So, You Think You Had a Tough Day?

Equipment is piled on the bank as the big vehicles go to work.^

This is the tred mark left on the bank of the river.^

Workers line up the frame in the middle of the river using this scope and one on the other bank.^

Workers drive the canal-diggers.^

The long brown strip in the foreground is a footer that has been laid for the bridge.^

If you were sitting in your office today, watching the snow fall outside and fretting about how hard it would be to get home this evening, you might want to pay close attention to the above photos. This is how the other half works.

This crew from Hammond-Mitchell, which is constructing a new low-water bridge in Wasena Park on the Roanoke River in Roanoke didn't get the day off. Didn't get to do some of the easy work. Didn't even get to stay on land. With the snow falling hard, the guys climbed aboard their canal diggers and went to it.

They were positioning the metal framework that is sticking up from the riverbed so it could be covered with heavy plastic, cutting off the water flow inside so they could place another footer for the bridge in the middle of the river. That meant driving the heavy equipment straight to the center, while the guys on short aligned the frame so it would line up with the other footers. Precise, tough, gritty work in the middle of a snowstorm.

And you thought you had it tough.