a rock out was to shut down the whole plant,” Doug said. “Running continuously the way we do, we never want to shut the plant down if we don’t have to. Now, with the flip of a switch in the control tower, we can open the gate to the maximum open-ing, allow the rock to come out, and then re-close it quickly and keep right on run-ning. And it’s not just rock—it could be a


Sargent Materials asphalt plant looking forward to 2017 after making several process improvements during the winter



Sargent Materials delivered 2,500 cubic yards of concrete to the new breakwater in Eastport (above), which was recently completed. Work on the project began in May 2016 and was completed in June 2017. Eastporters celebrated with a July 4 ribbon-cutting ceremony.

Sargent Materials leases East Machias plant to Meadowbrook Materials

Sargent Materials Redi-mix Operation 2017 season off to a good start The Sargent Materials Redi-mix Opera-tion is off to its second-best start ever in 2017, second only to 2016 when Sargent concrete trucks were supplying a series of high-volume windmill projects. Chad Comstock, manager of Redi-mix Operations for Sargent Materials, says the company has only one windmill project on the books so far—the 8 tower Canton Wind Farm in Canton, ME, which will take 1,200 cubic yards from the Monmouth plant—but it’s supplying concrete to a lot of other jobs, including bridge work and DOT work. He also says the company has been helped by an improving economy and a growing reputation for customer service. “You can see the economy turning—or continuing to turn—in a lot of industries,” he said. “People are spending money on a lot of things they probably wouldn’t have done a few years back. On the residential

Sargent Materials has leased its East Machias concrete plant to a start-up com-pany called Meadowbrook Materials, a unit of Guptil Logging. The lease, which was effective April 1, includes the plant and five Mack mix trucks. Chad Comstsock, manager of Redi-mix Operations for Sargent Materials, says the lease agreement will allow Sargent to consolidate its resources and improve customer service from the Damariscotta,

Hancock, Monmouth, and Hermon plants. “We’ve already seen positive results because of that decision,” he says. “We’re now able to concentrate our resources where we need them. We can use our Hancock and Hermon plants and drivers to complement each other, and the same holds true for our Monmouth and Damariscotta plants.” Chad said he thinks the consolidation of resources has helped the company achieve a very good start this year. “We’re able to cover the areas we serve

very efficiently,” he said. “We’re able to deliver product to our customers when they need it without having to finagle ways to do it.” Chad says Sargent Materials has devel-oped a great relationship with Meadow-brook. “So far, things have panned out real well,” he says. “They’ve helped us out with the Eastport job [supplying concrete for the Eastport breakwater], and we’ve helped them get started.”

side, we’re seeing a lot of garages being poured that people probably wouldn’t have built a few years ago.” Chad says Sargent Materials is also benefiting from its investment in front-discharge and conveyor trucks during the past two years, as well as from its focus on customer service.

“We have good equipment hauling quality product,” he says. “Customers love our front discharge and conveyor trucks, but they also appreciate our commitment to service. We try to provide the best service we can, and a lot of people are buying from us even if we aren’t exactly the low price.” Chad says the company doesn’t have

a lot of huge projects on the horizon, but a number of jobs requiring concrete are coming up for bid, including the Jonesport bridge, the Sears Island bridge, and the Fiberight recycling facility in Hampden, as well as some substantial windmill jobs. “We should have a very busy couple of years,” he says.

chunk of compacted crusher dust.” The pneumatic cylinders were installed on two of our bins where we had problems most often. “We’ll do the rest of the bins later,” Doug said. • A waste dust pit has been created that captures our baghouse dust so that we can

contain it in a slurry and prevent airborne dust on site. We have also installed a new waste dust auger with water injection ports to optimize the moisture of the dust as it leaves the plant. Last year, there was an area on top of the ground where waste dust collected. This year, Doug wanted to make sure that the dust went into a pit, so a loader could

drive down in, scoop out the material, load it out, and haul it off site. “This was a good modification,” Doug said. “It works very well. We have been very happy with all the modifications from last winter and have already started a new list of things to further increase our pro-ductivity.”

(Continued from preceding page)Asphalt plant looking forward to a good year in 2017



Sargent Materials has acquired six new trucks for its redi-mix operations. Three of the new vehicles are front-discharge trucks, which will be used at the Damariscotta plant. The other three are rear-discharge trucks, two of which have been modified into conveyor trucks—trucks with a conveyor mounted on the back that allow deliveries of concrete up to 42 feet away from the truck. One of the conveyor trucks is being used at Damariscotta, the other at the Mon-mouth plant. The sixth new truck, a conventional rear-discharge truck, is also at Monmouth. Chad Comstock, manager of Redi-mix Operations for Sargent Materials, said the trucks were purchased “to help us better serve our customers.” He said the front-discharge trucks have been very popular with customers in the Damariscotta area, and that customers “absolutely love” the conveyor trucks. Sargent now has three conveyor trucks—one each at Monmouth, Damar-iscotta, and Hancock. In addition to the new trucks, Sargent Materials is installing an auxiliary silo at the Damariscotta plant. The new silo will allow the company to

do commercial work and DOT work out of Damariscotta, which it couldn’t do before. Commercial and DOT work typically require cement to be mixed with either fly ash or slag, which requires an auxiliary silo. Last year, an auxiliary silo was installed at

Monmouth, which allowed Sargent Materi-als to supply concrete for a Sargent Corp. project to construct a 1.2-mile underground 115 KV transmission line in Lewiston. The Hancock and Hermon plants cur-rently have auxiliary silos.

Sargent Materials acquires 6 new redi-mix trucks

Michael Kinch (left) and Aaron McGinnis pour the piers for the new auxiliary silo at Sargent Materials’ Damariscotta plant using one of the plant’s new redi-mix conveyor trucks.

One of the three front-discharge redi-mix trucks that was purchased this year.



Sargent completes 10.7-acre cell at Prince William County Landfill Crews from Sargent Corporation’s Mid-Atlantic Region have completed construc-tion of Cell D, a 10.7-acre municipal solid waste landfill cell at the Prince William County Landfill in Dumfries, VA. Work on the $4.7 million project began in December 2016 and was substantially complete in July 2017. The project began with clearing and grubbing 7.5 acres adja-cent to the new cell for borrow. Then the crews began site preparation by demolish-ing some existing features and salvaging others, including erosion controls and sedi-ment basins. The crew also installed 3,000 linear feet of stormwater diversion berms. Site preparation for the project required 125,000 cubic yards of excavation to fill, 17,500 cubic yards of soil liner, and 28,000 cubic yards of cushion soil, all from on site borrow areas. After the Sargent crews placed 12 inches of soil liner, the liner sub-contractor, National Lining Systems of Fort Myers, FL, installed the liner system, which included a GCL layer, a 60-mil HDPE liner, and a geocomposite liner. Portions of the cell were covered with rain cap. Sargent crews also installed 4,600 linear feet of 6”, 8”, and 10” HDPE leachate col-lection pipe; 2,500 linear feet of 6” hori-zontal LFG collector pipe and wellheads; 530 linear feet of 16” LFG pipe, and 700 linear feet of RCP storm drain pipe. They also imported and placed 4,000 cubic yards of roadway surfacing aggregates. Sargent crews also constructed two sediment basins, each with a riser struc-

ture, and outlet piping. The project owner was Prince William County, and the project engineer was Solid Waste Services (SWS). Justin Porter was the operations man-ager for Sargent, and Travis Ridky was the project manager. Pat Dubay and Aaron Tidd were the estimators. Rick Powell was the project superintendent, and Nick Ross-wog, Marc Denis, Wilber Serrano, Dwayne Waters, and Hunter Cole were the foremen. Travis said the project started during the winter months and continued into the spring rainy season. Thanks to a good team effort among all parties, the project was completed on time allowing SWS and Prince William County to get the cell certified before the adjacent cell reached its capacity. This was important because the adjacent cell was filling up faster than expected due

to unplanned waste being diverted from another local landfill. Travis said some additional work that was added to Sargent’s scope by the owner and engineer was also completed during the original contract substantial completion date. This work included additional borrow areas that had to be cleared and prepped to meet the fill, soil liner, and cushion soil quantity requirements for the cell construction. Subcontractors on the project included Ace Hydroseeding, Richmond, VA, seeding and erosion and sediment controls; Fitzger-ald Excavating & Construction, Covington, VA, clearing and grubbing; JKS Construc-tion, Fredericksburg, VA, cast-in-place drop inlet structure; Hercules Fence, Manassas, VA, chain link fencing; Draper Aden Asso-ciates, Richmond, VA, quality control; and L. S. Lee, Richmond, VA, guardrails.

Aerial view of the completed liner system and the start of the start of the placement of the cushion soil layer.

Sargent crews place protective cover material and install the leachate collection piping on top of the completed liner system.



Bill West operates a CAT 329E excavator at the Sieur de Monts project.

Sewer system upgrade completed at Sieur de Monts in Acadia

Will Scanlon wraps a precast structure during installation at the Sieur de Monts project.

pleted, Sargent crews stripped off the topsoil from the one-acre leach field at the Sieur de Monts comfort station and removed the stone, sand, and other components from the leach field. Then the crews placed loam back onto the site of the former leachfield and made some high spots and low spots to enhance the wetlands effect. The tie-ins to the Mt. Desert sewer sys-tem were made at the last sewer manhole on Meadow Road in Mt. Desert. The crews started by installing the grav-ity pipe part way up Meadow Road. The force main was installed the rest of the way up Meadow Road to the intersection with

the Loop Road, then up the Loop Road to the entrance of Sieur de Monts, and then to the Sieur de Monts pump station. Work on the project started in mid-Sep-tember 2016 and was completed at the end of May 2017. Most of the work was done by Christmas. Colby Currier was the operations man-ager for Sargent Corporation. John Sturgeon was the project manager at the start until he retired. He was replaced by Pete Parizo. Peter Broberg was the superintendent, and Dennis Bemis was the field cost manager. Key foremen were Chris Curtis and John Koch. Mike Hamby performed layout on the project.

proximity to wetlands and several streams.”* * *

Sieur de Monts Spring is located behind the Nature Center in Acadia National Park, close to where Route 3 crosses over the Park Loop Road. The original Abbe Museum and the Wild Gardens of Acadia are close by. The spring has a significant place in the early history of Acadia National Park. In a true sense, it has come to symbolize the vi-sion and passion of private citizens such as George B. Dorr that blossomed into Acadia National Park. Dorr, Acadia’s first superintendent, built an octagonal tile-roofed structure over the spring in 1909. He named the spring “Sieur de Monts” in honor of the French noble-man who was commissioned Lieutenant Governor of New France by King Henry IV in 1603. As Lieutenant Governor, Pierre Dugua, Sieur de Mons, sailed to North America with his navigator Samuel Champlain, where they established the ill-fated French settlement on Saint Croix Island, located on the present-day Maine/New Brunswick border. According to AcadiaMagic.com, Dorr’s work at Sieur de Monts Spring “symbol-izes the enthusiasm and spirit of many early 20th century summer residents who worked to preserve and protect the natural and historic values of Mount Desert Island. In a sense, Sieur de Monts Spring has become a memorial to Dorr, for it was his inspiration and determination that led to the creation of Acadia National Park.”

Hampden Electric was a subcontrac-tor to Sargent on the project. Colby said working in Acadia National Park was a challenge because of the very detailed, specific require-ments. “We had to be very careful about the trees and other natural features in the project site,” he said. “Erosion and sediment control was very important, as we were working in close

Sargent Corporation has com-pleted a subcontract to upgrade the sewer system and eliminate the leach field at Sieur de Monts Spring in Acadia National Park on Mt. Desert Island, Maine. Sargent was a subcontractor on the project to CCI Energy and Construction Services of Augusta, an Alaska Native Corporation-owned firm. The project involved install-ing 1,300 linear feet of 8” PVC gravity pipe and 6,000 linear feet of 6” force main to tie the pump station for the Sieur de Monts comfort station into the Town of Mt. Desert sewerage system. After the tie-ins were com-



Sargent crews place stone drainage layer and install leachate collection piping.

New Cell 6 completed at Livingston Landfill in Spotsylvania, VA Sargent Corporation has completed con-struction of a new Cell 6 at the Livingston Landfill in Spotsylvania, VA. To ensure that the $2.3 million project was completed on time, the crews worked during the winter holidays to deploy the liner prior to the arrival of a major storm system that would have caused significant delays. Travis Ridky, project manager for Sargent Corp., said Christmas Day was a holiday, but everyone was back on the job on Monday, Dec. 26, to work on the liner installation. “A major storm was forecast for later that week,” Travis said. “If we took time off and didn’t get the liner system in place before the rains came, the entire project probably would have been delayed for a couple weeks, if not longer.” The liner system—six acres of 60-mil HDPE liner, geonet, geocomposite, and rain cap—was installed by Antana Linings of Latham, NY. Before the liner could be installed, Sargent crews had to complete the site preparation, which included 46,000 cubic yards of excavation to fill.

After the liner was in place, Sargent crews installed an 18” leachate drainage layer with 15,000 cubic yards of #68 stone and 1,650 linear feet of 6” PVC leachate collection piping and cleanouts. The #68 stone was hauled and dumped directly in the cell by the stone supplier, Luck Stone of Fredericksburg, VA, with Sargent crews providing assistance in plac-ing the stone in the cell. Luck Stone crews used on-road trucks, which eliminated the need to stockpile the stone on site and then re-handle it when putting it in the cell. “Direct placement of the stone and the close cooperation between Luck Stone and Sargent crews were two keys to timely completion of the project,” Travis said. Work on the project began in Decem-ber 2016 and was completed in March 2017. The project owner was Spotsylvania County, and the project engineer was Drap-er Aden Associates. In addition to clearing, grubbing, and excavating the 6-acre site, the project included: • Installation of 475 linear feet of RCP storm drain piping. • Construction of a sediment basin

with a riser structure and RCP outlet pip-ing. • Construction of an access road that required 2,500 cubic yards of roadway aggregates. • Installation of a foundation and slab for an owner-supplied metal building. Justin Porter was the operations man-ager for Sargent Corporation. Jeff Marsh was project superintendent, and Travis Baker, Hunter Cole, and Marc Denis were the foremen. Aaron Tidd was the estimator. In addition to Antana Linings, sub-contractors were Ace Hydroseeding of Richmond, VA, seeding and erosion and sediment controls; Eastern Clearing of Bealeton, VA, clearing and grubbing; JKS Construction of Fredericksburg, VA, building foundation and slab; Lantz Construction Company of Broadway, VA, metal building erection; and Tommy Wallace Electrical of Fredericksburg, VA, building electrical work and service. “Overall, this project showed a good team effort among all parties involved,” said Travis. “The result was smooth and timely completion of the project.”



Sargent completes new cell, sediment basin at Middle Peninsula Landfill A $1.3 million project to con-struct a new cell and sediment basin at the Middle Peninsula Landfill in Glenns, VA, has been completed by Sargent Corpora-tion. Work begin March 2017 and was completed in July. The owner was Waste Management of Virginia. The project engineer was Golder Associates of Richmond, VA; the QA/QC was Draper Aden Associates, also of Richmond. Justin Porter was the opera-tions manager for Sargent Corp.,

HDPE riser pipes, which were plumbed into the sump house. • Installation of 330 linear feet of 6”x10” HDPE dual contained leachate force main. • Relocation of 1,000 linear feet of HDPE odor misting pipe. • Installation of 475 linear feet of RCP storm drain piping. • Installation of a geosynthetic liner system and rain cap over the 7-acre cell. • Installation of 3,050 tons of roadway surfacing aggregates. • Installation of a sediment basin with a 60” diameter riser structure and 42” RCP outlet piping. • Construction of a sump house for the

sediment basin. • Seeding, mulching and final site stabilization. Subcontractors included Erosion Control Services, Virginia Beach, VA, seeding and erosion and sediment controls; Yard Works, Moseley, VA, clearing and grubbing; ESI, Baton Rouge, LA, liner system; Chesa-peake Containment Systems, Middle River, MD, liner system and rain cap; Peninsula Concrete and Steel, Gloucester Courthouse, VA, sump house foundation and slab; Max-well Welding, Richmond, VA, sump house structural steel, roof, and floor grating; C&C Electric, Charles City, VA, sump house electrical; and Flora Surveying Associates, Glenns, VA, project surveying.

Project manager Travis Ridky said an extremely wet spring resulted in about 2½ weeks of rain delays, but Sargent crews were able to push through and complete the cell on time. “This was important for the owner, as air space was getting very tight at the land-fill’s current working face,” Travis said. He said quick work by ESI in “blacking out” the new cell, followed by Sargent’s efficient placement of the owner’s stock-piled protective cover stone helped make up some of the lost weather days. “Overall, we had a good team effort involving all parties that resulted in safe, smooth, and timely completion of the proj-ect,” Travis said.

Sargent crews place fill in the proposed perimeter road tie-in area.

and Travis Ridky was the project manager. Jeff Marsh was the superintendent, and the key foremen were Travis Baker, Jimmy Mauldin, Marc Denis, Dwayne Waters, Tim Powell, and Wilbur Serrano. Aaron Tidd was the estimator. Construction of the 7-acre Cell 13 and Basin No. 5 required: • 19.5 acres of clearing and grubbing. • 175,100 cubic yards of excavation, including 64,700 cubic yards excavation to fill, 75,000 cubic yards excavation to stockpile, and 35,400 cubic yards of exca-vation from the sediment pond which was used for fill. • Hauling and placing 18,500 cubic yards of protective cover stone from an on-site stockpile. • Installation of 800 linear feet of 8” HDPE leachate collection piping and clea-nouts. • Installation of 220 linear feet of 24”

Sargent crews excavate Sediment Basin No. 5 area with scrapers to place in fill areas within the basin or at Cell 13.



Sargent battles wet weather, site conditions to construct 21,000-square-yard apron at Hanover County Airport

Aerial view of site work on new apron for the Hanover County Municipal Airport.

Sargent Corporation crews have been battling wet weather and wet site condi-tions to construct a 21,000 square yard apron on the east side of the Hanover County Municipal Airport in Ashland, VA. In addition to the apron, the crews are constructing a new taxiway connector and a 3,450-foot-long paved access road. Work on the $4.8 million project began in October 2016. The targeted completion date is September 2017. Justin Porter is the operations man-ager for Sargent Corporation, and Scott Bartlett is the project manager. Mike Van Merlin is the superintendent, Hunter Cole and Jim Lagasse are the pipe fore-men and John Madigan and Tim Powell are the dirt foremen. Mike Thibodeau and Aaron Tidd were the estimators. The owner is the County of Hanover, VA; the project engineer is Delta Air-port Consultants, Inc. The project will require 21,500 square yards of lime-treated subgrade, 5,800 tons of cement-treated base course, and 5,750

tons of P-401 pavement. The crews will have to install 1,300 linear feet of RCP storm pipe, 3,300

County issued a change order that allowed Sargent to install 2,100 linear feet of water line, 500 linear feet of sewer, a pump station and force main. These improvements were completed during the winter while the FAA portion of the project was shut down. The project restarted on May 1. The soils are still wet but the better weather has allowed the crews to dry the soils by spread-ing in thin lifts and discing with a tractor. Subcontractors on the project are Erosion Control Services, Virginia Beach, VA,, silt fence and stabilization matting; RSG Land-scaping, Concord, VA, landscaping and porous pavers; Slurry Pavers, Richmond, VA, soil stabilization; Branscome Inc., Rockville, VA, paving; Eastern Clearing, Bealeton, VA, clearing and grubbing; Cedar Peaks Enterprises, Wake Forest, NC, airfield electrical; ICSE, Ashland, VA, pump station electrical; C. W. Wright Construction Co., boring; HASCO, Inc., Greensboro, NC, pavement marking, sealant, tie downs, and signage; and Aacme General Contractors, Brandy Station, VA, seeding. Scott says the project has been challeng-ing but it’s going well. “The crews are working together to over-come the wet site conditions and deliver a good final product to the owner,” he says.

linear feet of underdrain (under the new apron), 2,000 linear feet of 20” ductile iron water line, 1,300 linear feet of 2” sewer force main, a new pump station, and 460 linear feet of 6” gravity sewer. Clearing and grubbing for the project was completed from October to December 2016. After digging some test pits, it was determined that the soils were extremely wet due to the perched water table. Soils being excavated were about 5% above optimum mois-ture and had to be dried out to meet compaction requirements. With the moisture levels so high, Sargent recommended installation of some of the Phase 1 storm drains and erosion control measures prior to the winter shutdown in order to allow the site to dry a bit before construction re-sumed in the spring. In some cases the crews had to use lime to dry the soil to achieve compaction in pipe trenches. After the FAA portion of the job was shut down in December, Hanover

Hunter Cole, Jacob Little, and Jim Legasse install the 16” waterline.



Sargent receives ‘Build Maine’ awards for 4th consecutive year;Capisic Pond project, Oxford Area C Sewer project earn honors The Associated General Contractors of Maine recognized two Sargent Corporation projects as the best of 2016 in its annual Build Maine Awards celebration at the Augusta Civic Center on April 12. Sargent received a Build Maine Award in the Specialty/Environmental division for the Capisic Pond rehabilitation project in the City of Portland. The company received a second Build Maine Award in the Municipal/Utility divi-sion for the Oxford Area C Sewer project in the Town of Oxford. It was the fourth year in a row that Sargent projects have been honored with Build Maine Awards. The Capisic Pond project involved dredg-ing the pond for the first time in 60 years, restoring the habitat, and increasing the open water area from about 2 acres to almost 4.5 acres. The project was submitted for a Build Maine Award because of the impact that will result from its completion. Over the years, sediment filled the pond, the water became shallow, and cattails grew, reduc-ing the open water area by 70%, from 7.7 acres to about 2 acres. Fortunately, a community group, the Friends of Capisic Park Pond, knew what was hidden behind the cattails. The group performed extensive research and worked closely with several city departments and the District 3 city councilor to identify needed improvements and generate support

for the project. Sargent Corp. worked closely on the project with the Friends of Capisic Pond Park and the city to implement the project, and the positive feedback from the com-munity has been exceptional. Glenn Adams was the operations manager for Sargent and Ian McCarthy was the project manager. Katrina Morgan was the superin-tendent, and Dave Preble was the estimator. Work began in May 2016 and was com-pleted November 1, 2016. The owner was the City of Portland; the engineer was Woodard & Curran. The Oxford Area C Sewer project involved installation of 17,000 linear feet of force main and gravity sewer lines as part of an elaborate expansion project to attract new business and meet current needs. A complex dewatering system was designed to avoid ten feet of water filling the 14’ trench. The Oxford sewer project was submit-ted for a Build Maine Award for multiple reasons. This project by far represented one of the most challenging projects due to the dewatering. Sargent crews had to success-fully pump millions of gallons of water on a 24/7 schedule including critical discharging of the water without negative environmental impacts to the surrounding area. In addition, it was the third project that Sargent crews completed for the Town of Oxford’s new sewage collection and state-of-the art treatment system. It represented a major step for the Town of Oxford and is

viewed as a catalyst for economic develop-ment in the area. Despite many challenges, Sargent employees compiled more than 18,235 workhours without a lost time injury on this final phase and a total of 40,290 hours combined on all three contracts. Glenn Adams was the operations manager for Sargent, and Adam Kapaldo was the project manager. Seth Watts was the superin-tendent, and Pat Dubay was the estimator. Work on the project began in September 2015 and was completed in August 2016. The owner was the Town of Oxford; the engineer was Woodard & Curran. The other two Build Maine Awards for 2017 were presented to Reed & Reed Con-struction in the Industrial/Energy division for the Hancock Wind project, and to RJ Gron-din and Sons in the Highway division for the Route 1 Construction project in Ogunquit. In 2016, Sargent Corp. received a Build Maine Award in the Specialty Environ-mental Category for removal of the Veazie Dam during the summer and fall of 2013. In 2015, Sargent received a Build Maine Award in the Municipal/Environ-mental Category for the final closure of the Presque Isle Landfill, a design-build project that was completed under budget and more than a year ahead of schedule. In 2014, Sargent received a Build Maine Award in the Municipal Category for the City of Portland’s Baxter Boulevard North Storage Conduit Combined Storage Overflow Project.

BuiLd maine aWaRd FOR CaPiSiC POnd PROJeCT—From left: Ian McCarthy, Lauren Swett (Woodard & Curran), Katrina Morgan, Nathaniel Smith (City of Portland), David Senus (Woodard & Curran), Stephen Williams (Friends of Capisic Pond), Clayton White, Glenn Adams

BuiLd maine aWaRd FOR OXFORd aRea C SeWeR PROJECT—From left: Adam Kapaldo, Brent Bridges (Woodard & Curran), Rob Polys (Woodard & Curran), Marie Jordan, Kevin Hughes (Woodard & Curran), Rob Wilson, and Glenn Adams.



Sargent Corporation Benefits Update

When you don’t know where to turn . . . Sargent Corporation’s Employee Assistance Program (EAP) is there for you Sargent Corporation and Sargent Materials recently changed their Life and Disability Insurance carrier from AIG to AXA. Like AIG, AXA has an Employee Assistance Program (EAP) available to our employees along with their immediate families through GuidanceResources. You can reach out to GuidanceResources by calling 1-866-641-3178, going online at www.guidanceresources.com or using their app Guidance Resources Now. The ID was recently sent to you as a payroll stuffer. Any information shared with GuidanceResources is strictly confidential and never shared with Sargent Corporation or anyone else. By going online or by using the GuidanceResources Now app, you are able to easily find answers to most questions along with a few you haven’t even considered. You are always able to communicate with a consultant by clicking “Send a Question”. An EAP offers confidential support for the following: • Emotional Issues ~ Helping you and your family members with issues which include anxiety, depression, stress and grief along with relationship conflicts. (Free face to face visits – limit 3) • Legal Guidance ~ Talk to an attorney about divorce, adoption, family law, wills along with many more legal issues. (Free 30 minute consultation and a 25% reduction in fees.) • Financial Resources ~ Experts can assist you with budgeting, debt counseling, bankruptcy, mortgages, retirement planning, and many other financial needs you may be questioning. (Free face-to-face visits – limit 3) • Work-Life Solutions ~ Providing you with resources for find-ing child care, career development, travel tips, hiring home contractors, consumer rights along with many, many more topics. Employee Assistance Programs are known to be the most under-utilized benefit offered to employees. Many employees refrain from contacting the EAP, because they fear information will be shared with their employer. Sargent Corporation will never be given any informa-tion from GuidanceResources or AXA about the employees who have contacted the EAP, so we will never know how many employees are helped by using this incredible benefit. AXA also offers an Emergency Travel Assistance Program. This pro-gram offers you a wide range of domestic and worldwide travel services 24 hours a day / 365 days a year along with emergency medical trans-portation. Their website www.axausglobalassist.com offers a wealth of travel information at your fingertips. You recently received a payroll stuffer explaining the benefits this program has to offer including phone numbers to call for assistance.

Sargent Corporation has completed work as a subcontractor to Reed & Reed on the new Howland-Enfield bridge across the Penobscot River. Sargent’s role in the project included: • Excavation and placement of heavy riprap around the new bridge abutments and hauling riprap for Reed & Reed to place around piers in the Penobscot River to protect them from river ice. • Sitework and drainage piping for the approaches on both sides of the river, where Route 155 meets up with the Argyle Road and Terrio Street in Howland and the Old County Road in Enfield. • Assisting Reed & Reed with the demolition and removal of the old bridge. Excavation and placement of riprap took place in the fall of 2015. The crews excavated and then placed 5,000 cubic yards of boulders ranging in size from 24” to 36” to stabilize the bridge abutment footings below the water line and along the shoreline for high water conditions. To install the bridge piers in the river, Reed & Reed crews created sheet pile coffer dams in the river, so they could construct the concrete pier structures in the dry. After the bridge piers were constructed in the river Reed & Reed placed riprap around the piers using a crane and riprap hauled to the site by Sargent Corpora-tion. Reed & Reed did this work from a temporary bridge constructed from one side of the river to the other to assist with construction of the new bridge. After the riprap was completed, Sargent crews demobilized, returning in 2016 to do the earthwork for the new bridge and the inter sections on both sides of the river. From the fall of 2015 to the summer of 2016, the Howland-Enfield bridge project was handled by Sargent’s New England Region, with Colby Currier as operations manager, John Sturgeon as project man-ager, and Mike Gordon as superintendent. However, in July 2016, due to workload considerations, the project was reassigned to the Bangor Region, Sean Milligan replac-ing Colby as operations manager, and Craig Shorey replacing John as project manager. Most of Sargent’s 2016 work started in August, when drainage pipe had to

Sargent completes work as sub to Reed & Reed on Howland-Enfield bridge



Materials were carefully loaded in dump trucks and hauled offsite for disposal.

and maybe a third street at one intersec-tion. Jon did a fantastic job at that, keeping everything safe.” Jon also had to coordinate the excavation and gravel placement with the public, as the existing roadway had to remain open for traffic, and with Pike Industries, which was brought in by Reed & Reed to do the paving. “We were on a pretty tight schedule in the fall of 2016, because Pike had to put the surface paving on the bridge deck before the seasonal surface paving deadline so that the bridge could be opened to traffic for the winter months,” Craig said. After paving the bridge surface, Pike put binder pavement on the roadways on both sides of the bridge. Sargent crews then backed up the paving on the shoulders of the roadway and got as much work done as pos-sible before demobilizing for the winter. The new bridge was opened to traffic in October 2016 and Reed & Reed began to dismantle the old bridge during the winter of 2016-17 with assistance from Sargent. “Reed & Reed took it apart piece by piece with cranes and manpower, which was a pretty tedious process,” Sean said. “As they would get parts of the bridge demolished, we would take the debris and

be installed on both sides of the river and existing roadways had to be exca-vated and gravel installed, mainly at the intersections at either end of the bridge. Jon Nadeau was the new site supervisor for Sargent. Craig said Jon did a great job getting the drainage pipe installed and managing the traffic while work proceeded on the intersections. “It’s tough when you have three roads that come together,” Craig said. “That’s what Jon had to deal with on the Howland side, where the bridge intersected with Route 155, the Argyle Road, and Terrio Street. Even in a rural area, managing the traffic is a challenge when you have to cross one street, then another,

haul it away for them.” Throughout the winter, Sargent tried to consolidate the work and schedule a crew to come up to Howland and Enfield every couple weeks for a day or two, rather than having a crew work a couple hours a day. Craig noted that the old bridge piers and abutments had old granite blocks that the crews were able to salvage and save for future use.

When the crews returned in the spring of 2017, the work was pretty straightfor-ward. Pike came in and did the surface paving of the road on both sides of the bridge. Sargent then cleaned up the edges of the roadway and made final adjustments to the catch basin tops to match the surface of the roadway.

Reed & Reed removes one of the bridge piers using a crane and clamshell bucket.

Sargent completes work as sub to Reed & Reed on Howland-Enfield bridge



‘Dig in for Health’ — Your Sargent corporation Wellness Program

Sargent Corporation’s Wellness Program

Our Wellness Health Educator, Derek Hurst, travels to job sites to meet with employees. If you haven’t met with Derek and would like to, contact him at [email protected] or call 207-817-7511, today!

A message from Herb Sargent In the spring of 2007, Sargent Corporation instituted a Wellness Program, which is intended to create positive change for both the company and its employees. Our top priority is to help employees live a full and healthy life.

Cases of diagnosed Lyme disease eclipsed 20,000 cases in 2002, and has stayed above that level ever since while peaking in 2009 at roughly 30,000 cases. 95% of cases in the U.S. are diagnosed in 14 states, with Maine, New Hamp-shire, and Virginia being three of those states. As mild winters become more prevalent, tick populations appear to be on the rise. As tick populations are increasing, the fear is that Lyme disease may start to increase. The following article discusses Lyme disease and provides tips to prevent tick exposure and what to do if you’ve been bit-ten by a tick. \

Lyme Disease Lyme disease is caused by the bacterium Borrelia burgdorferi and is transmitted to humans through the bite of infected blacklegged ticks. Lyme is diagnosed based on symptoms, physical findings (e.g., rash), and the possibility of exposure to infected ticks. Most cases of Lyme disease can be treated successfully with a few weeks of antibiotics.

Early Signs and Symptoms (3 to 30 days after tick bite)

• Fever, chills, headache, fatigue, muscle and joint aches, and swollen lymph nodes • Erythema migrans (EM) rash: —Occurs in approximately 70 to 80 percent of infected persons —Begins at the site of a tick bite after a delay of 3 to 30 days (average is about 7 days) —Expands gradually over a period of days reaching up to 12 inches or more (30 cm) across —May feel warm to the touch but is rarely itchy or painful —Sometimes clears as it enlarges, resulting in a target or “bull’s- eye” appearance —May appear on any area of the body

Later Signs and Symptoms (days to months after tick bite)

• Severe headaches and neck stiffness • Additional EM rashes on other areas of the body • Arthritis with severe joint pain and swelling, particularly the knees and other large joints. • Facial palsy (loss of muscle tone or droop on one or both sides of the face)

Summer Tips: Tick Prevention and Lyme Disease



‘Dig in for Health’ — Your Sargent corporation Wellness Program

• Intermittent pain in tendons, muscles, joints, and bones • Heart palpitations or an irregular heart beat (Lyme carditis) • Episodes of dizziness or shortness of breath • Inflammation of the brain and spinal cord • Nerve pain • Shooting pains, numbness, or tingling in the hands or feet • Problems with short-term memory Untreated Lyme disease can produce a wide range of symp-toms, depending on the stage of infection. These include fever, rash, facial paralysis, and arthritis. Seek medical attention if you observe any of these symptoms and have had a tick bite, live in an area known for Lyme disease, or have recently traveled to an area where Lyme disease occurs.

Preventing Tick Bites on People While it is a good idea to take preventive measures against ticks year-round, be extra vigilant in warmer months (April-September) when ticks are most active.

Avoid Direct Contact with Ticks • Avoid wooded and brushy areas with high grass and leaf litter. • Walk in the center of trails.

Repel Ticks on Skin and Clothing • Use repellent that contains 20 percent or more DEET, pi-caridin, or IR3535 on exposed skin for protection that lasts several hours. —Always follow product instructions. Parents should apply this product to their children, avoiding hands, eyes, and mouth. • Use products that contain permethrin on clothing. Treat clothing and gear, such as boots, pants, socks and tents with prod-ucts containing 0.5% permethrin. It remains protective through several washings. Pre-treated clothing is available and may be protective longer. • The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has an online tool to help you select the repellent that is best for you and your family.

Find and Remove Ticks from Your Body • Bathe or shower as soon as possible after coming indoors (preferably within 2 hours) to wash off and more easily find ticks that are crawling on you. • Conduct a full-body tick check using a hand-held or full-length mirror to view all parts of your body upon return from tick-infested areas. Parents should check their children for ticks under the arms, in and around the ears, inside the belly button, behind the knees, between the legs, around the waist, and especially in their hair. • Examine gear and pets. Ticks can ride into the home on clothing and pets, then attach to a person later, so carefully exam-ine pets, coats, and day packs. • Tumble dry clothes in a dryer on high heat for 10 minutes to kill ticks on dry clothing after you come indoors.

—If the clothes are damp, additional time may be needed. —If the clothes require washing first, hot water is recommended. Cold and medium temperature water will not kill ticks effectively. If the clothes cannot be washed in hot water, tumble dry on low heat for 90 minutes or high heat for 60 minutes. The clothes should be warm and completely dry. If you find a tick attached to your skin, there’s no need to panic. Several tick removal devices are available on the market, but a plain set of fine-tipped tweezers will remove a tick effectively.

How to remove a tick 1. Use fine-tipped tweezers to grasp the tick as close to the skin’s surface as possible. 2. Pull upward with steady, even pressure. Don’t twist or jerk the tick; this can cause the mouth-parts to break off and remain in the skin. If this happens, remove the mouth-parts with tweezers. If you are unable to remove the mouth easily with clean tweezers, leave it alone and let the skin heal. 3. After removing the tick, thoroughly clean the bite area and your hands with rubbing alcohol, an iodine scrub, or soap and water. 4. Dispose of a live tick by submersing it in alcohol, placing it in a sealed bag/container, wrapping it tightly in tape, or flushing it down the toilet. Never crush a tick with your fingers.

—Information gathered from Centers for Disease Control and Prevention website

(Photo by James Gathany, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.)



The Herbert E. Sargent Way

Old Town High School Most Promising Scholar Award

American Heart Association:Life is why

UMaine College of Engineering Herbert E. Sargent Scholarship

Stillwater Federated Church says thanks for plowing, sanding last winter

At the American Heart Association, we want people to experience more of life’s precious moments. It’s why we’ve made it our mission to build healthier lives, free of cardiovascular diseases and stroke. Why do we do what we do? Life is why. Your recent gift is making a critical dif-

On behalf of the College of Engineer-ing, I would like to thank Sargent Corpora-tion for its gift to the Herbert E. Sargent Scholarship Fund. Through your generos-ity and commitment to the College, we are able to continue to improve our programs and facilities for our growing student body. This growth is critical to meeting the demand for engineers in Maine and beyond. Thanks to the support from alumni and friends, last year’s gifts allowed us to purchase equipment for student projects, support undergraduate scholarships, hire new engineering faculty, and show off our college to prospective students.

We would like to thank you for your sponsorship of the Most Promising Scholar Award again this year. This award was presented to Adam Regan [on May 16] at our Spring Awards Ceremony. Adam is an individual who, through a combination of qualities, including attitude toward aca-demics, impresses the staff and administra-tion of Old Town High School Thank you again for your continued support of this worthwhile award. We appreciate all that you have done for the students of Old Town High School. — Scott Gordon Principal, Old Town High School

The University of Maine College of Engineering is well renowned and re-spected as a signature program, thanks to the continued support of our friends. Our students have the opportunity to work in world-class research facilities including the 100-ft long Alfond W2 Ocean Engineering Laboratory. The College has experienced remark-able growth--a nearly 70% increase in undergraduates since 2001. In Fall 2016, our incoming class had 405 first year students, an increase of 6% over the prior year. Additionally, 80% of UMaine engi-neering students participate in co-ops and internships. The demand for our graduates is demonstrated by nearly 99% of UMaine engineering students who are either em-ployed or in graduate school six months after graduation. The College continues the tradition of excellence through our graduates who will meet the challenges and develop the

solutions required to grow Maine’s and the nation’s economy. Thanks again for your generous support of the College of Engineering. — Dana N. Humphrey, Ph.D., P.E. Dean of Engineering



Thank you for supporting SkillsUSA students at UTC

Thank you for your participation in the 2017 Heroes Hope Healing McDonald’s Golf Classic, presented by Bangor Savings Bank. Donors like you make a difference in

2017 Heroes Hope Healing McDonald’s Golf Classic

New Hampshire Senate says thanks to Sargent Corp., others for help in renovating, reopening historic Nansen Ski Jump

We at United Technologies Center (UTC) would like to thank you for your generous financial support of our Skills USA students. You should take pride in knowing that you are helping shape the lives of these young people. Your contribution assisted UTC in hosting the 2017 state SkillsUSA competition and [assisted] our gold medal winners to attend the National SkillsUSA competition in Louisville, Kentucky, in June. As a SkillsUSA contributor, your name will displayed on a banner at UTC throughout the school year. Thank you again for helping us to achieve our goal. — Noelle O’Clair Marty Gray SkillsUSA Advisors, UTC

ference by helping more people to experi-ence those moments that bring special meaning to their lives. Your generosity allows the American Heart Association to fund cutting-edge scientific research, programs to improve the quality of care in hospitals, CPR training, advocacy for legislation to improve school lunches, and much more. None of the work we do would be possible without your vitally important support. Life is why. Thank you again. — Heather Kinder, American Heart Association

the lives of the patients and communities we serve. Your participation will help sup-port care for children in central, eastern, and northern Maine who are receiving treatment for cancer and blood disorders at the EMMC Raish Peavey Haskell Chil-

dren’s Cancer and Treatment Center. Thank you again for your thoughtful support. — Michael R. Crowley Chief Philanthropy Officer Eastern Maine Medical Center

The Herbert E. Sargent Way

Sargent Corporation ON TRACK Winter 2011-12


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Steve Roberge, ird party inspector on the Canton Wind Farm project (story on pp. 18-19) took this photo of 12 Saddleback Ridge wind towers from the Canton Wind Farm Tower 1 location on December 21, 2016. Sargent did the earthwork for the Saddleback Ridge Wind Farm in 2014.

Saddleback ridge wind towers as seen from canton Wind Farm Tower 1

volume 13, no. 1 summer 2017 - sargent corporation...volume 13, no. 1 summer 2017 cover photo:...

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