The Big Bar slide on the Fraser River last summer affected the spawning of millions of salmon and crews are scrambling now that they have a short time to work on assessing the problem.

Crews have a six to eight week window before water levels start to rise again so they have to work fast.

Federal Fisheries and Oceans Minister Bernadette Jordan was on NL Newsday and pointed to the sheer size of the slide. “The magnitude of this slide was phenomenal. Think about a building that’s 35 stories high and 18 stories wide and that’s what fell into the Fraser River.”

“So, this has been one of my top priorities since I’ve been appointed minister in November. It was actually the first thing that I heard about when I was appointed was we have to get in there and get this cleared.”

Jordan reiterated time is of the essence. “This is the window, we have about six to eight weeks to get in there and clear before that water levels rise so Kiewit is working on site now, they’ve got technical people there, they’ve come up with a three pronged approach to clear the water way.”

“They’re working very hard. We know this is a huge, huge project and it’s something that’s critically important to the First Nations communities there, so, that’s one of the reasons that it’s a number one priority for us but we’re also looking at long term in terms of what happens if it doesn’t work.”

Jordan says the end result doesn’t have to be perfect, “Like I said we don’t have to clear all the rock, we just need to clear enough to make sure the salmon can get through.”